I had an itch to mod, my woodsplitter

[sicivicdude]

So there I was thinking to myself.... Self, how can a 30 ton north star woodsplitter with a 13 hp honda and 2 stage pump get ANY better. The the answer HIT ME, quad splitting!


What it started off as, a single wedge for two splits. I've just cleaned the paint from the side with the grinder:

What I'm going to be welding on there, it's a 3/8" thick box blade, blade cut into a relatively short chunk ~5" and V-ground at the end.

6011 root pass, sorta! Kinda ugly but I ran out of one rod halfway through and started at the other end with another one. 3/32" 6011 running at about 80 amps DCEP.

As the weld cools, it shrinks which pulls the steel "up" towards the weld area. That requires some minor "adjustment":

Cap pass with ER7018AC running on about 120amps:

Without flux removed:

With flux removed:

Left side done:

Right side welds:

 

[sicivicdude]

And, the finished product:

 

[blasterbuddy200]

nice one! have you tried er out yet?

 

[sicivicdude]

nice one! have you tried er out yet?

Not yet LOL. Heck, it's still cooling off right now!

 

[blasterdemon7]

Nice job on that. That will save you some time.

 

[blasterbuddy200]

Not yet LOL. Heck, it's still cooling off right now!

ah, how high did you weld them on? if your splittin some 8-12 inch logs it should work good but anything else shorter they might go right under them?

 

[yamaha28]

you are one creative man civic! We need a video demonstration of that bad boy!

 

[sicivicdude]

I welded them about 6" off the I-beam so just right for a 12" log (which is in the range I'm splitting most of the time) but if I have a slightly smaller log that still needs to be split 4 ways, I can just lift it up until it's centered and then begin the split so the splitter will just shoot it straight into the 4 splitting surfaces evenly.

 

[sicivicdude]

you are one creative man civic! We need a video demonstration of that bad boy!

I have a few more mods to make before I'm done with it.... video afterwards maybe!

 

[blasterbuddy200]

I have a few more mods to make before I'm done with it.... video afterwards maybe!

good man! we split alot of wood but never thaught of this.. my uncle had a chevy 350 small block wood splitter.. let me dig a pic of it, it blew my mind

 

[Prime]

That looks awesome! The final welds look good too.

 

[sicivicdude]

Let it cool off properly, do a little bit of filing to remove the splatter and then some cleaning up with a knotted wire wheel and throw a little black paint it. Might not even know they weren't there all along I:I

 

[Racer51]

Nice welds but it's been done... as a shoe over top of the existing wedge taking flat chunks and molding it into the angle of the wedge and just adding the left and right wings.kinda like below, still cool innovation
-||-
v

 

[sicivicdude]

Are you talking about something that slides around the splitting wedge that's already there? I would be afraid of adding anything to the depth of the splitting wedge, the ram is perfectly positioned so that the show won't ever touch the wedge. It lacks touching by a little less than an inch but anything you could slide in front of the wedge that would be strong enough to take the force of holding the side wedges might be too thick to maintain an interference free fit. Not something I'd like to get into...

 

[Racer51]

yea only the wedge is fixed with a cotter pin system on the end of the hydraulic rod like on a smaller 20 ton splitter. I do see your point but in ohio we dont deal with hard woods regulary. so it goes through pretty cleanly or if ther's a big chunk we just split it into a half piece and the half pieces into thirds. By picking up an end and it just peals/falls off half way through the piece. But If we get the ocassional hard wood it just studders a second or 2 but then just cleave's right through with out even trying. The 4 way is just if were getting lazy or if it's a real big piece of normal wood. What kind do you get hard normal or soft birch I find oak usally.

 

[sicivicdude]

Yeah, this one the shoe is attached to the hydraulic ram and the splitting wedge is welded to the frame.

For this setup, a solid welded quad splitting wedge should work better because each normal split will be into 4 pieces.

I normally deal with whatever sort of trees I can get my hands on. Generally hardwoods if I can help it because my sister and brother in law heat in a fireplace insert which means pine sap would create creosote and could burn down their house LOL.

 

[brandoz28]

This guy can't leave anything alone!!!!!


looks like it'll work great!

 

[sicivicdude]

I cannot leave ANYTHING alone....

 

[little3mil]

gotta love it !

 

[sicivicdude]

Well, I loaned the woodsplitter out to a buddy and he tried to split a large piece of elm...

The good news is, THE WELDS DIDN'T BREAK!