Firewood Processor (Pic Heavy)

[Timberline]

I thought some of you might be interested in seeing dh working on our wood supply and wood to sell. The machine is a Chomper, dh can cut and split about a cord an hour with very little effort. It goes faster with two people, but the machine has an automatic setting and dh can run it by himself, it cuts and splits while he winches up the next log. Very cool!

One log going through and the next one on the winch. The hydraulic gates can swing wide open, one or both, to guide the logs. These are some of the smaller logs in the stack, the machine can do a 12" diameter log.


The guillotine style cutting blade and the splitter. There are two of those white pins which are adjusted to the desired length of firewood. They stop the back and forth movement of the blade automatically. It feeds the log through while the operator is getting the next log ready. It can also be run manually, which dh prefers so he can make sure the log doesn't get jammed.


Coming through the splitter. From there the wood drops onto a conveyor.


The conveyor can be raised or lowered to drop the wood into a truck bed, trailer, or in this case onto a stack. The conveyor is run by hydraulics from the machine.


The controls.

[SirDude]

Thank you for sharing that, that's cool. To think of the hours of back-breaking work that would be needed to do that by hand is out this world. And yet it wasn't that long ago that we did that way.

Thank god for some machines!

[nehimama]

Thank you, Chalk Creek, for an interesting and informative presentation. Your photos are sharp, and your explanations are very clear - even a mechanically-challenged person like myself can easily understand the whole concept.

[MOgal]

Wow! I'd like to have him around here for a day if we could get the trees to a central location. We have so many dead and dying trees, mature trees that need to be cut to make way for younger trees that it's going to take a month of Sundays to get them processed. Way cool machinery.

[fordy]

...............I can visualize an owner and a helper cutting and splitting wood for four or five months during the summer and fall and making enough too kick back all winter . Every resident or vacationeer needs firewood , it's just a part of the culture . The Rockies will heal a persons Soul and Spirit faster than any Rx ever could . , fordy

[Timberline]

Thank you for the nice comments, everyone.

Originally Posted by fordy

...............I can visualize an owner and a helper cutting and splitting wood for four or five months during the summer and fall and making enough too kick back all winter . Every resident or vacationeer needs firewood , it's just a part of the culture . The Rockies will heal a persons Soul and Spirit faster than any Rx ever could . , fordy

Exactly, Fordy, exactly.

[rambler]

Neat machine. Cool pics & explination.

Here in the upper midwest, we have mostly hardwoods in my location, and a tree isn't ready for harvest until it is 2-3 feet in diameter. Try to split wood 7-8 inch thick pieces, 2 feet long.

Lot of those automated machines can't quite hack such big wood or big pieces or hard woods very well, unless you get into some really serious money.

Not that this unit was cheap I'm sure, that much hydraulics costs a lot of bucks!

Neat machine, haven't seen quite that type before.

--->Paul

[Timberline]

Originally Posted by rambler

Neat machine. Cool pics & explination.

Here in the upper midwest, we have mostly hardwoods in my location, and a tree isn't ready for harvest until it is 2-3 feet in diameter. Try to split wood 7-8 inch thick pieces, 2 feet long.

Neat machine, haven't seen quite that type before.

--->Paul

Here we have a lot of lodge pole and ponderosa, so this little machine works very well for us. We still block the big ends with a chainsaw and split with a splitter. This Chomper is about 10 years old, I don't think they even make this model anymore. Dh bought it used from someone who bought it used, so it wasn't too bad. Chomper makes some bigger models and yes, lots of money. Theyare made in Oregon.

[TSYORK]

I definitely need one of those contraptions! for sure!

[clovis]

That is pretty cool.

Tell me how the logs are cut to length...are they sheared, or sawed?

[Timberline]

It's sheared off by the arch shaped blade shown on the right side of the second pic.

[Murray in ME]

That's a pretty cool machine. I haven't seen a processor that works in quite that way.

[RonM]

Thanks for the"tour", interesting machine....

[timfromohio]

That machine makes me drool ....

I split Maple for two hours today by hand and didn't get a cord done, that's for sure. That machine is awesome!!!

[Shepherd]

Originally Posted by timfromohio

That machine makes me drool ....

I split Maple for two hours today by hand and didn't get a cord done, that's for sure. That machine is awesome!!!

For sure, that's one incredible machine. We got lucky and got our log splitter (hooks up to the 3 point on the tractor) real cheap at an auction - they sure do save a ton of time and effort. Thanks for sharing the pics, Chalk Creek.

[Wolf mom]

Sigh - oh that wood! Oak is going for an averaqge of $175 a cord. McMansion area pays higher.

Thanks for the pix. Never saw a machine like that before.