The BEST brand of Log Splitter!

Written by Paul Thompson, Winterpark, CO.

Cage represents one cord of wood

We live in the mountains of Colorado and have a heating season of about 6-7 months a year.  We use wood stoves and a wood burning fireplace as our primary sources of heat with a gas furnace as backup.  I have been purchasing five cords of split wood every year, but since my property is full of trees, many of them dead, it made sense to my wife that I could save all kinds of money and split the wood myself.  I actually liked the idea of splitting our wood because it would give me a lot of great ammunition when my wife would ask me to do something. I could always respond “Hey I cut and split all the firewood.”    

First things first. What do you need to split our own firewood?  Well, of course, you’re going to need a source of firewood.  Many firewood suppliers will also sell you logs cut to a manageable length that you can split yourself.  They will no doubt deliver them, but you can probably save money if you pick them up yourself.  In rural areas, farmers will often allow you to cut dead wood off their property, but of course you would have to get permission.  If you live near land managed b the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), you can usually get a permit to cut wood from the BLM, but make sure you follow the rules.

Chain Saw

  

So, the next thing you will need is a chain saw.  I have a good chain saw and a pickup (you have to have a way to get the firewood to your house) so I was left with trying to find the best and most economical way of splitting firewood.

I like to burn logs that have been split to 6” X 15” in size.  They’re easy to stack and easy to handle.  Of course, the ideal log to start with would be 12” wide, but logs come in many different sizes so you will need tools that can produce the desired end product from various sizes of logs.

The first thing I thought of was a maul.  It would be the cheapest approach (a good axe or maul costs between $25 and $80).  A maul is better than an axe because an axe will get wedged in the log.  A maul can be used to reduce many different sized logs to the desired 6” x 15” size.  If I started with a 12” log, I figured I could split 20-30 logs per hour. That’s 80 to 120 quarters 15” long.  We burn about 14, 15”  logs per day, so I could split a week’s worth of wood in about 4 to 6 hours and a winter’s worth of wood in about 140 hour of hand splitting.  That’s 3 ½, 40 hour weeks. Whew!

Maul

Using a maul is easy and it burns a lot of energy, but I keep getting this image of the maul ricocheting off the log and hitting my leg.  There I would be, out in the middle of the back 40 in freezing weather and not being able to move.  In the end of my vision I get eaten by a bear.  That image, along with the month’s worth of chopping, encouraged me to give up on the maul idea, even though it would be the cheapest and it would give me the most ammunition when my wife asked me to clean the garage.

The second least expensive alternative is a power assisted hand splitter.  This machine can be purchased for about $180 - $240 will split an 8” log.   You can split about 18 – 24 logs per hour, so it’s actually slower than using the maul. However, the one I tested worked OK.  To split the log, you pump a lever and the machine uses hydraulics to split the log.  It worked fine.  It just took a long time. Since this machine is hand operated and has no engine, you can use it anywhere including your garage or basement.

Unfortunately there are more negatives than positives with this machine.  First, it’s slow, very slow.  Second, the machine I tested operates only in the horizontal position, as a result, you to kneel to use it.  That’s OK if you are only going to split logs for an hour or so, but, if you’re going to be doing it hour after hour, you’ll want to sit down, and that’ll require a splitter that operates in the vertical position.  The hand splitter limits the size of log you can split. The final problem I encountered was that the thing didn’t always split the log in half.  So I would have to turn the log around and split it from the other end.

I really couldn’t see myself using this machine to split all the wood I needed for a year.
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The next machine I tested was an electric splitter.  It operated basically the same way as the hand hydraulic splitter, but it was powered by an electric motor.  

Electric Hydraulic Splitter

The electric splitter I tested cost about $1,300, but smaller versions are available for anywhere between $250 to $500.  I chose the more expensive splitter because it split in the horizontal and the vertical position.  The splitter was easy to set up and all I had to do was plug it in.  It split a 24 x 18” log with ease and if I was splitting wood in my back yard it may have been just what I was looking for.  My source of wood is in the woods in the back of my house and unless I buy a generator or about 2,500 feet of extension cord, it wouldn’t work for me.  The splitter was not road tow-able although I could tow it with my ATV.

My search finally brought me to a hydraulic splitter powered be a gas engine.  I could tell right off that this was where I was supposed to be. These machines are expensive, ranging in price from $800 to $3,000 for a professional model. How can you justify spending so much on a log splitter?  Well, I pay $150 per cord and I burn 5 cords per year.  So I figured a two or three year payback would be a good investment.

Many gas operated splitters operate in the vertical as well as the horizontal position and are road tow-able.  This feature is important to me because I split some very large logs that I can’t lift to place them in the splitter when it’s in the horizontal position, but I can easily maneuver them into position when the splitter is in the vertical position.  The splitter I looked at was road tow0able and could also be towed with an ATV.

When splitter shopping you'll notice that manufacturers tout the machine's splitting force in tons. The model I looked at had a splitting force of 20 tons.  Splitting force is important, but cycle time is also very important.  Too fast and it can be a safety risk for an amateur like me.  Too slow and you will waste a lot of time.  I think something in the 8 to10 second range is the best.  That would allow me to split the log, clear the halves and then reset for the next split.

The next thing on my list was durability.  In a gas powered splitter there are three things that go into evaluating durability; the engine, the hydraulic cylinder and the frame.  Of these three, the engine is the most likely to give you problems.  I’m not an expert on small engines, so I looked for a splitter that was powered by an engine with which I had some familiarity.  I’ve used Honda, Suburu and Robin powered machines for many years and all have performed well. Since Robin engines are less expensive, I looked for a splitter powered by a Robin engine.  After hours of research online, which I recommend that you do, I found the splitter I wanted far less on BuyAceHardware than other sites.  I was able to buy an upgraded engine for the cost of what I was planning on spending for the cheaper one.

I purchased the Iron and Oak 20 Ton Fast Cycle log splitter with a Honda engine.  This splitter is built with a rugged frame, it operates in the horizontal and vertical position and it’s road tow-able.  This splitter has plenty of power with an 8 second cycle time. 

Iron and Oak 20 Ton Log Splitter

Since I live in a smaller mountain town, I decided to purchase the Iron and Oak Fast Cycle on the web.  I had two concerns about buying a log splitter online.  The first was freight.  What would it cost to get the thing to my house and how would I unload it.  Well the people I purchased it from (www.buyacehardware.com) shipped it to me freight free, plus they were, by far, the least expensive on the web.  They asked me if I had a way to unload it, I said no and for a small extra fee, they made arrangements for the splitter to be shipped to me on a truck equipped with a lift gate.  The second concern I had was assembly.  Let me tell you, the Iron and Oak was easier to assemble than most toys my grand kids get for Christmas.  This thing even comes with a quart of oil, so all you have to do is put some regular gas in it and start it up.

The Iron and Oak 20 ton is easy to handle.  One person can hook it up to a bumper hitch and it tows real easy.  It was, and continues to be an easy starter and while my wife has never split wood, I think she could start and use this thing (with some coaching of course).  So, if you’re looking for a great log splitter, look no further than the Iron and Oak. The best purchase I could have made.