Physics-exploiting axe splits wood in record time

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bb07

Native
Feb 21, 2010
1,322
1
Rupert's Land
Now this is about the strangest looking thing I have ever seen. Although it appears to work well, being set in my ways I don't think I could ever use it.

The story here
 

Biker

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
That's a brilliant idea of using an old tyre to hold the wood in place. If nothing else I'm going to have to adopt that idea at least. The 3kg splitting maul I have does the job perfectly but I do like the principle behind this wedge action. Very clever! Thank you for sharing it.
 

dwardo

Bushcrafter through and through
Aug 30, 2006
6,455
477
46
Nr Chester
So I gather it kind of twists as it splits? If so I wonder how how your wrists would fare after a while with the torquing.
 

Joonsy

Native
Jul 24, 2008
1,483
3
UK
That's a brilliant idea of using an old tyre to hold the wood in place.

i can't help think that the log would 'need' to be secured for that tool to be work efficiently (perhaps that is why he is using that tyre, it may be neccessary), while the twisting action may work on wide logs smaller diameter logs would be more prone to toppling over instead of splitting if log was not secured.
 

Goatboy

Full Member
Jan 31, 2005
14,956
17
Scotland
Must admit trying not to be a naysayer but I'm with the others in that I thought that it looked like it put a heck of a strain on the wrist. Also thought that due to the blasé way he was throwing it about that the risk of it skating off and injuring someone seemed increased. Tyres are good to retain logs as long as you don't miss and it'll bounce an axe back at you. (But if you're OK with an axe that shouldn't happen.) Nice to see folks trying something different though.
 

Swallow

Native
May 27, 2011
1,545
4
London
Funny...... but it makes you chop just the way Ray says you should...... at 3.38 here

[video=youtube;X5W6r5U7yBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5W6r5U7yBE[/video]
 

dancan

Nomad
Sep 29, 2007
271
0
Nova Scotia Canada
The owner of them spendy axes was actively posting on another forum I'm on a while back , I called him out on the videos showing how good his axe was versus a regular splitting axe was , his slabs off the side of a round and the regular went for splitting down the middle , he had no comments when I asked him to show a comparison of both axes showing the same both techniques , when asked about what steel was used the answer was that what they used was a trade secret . Then he got argumentative with me and said I knew nothing about splitting firewood .

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IMG_20140316_134801.jpg


I guess I have no clue how these 20" long rounds of wood fell apart and got into the back of my van .
 

mrcharly

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Jan 25, 2011
3,257
44
North Yorkshire, UK
The main thing I have against it is lack of versatility. Try using it on some knotty wood where you need to cut through a knot halfway. Ah, it's unusable for that.

Try using on a long log - maybe you are splitting a pole for some use - we used to split6ft lengths of tree-trunk for fenceposts. Start split at top, work along, doesn't take long with a normal hardware axe.
 

nickliv

Settler
Oct 2, 2009
755
0
Aberdeenshire
I use a old tyre, it's a real boon not having to bend down to pick the bits up to load the wheelbarrows. You can stuff the tyre with wood and go berserk for a minute or two if you fancy a fortnight's kindling too.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
 

Everything Mac

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Nov 30, 2009
3,112
83
36
Scotland
It's all been covered. I really do like the tyre idea though. Similar to using an elastic cord.
If only I needed logs to be split on a regular basis. :(
 

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