Jack Hammer wood splitting?

[some zilch]

i tried to bust up a crane mat (a bunch of 12x12 inch hardwood beams laced together to give a crane a stable platform to put its tracks on) with a pretty large (10000 pounds or so) hydraulic hammer on an excavator. it broke it up, but more beat it to pieces, and mangeled everything to bits more than split anything.......

 

[bullseye13]

Take your chainsaw and cut a slit in the wood at the outer edge of the round, right in line with any natural crack in the round. Pound in a wedge on each side, should split it no problem. I do it frequently, i dont like noodling with the saw, kinda hard on it i think. I slit the edge and have it split faster with a wedge and sledge than with a chainsaw, even a big one. If you have a big digging bar, they are handy to pry open cracked pieces with a wedge stuck in them.

 

[Stealth]

I dont think it will work, even with a wedge welded on.
I dont think the stroke length from a jackhammer is sufficient for wood. The trick to breaking concrete is to almost vibrate through it with lots of relatively small repetitive impacts. Wood splits based on fewer, slower but more forceful/deeper impacts.
You dont really split concrete and you dont really break wood.

Just my thoughts anyways.


I hope you do try this out, b/c I like Mythbusters type entertainment, but whatever you do, plz where safety equipment. Would hate for you to have the jackhammer bounce back into your face or something and loose a tooth.

 

[double7]

jack hammer wood splitting

the wedge have to be a one piece steel no welding will hold the pneumatic hammering for long time tempered steel can not be weld very good dont ask how i know hi hi

 

[boltboss]

I dont think the stroke length from a jackhammer is sufficient for wood.

Stealth,

I think that you have a very good point and it has occurred to me too. I have never used a jack hammer but I imagine that the stroke length is set and there is no way to extend it. The fast short strokes might drive the bit deep into the wood without striking a splitting blow. It's a good chance that one might spend more time releasing the stuck bit than splitting wood.

JN

 

[BlueRidgeMark]

I need to fail miserably with the jack hammer so I can justify the log splitter to the wife, of course!

JN

Okay, I have to revise my opinion, and offer an apology.


I was thinking this guy is an idiot, but I was very, very wrong!


He's a genius! And he's one of US! :hmm3grin2orange:



Seriously, though, boltboss, I, too, predict it won't work, but I'll be glad to watch the video.

But remember, we won't be laughing WITH you! We'll be laughing AT you!


And we just might petition the moderators to change your username to "jackhammer".



Noodle them, or get a few wedges. Cut a kerf about 3" into the face of the round, and get to work with a maul.




(Oh, and I wasn't really thinking you are an idiot. )

 

[boltboss]

He's a genius! And he's one of US!

Mark,

Thank you for the upgrade. With rain predicted today and with a long list of hiney-do's (oooops - I meant to type honey-do's but I guess you need to do one to get the other :hmm3grin2orange I won't be renting and playing with a jackhammer this weekend. Which is not to say I have retained my sanity so stay tuned!

JN

 

[MarkD1]

I'd rather swing an ax than run a jackhammer any day! If your willing to spend the money to have a large triangular shaped wedge made, it might work. Good luck

 

[Stealth]

Lead-in on the video should not be "Now watch this."

Too DarwinList-esque.

I dont know why, but this reminds me of when George W. Bush was on a golf course and said "Now watch this drive!" lol.

 

[stock50s]

The only way I could comprehend a jackhammer working well for this is if there was a specialty bit for the application. The way I see it, as soon as the bit gets stuck in the wood, the round and bit would remain stationary while the hammer jumps violently up and down.:bang: Now if there was a bit that had a captured wedge on the end it may make for a viable splitter. The bit could would consist of the wedge and a shaft. The shaft would be able to slide up and down within the wedge, allowing the impact of the bit even when the wedge is stuck. How practical this may be, would depend a lot on the user and their self respect for their body.:hmm3grin2orange: Personally, the noise and bone jarring nature of a jackhammer is an extreme solution to a mild problem.

 

[deutzman]

When I watched that video it brought back memories. I grew up and still live on what use to be a flu cured tobacco farm. In the 50's we used wood to cure tobacco. Fire boxes were made of concrete sides,bottom and metal tops with flu pipes in the end inside the barn that came out after being run along the floor of the barn. The firebox (2 per barn) were open on the end where the wood was fed in. The wood was up to 10' long. My folks spent fall and early winter cutting down trees, cutting to length for the firebox for the barn and splitting the trees. Once split it was loaded on a wagon and brought to each barn and placed in a wood shock which is wood standing up in a circle. Some shocks would be 40' across or maybe more. That's where it dried for the next crop. They used wedges to split that long wood. Once they drove the wedges in and it didn't open so they could finish splitting it with an axe, they used a powder wedge. Here's a link with a powder wedge:http://www.ytmag.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=ttalk&th=451406

They would buy kegs of black powder to use in the powder wedges. I was to young to be allowed in the area where the powder wedges were used. But I remember seeing one driven in the wood and can remember standing in the front yard and hearing them go off. I also remember seeing a big cloud of smoke go up above the tree tops once when a piece of hot fuse came down in a keg of powder and burned what was left in the keg.

When tobacco barns were fired with wood someone and most of the time 2 would sleep at the barn to keep the heat regulated in those barns. When they got up in the night they would walk from barn to barn with a lantern to put more wood in and check the temp to keep it right for each stage of curing.

I wish I had those old powder wedges today but I'm sure they were sold for scrap iron once they switched over to kerosene and then later to LP gas. I do have pieces of the fires boxes that I used in a spillway of a pond to keep the dirt from washing out. Folks did a lot of hard work back then. I do have a oil bill from 1956 when Dad switched over the first wood fired barn over to kerosene. Kerosene was 6 cent a gallon then.

 

[olyman]

interesting idea, but, you'd have to put a splitting wedge on the end. the narrow chisle of a jack hammer would most likely just sink into the wood.

beat me to it--agreed!!!

 

[airwolf]

The only way I could comprehend a jackhammer working well for this is if there was a specialty bit for the application. The way I see it, as soon as the bit gets stuck in the wood, the round and bit would remain stationary while the hammer jumps violently up and down.:bang: Now if there was a bit that had a captured wedge on the end it may make for a viable splitter. The bit could would consist of the wedge and a shaft. The shaft would be able to slide up and down within the wedge, allowing the impact of the bit even when the wedge is stuck. How practical this may be, would depend a lot on the user and their self respect for their body.:hmm3grin2orange: Personally, the noise and bone jarring nature of a jackhammer is an extreme solution to a mild problem.

Don't jackhammers already work this way? Even my elcheapo electric rotary hammer has a separate striker that continues to strike the shaft of the bit, even if the bit becomes stuck. The bit is free to move up and down, but the bit doesn't have to retract between each blow of the striker.

 

[cat10ken]

Doesn't the famous Super Splitter work on the same principal as a jackhammer; with the flywheel continuously hitting the wedge?

 

[ziggo_2]

Not mine, seen on youtube........push mute right away....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUeFCFHBd_w


Similar to a jack hammer. works good for small logs.

 

[Haywire Haywood]

Doesn't the famous Super Splitter work on the same principal as a jackhammer; with the flywheel continuously hitting the wedge?

Nope, it uses the flywheel to push the log through a knife in one long stroke, not multiple hits.

Ian

 

[ray benson]

Maul, sledgehammers, various sizes of wedges and noodling.

 

[Benchmark]

noodling

I have operated an air hammer, as well. It might work, but I wonder if the impact of the chisel end of the hammer would be absorbed by the wood, being a lower density than concrete. If you do quarter the wood with a chainsaw, (which is what I do to the larger havier pieces prior to splitting) you can get a chain for the saw made for cutting in that direction-a ripping chain.

 

[BlueRidgeMark]

Not mine, seen on youtube........push mute right away....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUeFCFHBd_w


Similar to a jack hammer. works good for small logs.

Those aren't small logs. That's kindling wood.

 

[komatsuvarna]

I dont think itll work either. Im just basing my opinion on years of excavator with a hammer and track drilling & blasting operations. I took an excavator and tried to bust a few stumps up that were still in the ground. They were sugar maple and about 18 inches in diamater. It didnt work to good. Like STL said, it just vibrates the heck out of everthing. The wood is too soft and absorbs too much.

Also, I know were not drilling on here, but A ingersoll ECM 590 trackdrill will drill about 19 foot a minute in good solid hard rock. If you drill next to a stump or tree and get on a root, itll take you about 2 minutes to get through a 4 inch root... or so.... but again I know were not drilling the wood. I know when blasting rock that the soft rock is harder to bust. Sounds right backwards, but its not. Take a real hard limestone shot and it bust just like glass with a small amount of powder. Soft sandy rock, you gotta load the heck out of it to get it to bust.

Just my opinion for what little its worth, lay the rounds on there side and noodle them up. White oak is pretty straight grained and shouldnt be to hard to split once you get it started.