Adaptive Curmudgeon

I haven’t had time to write up the end result. So here’s a few more photos of a broken woodsplitter. As a general rule anything that can be done, someone has done it and posted it on the internet. That’s one of the best parts of the internet… seeking someone who has done it before so you don’t have to “reinvent the wheel” (no pun intended). I found a thousand ideas about woodsplitters but only one person who upgraded a splitter of my make and model with larger tires in the manner I wanted. I forgot the link but I found it buried in an old thread about logging or sawmills or something. That guy had upgraded just like I wanted and it looked slick. (If I’d kept the link I’d have sent him a thank you note!)

So it had been done once and looked good. I dispensed with many “outside the box” ideas and settled on installing a torsion axle suspension directly on the hydraulic fluid reservoir.

• I’d go with five bolt hubs because four bolt hubs are annoying.
• I’d go with larger tires so I could roll down the road at 65MPH but I wouldn’t go too large. This was the $10,000 question. How large is too large? For towing there’s no such thing as too large (and full size car tires could be acquired for a song) but towing is only half of the equation. I didn’t want to lift the work area much above OEM height. Even a few inches of lift on the splitter beam might mean a thousandfold increase in sore backs! This means cool ideas like salvaging car tires from a junkyard were out of the picture. Also I’m vain and wanted it to look “almost OEM” and not “minivan axle welded to it”.
• I was worried about the topheavy thing for taking a hard turn while towing. I had my concerns about trailer tires which are inherently narrow. Tall and narrow means a higher rollover risk. The logical thing to do is put on an axle that’s a bit wider. Wide means more stable ride. But just like I didn’t want to lift the splitter beam I didn’t want to be leaning waaaayyyy over a wide axle. I figured a big lean of an axle that juts out is just another way to wear out your back. Also how many times can you step past an axle/tire that’s jutting out before you smash your ankle into it?

The moral of the story is that every change, no matter how crude and simple the machine might be, is a compromise between competing goals. Towing wanted big, tall, wide tires on a wide suspended axle. Working wanted small, short, narrow tires, on a narrow section of the machine with welded spindles.

Luckily I had time on my side. It’s better to spend 10 hours thinking and save 100 hours in the worksite than the other way around so I pondered for a few months. Also I couldn’t find a locally available torsion axle (I was looking for new parts and not salvaged). When the zombie apocalypse happens… we’re going to run out of torsion axle parts within hours! Has nobody thought of this?

One idea I had, that seemed clever, was to get snowmobile trailer tires. Those are super wide and short, the Fat Albert of trailer tires. I figured the extra width would make the towed object more stable against rollover but the super short tires would keep the splitter’s beam low to the ground. I thought this was the coolest idea ever, but in the end I didn’t do it. Once the welding was done it just didn’t seem necessary (and I didn’t feel like saddling myself with another tire of unusual dimensions).

Usually I write silly stories and jokes. Lets face it, if you can’t make a joke about spindle diameter you don’t belong in a garage. That said I’m just going to provide a few facts. These are crude generalizations and I may have the nomenclature a bit off. All I can say is that all fabrication starts with understanding the underlying situation and once I was stuck with a one wheeled wood splitter I had to brush up on a few details. If you already know this stuff, you may ignore this post.

First of all little tires suck because they have small circumference. They’ve got to spin faster to go the same speed. This annoys the Gods of friction, makes bearings hot, and is generally un-good. The solution is big tires.

On the other hand every increase in tire radius means I’ve got to lift a cookie higher. Every inch I lift is a chance to buy my chiropractor a new boat. Also the splitter is narrow. Tall things that are narrow tend to fall over. If sparks from a rim are a “bad day”, an inverted splitter sliding down the highway is “nuked from space”.

So bigger tires are both good and bad. Life is like that.

Bigger spindles can accept bigger hubs. Bigger hubs have studs for lug nuts. At this size they come in either 4 or 5 bolt patterns. Four bolts wheels hold tires that range from small to a bit bigger. Five bolt wheels cover the full range of the 4 bolt pattern but also goes all the way to full sized vehicles. I never figured out what the point of a 4 bolt hub was if a 5 bolt does the same thing and also opens a larger range of options. Nobody else knew either.

The spindles are welded on to the frame. The frame is actually the hydraulic fluid reservoir. This also serves as an axle. So what you’ve got is a beefy metal box that is frame, reservoir, and axle. Cutting off the spindles and welding on new ones requires equipment I don’t have.

Little tires come in “high speed” and “not high speed”. Think of it as “boat trailer at 55 MPH on pavement” versus “lawn tractor at 5 MPH on grass”. Obviously the OEM wood splitter tires were “not high speed” and I had deserved what I got after several years of gingerly limping around at 45 MPH. I had no intention of messing with anything like that again.

Spindles welded to a solid frame/axle/reservior have no suspension. No suspension means no give (except the tires themselves). There’s a reason why everything has a suspension. Even if I welded on monster spindles and ginormous tires I’d have no suspension.

Trailer suspensions come in two flavors; leaf spring and torsion axle. Both are suitable. I found a thousand parts for leaf springs in every hardware store. They’re common on utility trailers, ice shacks, boat trailers, you name it. They’re cheap. Torsion axles are almost impossible to find and much more “fiddly”.

A leaf spring requires a few feet between  a front mount point and a rear mount point. Not possible on a five inch (about) wide fluid reservoir. If I wanted leaf springs I’d almost end up making a whole mini trailer frame. This isn’t without it’s own possible neato magic… but I like the “smallness” of the splitter for slipping around the forest behind an ATV. Mounting  on a 5′ wide trailer would be kinda cool because I could stack the wood on the same place as the splitter… but I’d have to lean waaaaay over on every cookie I lifted. Ergonomics is very important to me. I ruled it out and started wandering the earth looking for a torsion axle… which wasn’t working out so well.

Bored yet? Not all sagas are about dragons you know.

The following Monday I showed up at the tire store, checkbook in hand. “OK, what’s the damage boss?”

“Can’t fix it.”

“Umm… why?”

“Don’t have the part.”

“So? Order it?”

The guy looked as if I’d just mentioned a totally ‘outside the box’ idea. Then smiled…. brilliant! Ten minutes later he returned with a grim look on his face. “I’ve got the part numbers, you aren’t going to like it.”

I clutched the printout. The price was… well all I can say is TroyBilt can kiss my ass.

“This seems high.”

“No shit, those guys are pretty ruthless.”

“How about some other brand? Like maybe any other brand. It’s just a tire.”

The disappeared and came back quite some time later. “Gee, that thing is a bitch to source.” He showed me some pricing options. He wasn’t happy with them. I could tell he’d tried but some stuff just cost more than it ‘ought.

It turns out that the specific spindle size leads to a specific hub size and this spindle was the precise size to be ‘neither fish nor fowl’. The Troy-Bilt price was obscene. The alternatives were merely gross.

“All right, you tried. Thanks.” I nodded.

And with that we tossed the splitter on my waiting trailer. I handed him a ten, which he pocketed with both eagerness and guilt; like I’d handed him six joints, a smoking gun, and a krugerrand. I rolled out.

The place I bought the splitter is not my favorite place. When I got it I made the conscious decision that buying locally would give me a connection to future service people. Like maybe if I was too lazy to do an oil change or something. Later I decided I’d rather talk to a fencepost.

However they were the nearest official Troy-Bilt dealer. Oddly the parts price was a bit higher and… and the labor to install it was astronomical. “Two hours to mount a tire?” I glowered.

“Well, uh…”

“Do people pay that?”

“Sometimes.” He responded meekly.

Even so I was desperate. I like my equipment to be in top notch shape. Maybe I’d bite the bullet.

“So, you’ve got it in stock?”

“No.”

“So, when can it be done?”

He glanced at a calendar and named a date six weeks in the future. I smiled, thanked him, and left with the splitter still perched on my trailer.

At home I engaged on an epic internet search and found a zillion potential options, of which, very few would fit the spindle. None were particularly inexpensive. I had to face facts, this was going to cost something on the order of a couple hundred dollars. Shit!

(I know what you’re thinking. You saw shitty little tires and wheels like that at Northern Tool for a pittance so you figure I ‘ought to be able to solve the issue for $50 and an afternoon tinkering. I thought that too. But it just didn’t work out. The limiting factor seemed to be an odd spindle diameter. There were options but none were great.)

After a few days of moping I’d made my decision. Time for a Curmudgeonly Gem of Insight:

“When it’s already broken and the OEM fix isn’t cheap or easy… bold solutions are more likely to be wise. So quit pussyfooting around and do it.”

Never give up.

A.C.

P.S. I should point out that I’m cheap. I’m sure 50% of the population would have cut the check to Troy-Bilt and pretended like it really takes two hours to mount a mini-tire and been done with it. Being cheap in 2015 is simply odd or at the very least non-conformist. Also I don’t fault Troy-Bilt for raking in some cash from the small base of people who already own and like their device and also beat the hell out of it. All’s fair in economics.

Some photos. I accept in advance the irony of being a man who makes fun of people putting their lunch on social media yet posts photos of firewood and flat tires.

A modest trailer load of small “cookies”. Taking the cookie to the splitter will never wear out your splitter tires. Also, loading a small trailer means you don’t have to lift the weight so high.

A modest truckload of medium cookies. No biggie but after a couple truckloads I start needing Ibuprofen. (Nothing says “classy” like a bag of chicken feed tossed on top of firewood.) I often carry have a truck and trailer of firewood at the same time. I’m mystified why I have photos of little wood on the short trailer and heavier wood on the tall truck; hopefully they were taken on different days.

Little tires (no lug nuts!) are the work of Satan. In this example the tire has “popped a bead in low temperatures”. This only seems to happen when the tire is parked many days in a row at temperatures around -25 or so. (If you plan properly you’ll never be splitting wood in -25 weather anyway.) This photo is unrelated to the patch job I did before “the event”.

It seems to me that most people blog about their successes. I try to balance the universe by posting my dumbshit moments.

I don’t have many photos because snapping images of the splitter I’d trashed felt wrong; like taking selfies at a funeral.

In case you didn’t recognize it, the shredded object on the left is the tire. The wheel isn’t in the photo but the rim was partially flattened. The flexible plastic (?) fender didn’t break… it melted.

It was not one of my prouder moments. Sometimes a good machine gets hammered by a dipshit user. What can I say, we’ve all been there.

At Ed’s Tire Store I was that guy. Just 15 minutes before closing I burst in the door raving about tires and clutching the mangled wheel.

A six man staff was standing around doing nothing. They saw me and an invisible pecking order was deployed. Three guys vanished. They were the top of the ladder and had things to do… such as avoiding work. The fourth guy on the totem pole examined the wheel and declared the rim “unusable”. The fifth shuffled around and found a tire that would fit the rim which had just been declared unusable. The two agreed the tire couldn’t be mounted on the flattened rim and they had no other rims that size. No alternative rims would match the spindle diameter. No suitable wheel tire sets existed. They didn’t have any hub that could be installed on the spindle to change tire size. Having concluded the situation was hopeless they looked at me expectantly. Perhaps I’d kindly go off on an ice flow and die?

There was a standoff. I heard the clock tick. I waited.

Finally last and lowest guy on the totem pole broke. He looked about nineteen years old and had that long suffering look of a nineteen year old doing a good job despite being surrounded by idiots twice his age. He offered to take the company’s truck and trailer to fetch my splitter.

The two peons objected because… well because they were lazy dickheads. The nineteen year old froze, keys in hand. The poor kid was stuck between his desire to do a good job and outranking employees who are paycheck cashing leeches. I’ll never get used to 2015. Using the tire company truck to drum up business for the tire company with a guy who needs a tire shouldn’t be controversial. Ideally they’d bill me a few bucks and make me smile while doing it and then lock in my business on the repair end. Say it with me people; capitalism is not rocket science.

Time to give some instructions in customer service. I got in close and personal with the two who’d made the objection and spoke in hushed impolite tones. After a few declarative sentences I’d made my point rather forcefully. I’m not going to say what words were used but Officer Friendly, sitting in his warm cruiser a few miles away, probably sensed a disturbance in the force. The two bits of dead weight turned three shades of pale. They’d gained a new understanding of what a bearded woodcutter might do when his equipment was in jeopardy and just how willing he was to do it right here, right now.

One of the two losers nodded at the kid, who bolted for the door, and then they vanished. The kid had a huge smile. He’d enjoyed the show. I helped him hitch the company trailer to their truck (not mine… do that and a lawyer would explode) and he followed me down the road. It was 5 minutes to closing time at Ed’s and everyone’s car was already warming up in the parking lot. Real crack team of hard workers at Ed’s.

On the road we found Mrs. Curmudgeon parked a quarter mile from the the police officer. My splitter squatted between them like a mechanical no-man’s land. Neither had greeted the other. I’d told the officer a small hatchback might show up. They’d both decided to stay in their warm cars. Braving the cold was for lunatics with flat tires.

I was embarrassed at all the hubub. The whole road was lit up. Four vehicles and a trailer, all with headlights and flashers. Of course the police cruiser was lit up like a disco ball. All this to rescue a 600 pound wood splitter? We we’re probably on somebody’s Facebook page.

The kid backed up the trailer with the experienced hand of a country boy. Excellent! The police officer got out and shivered in the cold. (Police uniforms are designed by desk jockeys.) Three of us together slipped the splitter onto the trailer in one quick motion. I was thankful for the help. I’ve tried to lift it myself and it’ll kill one man alone. I noticed the teen and the police officer had the same traits; polite, business like, restrained, helpful. Society isn’t over yet.

I said thanks to the police officer about ten times. Mrs. Curmudgeon, who’d never left her car, lit out for home, followed by the police officer, my hulking truckload of wood, and finally the tire store truck & trailer. Big night for a rural highway.

Soon my woodsplitter was locked in Ed’s service lot with a repair tag. It was ten minutes after closing and the place was deserted. I stuffed a $20 the teenager’s hand and said thanks. He looked worried. “How am I going to write that up on the repair tag?” He mumbled.

“Don’t. Buy a pizza and never mention it to the jackwagons who didn’t help you.” He beamed and cleared out. It was over. I felt the weight of a really rough week seeping into my bones. I stood there a bit trying to let stress fade. My splitter was safely behind chain link. Tomorrow would be another day.

Having bought time, I decided to use money and awesome to fix everything the right way.

Many (most) cops mean well. I get that. I do. Really. It’s just that you don’t know which one you’ll draw. Your specific exposure to the random pool of police officers is a crap shoot.

I’ve watched attitudes progress from “serve and protect” to military gear and bad attitudes that kill, injure, and hassle law abiding people, trash people’s houses, and burn babies in their crib. You’d have to be a world class moron to expect badges to come with a halo. Cops are just people. Some are wonderful, all have flaws, a scant few are thugs.

Maybe things were better in the past? I don’t know. That’s irrelevant. If Andy Griffith has become RoboCop (or Tony Soprano) I accept that as simply the world as it is. Again, before everyone gets all atwitter and submits comments ranting about revolution, I’m not about that. I’m not saying all police are swine. I’m not an oppressed peasant facing Stalin. I was just meeting a cog in a system and systems do what they will. Logic, kindness, and justice come from people but not from systems.

The most likely “bad scenario” would be a traffic infraction or fine; even if the justification would be shaky. That would piss me off but I’ve got a checkbook and would readily make a hobby out of fighting city hall. Bring it. (The moral hazard of police financing through fines is something I saw young and long before cops owned tanks.)

What else might happen? Well… anything could happen. I’m as law abiding as a Boy Scout, it’s legal to tow a woodsplitter, and there’s no law against flat tires. So maybe he’d be real nice and show me pictures of his grandkids. Then again I look like a serial killer, wouldn’t cower before Voldemort himself, and it was a dark lonely road.

The middle option? I might have to listen to a mind numbing lecture about public safety. Ugh! I’d almost rather get shot.

The least desirable outcome was the very extremely unlikely (but not impossible) draw of the “thug lottery”. A serving of “respect my authoritah” is something I don’t fear but it wouldn’t be fun. Of course that outcome is out of my hands so I’ve long ago made peace with it. There’s a non-zero chance I might be tazed, shot, and tossed in the hoosegow over something that’s not a crime. That’s simply true. (I said “made peace with”, not “looking forward to”.) Your mileage may vary but I’m perfectly prepared to say take a hit if one comes and never raise a hand back or flee. I’ll smile as long as it takes to spit teeth on the ground and lawyer up the next day. All that really matters to me is that I won’t babble something like “don’t taze me bro” because that’s whiny bullshit. (To a thug, that’s a good enough reason to taze me. Ironic no?)

Yes, I’m cynical and paranoid. Then again it’s true that your cell phone is tapped, your car can commit a crime while you’re not in it, and the cop had already run my plates before he decided to blind me with his flashlight and approach so I couldn’t see him.

I pressed my truck’s key fob (locking the doors) and waited. If you want access to my truck you can break a window like a thug or get a warrant like a law enforcement officer. Of course the only thing my truck holds is maps, tools, and insurance papers so carefully organized that the Gestapo couldn’t find fault with them; but it’s the principle of the thing. I was not carrying at the moment and I set down the breaker bar that was in my hand.

I tried to smile. I’m not sure if my smile is appealing or reminds people of the Joker. At least I tried.

Would today be the day?

“Dude, that sucks!” The officer exclaimed.

He aimed his flashlight at the woodsplitter, spoke like a real human being, and examined the melted fender like someone who cared.

I breathed a sign of relief. Today was not the day. (Maybe the day will never come?) Great news!

In one second he’d gone from “cop” to “officer”. There’s a lesson in that and every officer in every force should learn it.

…

“It’s been that kind of week.” I agreed (as I relaxed).

“I’ve got a can of fix a flat?” He offered. Then he saw the tire which was literally split in half and shook his head sadly. A magic wand wouldn’t fix that tire. “You’re going to Ed’s?” (Ed’s is the only tire store in town.)

“I’d love to but I don’t want to leave my splitter where it can be stolen.”

“I can wait here.”

I felt a ray of hope. “Really? That’s about the nicest thing…” I was blown away. A simple, helpful, logical solution, born of an honest desire to help.

“If there’s another call I’ll have to go.”

“Fair ’nuff.” I agreed. “Thanks officer.” I shook his hand and got moving.

That’s how you do it! Every time a bit of bitter cynicism gets chipped away by a good police officer doing well, the ghost of Sir Robert Peel gets a free beer in heaven.

I cruised back roads at 45 MPH towing the little splitter behind my truck. It was comically out of scale. On the way I rolled up to a gas station with my huge thirsty diesel, put less than two bucks of non-oxygenated unleaded into the splitter’s tank and drove off. Ha!

At the Foxinator’s house I did a headcount. No family members had gone AWOL. Whew! The kids were consuming cable TV like addicts. Ignoring them, I headed to the woods, fired up the saw, felled a tree, bucked it up, split it, and stacked stovebolts in my truck like Tetris was a religion. Work was getting done! The cure for a bad week. I grinned like an idiot. The kids grumped some but helped when prodded. A loose turkey made an attack run at the roaring woodsplitter engine and crapped on my gas can. Turkeys have interesting personalities.

Just before sunset I rolled out for home with a full load of split wood. My trusty saw was perched on the carefully packed load. My good pal the splitter was still hitched and rolling behind the truck. It had been a good day. The stress of air travel had faded. I was a happy man.

I also picked up the kids but who cares about that?

Halfway home I got a call from Mrs. Curmudgeon. She was 100 miles out and closing. We’d all be home soon. The dog would be glad to see the family back together. (The dog doesn’t like it when some of her “flock” are missing.)

BAM!

Something was amiss! I saw sparks in side mirror. Sparks?!? I pulled over immediately.

The splitter’s tire had blown. Not “got a flat” but “kersplode”. I’d brought the truck to a stop quickly but the damage had been immediate. I’ve always hated those tires.

Not only had the rubber split but the wheel had gouged into the pavement causing the sparks and flattening a chunk of the rim. The sparks had also melted the plastic fender on one side. I inspected everything else; no actual damage to the mechanical elements of the splitter. I breathed a sign of relief. No breakdown is good news but things could have been worse.

I paced and cursed a bit as I internalized the scene. Once I realized the exploded tire was the opposite of the one I’d patched earlier that morning I felt better. The catastrophic tire failure wasn’t due to my patch job. Then I realized out of two possible tires I’d had two tire failures;  a branch stub puncture and a kersplode. That made me feel worse. Who has luck like that?

I jacked up the splitter, removed the castle nut, jiggered off the mangled wheel and tire, dropped the bearing in the dirt (every damn time!), stepped on my tool box and sent sockets everywhere, then…

Then what?

Should I leave my splitter abandoned by the side of the road? Hell no!

A word about crime. Many people think rural areas are crime free. Not so. We’ve got different crime. There are people who’ll see a $1,500 woodsplitter by the side of the road and consider it “found goods”. With the advent of cell phones a working group of friends and relatives and a truck can appear out of nowhere like a beer fueled special forces team. Six arms would toss the splitter into a rusty F-150 and I’d never see it again. This could happen in ten minutes while I was off buying a new tire. Note: I’ve met people who’d steal your splitter on a highway on Saturday night and smile at you in church ten hours later; all the while honestly thinking they’re going to heaven. Don’t overestimate your fellow man’s ability to separate the world into themselves, friends, family, clan, or whatever and “the other” to whom doing wrong is somehow justifiable.

I called Mrs. Curmudgeon who was still some way off. I’d have to wait for her to come to do guard duty before I could take action. By then the tire store would be closed. She’d have to wait while I went home, hitched my trailer, came back, and then… I sighed. I’d have to find some way that I alone or with only minimal added muscle power could lift the beast onto the trailer. I didn’t like that sound of that. It sounded like a great way to mash fingers and compress vertebrae.I saw no way around it either.

It had been just that kind of week. The whole week had sucked since Monday (it was now Saturday), my morning had sucked, my evening was starting to suck, and it was going to be a long sucky night. Everything sucked and that’s all there was to it.

Then the cops showed up…

Woodsplitter wheels are small but they’re fine for moving around the yard (or the forest). I’ve moved mine with ATVs, riding lawnmowers, tractors, trucks, and (when I can’t find any other way) pulling for all I’m worth. (It’s a bitch to hand pull the splitter and if you try to pull it downhill you’re both going to the bottom at a speed determined by physics alone.)

Where things get hinky is when the tree is not on my land. Maybe it’s 10 miles away. If you’re like me, you eye those little shitty wheels, say a silent prayer, hitch it up, and drive real slow. It works. It’s legal. Your truck looks silly with that teeny weeny thing on the back but it gets the job done and everybody does it. Repeat after me; everybody does it.

I know what I’m going to hear in the comments. If you’ve got to go ten miles it would be best to load the splitter in the truck bed or on a trailer. It is the best choice if you’ve got the option. However, if I had enough mechanical advantage to get a 600 pound object into a truck bed I’d just haul the logs home and split them in my yard. Duh! (The world is filled with guys that have three stout cousins who’ll do anything for a case of Budweiser and a Bobcat in their garage and think they’re cleverer than the lone Curmudgeon limping around at 45 MPH. Yes, I am bitter. What makes you ask?)

The little tires are too small to have lug nuts. You have to pull a cotter pin, spin off a castle nut, and remove the whole hub, bearings and all. As is tradition, the bearings are immediately dropped in the dirt and you’ll have to repack them. It’s not a big deal.

I did just that, I jacked it up, spun the nut, ripped off the hub, dropped the bearings in the dirt (of course), and then noticed a branch had stabbed the tire. Can’t blame the splitter for that. It’s an honestly acquired battle wound. I zipped to town to get a replacement tire. The tires are several years old and they’ve had their share of issues. It happens.

The tire store had a cheap replacement tire. You know what was cheaper? A patch kit. I consulted with the tire guy, bought the patch kit, patched the tire in the parking lot, aired it up with their compressor, and felt like a mechanical genius. Back at the compound I rinsed off the dirty bearing in the kitchen sink (wives love it when you do that), slapped on grease, shoved the patched tire & wheel on the spindle, tightened the castle nut (but not too tight), and I was back in business.

Time to retrieve the kids and liberate some firewood.

Since I’m ranting about firewood, I want to endorse two products.  I’ve already written a review of my woodsplitter here and my chainsaw here and I still recommend both products. I bought both several years ago and have used them fairly hard. I’ve had to do the usual routine maintenance and anything else is due to my stupidity and not the product (I’m thinking about woodsplitter tires which I simply overused.) If they were junk I’d know by now.

Both are name brands that don’t play pussyfoot with product designations (so you know model X from one vendor matches model X from another vendor). The make and model is important so think it over carefully, but once you’ve made your choice you don’t save much (if any) based on where or from whom you buy the model you’ve selected. Not all products are like that but I’ve found no huge upside to comparison shopping for Troy Bilt or Stihl.

I bought both locally several years ago but I had the option to buy the splitter on-line. If I were to do it again I’d buy it from Amazon and spare myself some hassles from the local guys. (This whole e-commerce thing isn’t all about iPads and collectors Star-Trek plates you know!) The whole idea of trying to establish a rapport with local service guys is bullshit and we might as well put a stake in it. Unless you live in 1950 they won’t recall you fondly or give you better service or even care whether you live or die. My local guys hose up most interactions, probably shouldn’t be using tools, and would rather be selling something like basketballs. My point being that buying on Amazon and having delivery straight to the house is a miracle and I wish I’d done it rather than letting those chimps get their greasy mitts on my money.

As for my recommendations; am I biased observer? Hell yeah. I bought both products myself and I tend to think I’m a pretty awesome guy. Secondly, if you buy ’em I get a tuppence and a pat on the head from the corporate overlords at Amazon. I’ll enjoy the cash but that doesn’t mean I’m trying to sell you crap. The stuff I recommend is what has served me well.

Woodsplitters:

I own a Troy-Bilt 27 Ton Hydraulic Log Splitter with 160cc Honda Engine. I’ve had good luck with Troy-Bilt products and the wood splitter in particular has been a big win. You can buy from Troy-Bilt on-line and the price is just about as good as you can possibly get. (Nor will they kill you on shipping.) The link on the Troy Bilt website is here.

Unfortunately, Troy Bilt’s website is proof that there are companies in 2015 that still can’t manage a decent web presence. Go figure? They’ve got the goods and a killer shipping deal but I just loathe their website. YMMV. Having made a zillion purchases through Amazon I’m happier with Amazon. Here’s the lame little image you’ll find on the Amazon web site:

You know you want it.

This is a representation of the product at work:

I bought mine about five years ago. The price has gone up a bit (like the price of everything else… despite the fact that there’s supposedly no inflation… but that’s another story). Also the components (mostly the engine) seem to fade in and out. Models with Honda engines seem temporarily rare. I figure there’s a factory somewhere that ran out of widgets in a way that affected a container ship in Timbuktu? I found two options; a Honda Engine or a slightly larger non-Honda Engine that costs a little less. Odds are both engines are fine and even the sexy Honda makes an unholy racket. But I bought a Honda and like it so I can’t say much about the other engine. Both are Troy-Bilt products shipped by a third party. I’ve never bought from either one, I wouldn’t expect hassles but you ought to do due diligence (make sure it comes with hydraulic fluid, etc…). Caveat emptor and all that.

Chainsaws:

I own and recommend a Stihl MS 361. Stihl is like Troy Bilt in that I never find it cheaper or more expensive by comparing stores. What this means is that if you find a Stil Model X in wherever, you’re unlikely to save a bunch by driving to six other stores (which is what I tried).

I couldn’t find Stihl on Amazon. They should be drawn and quartered for that. I’m going to assume there’s an army of lawyers shitting on free trade in a legal (but dangerous) tool, so screw them and their European aversion to selling stuff on the internet. (Note: while you don’t see a lot of complete Stihls on-line you can probably buy most parts in a heartbeat. As soon as I break something I’ll put that theory to the test.)

Photo of me cutting firewood.