Tractors and wood! Show your pics

/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,501  
Thanks J_Mc. So is it percent of total weight that is water or is there some other parameter or constant involved ??
I'm not sure. My understanding is that it is percent of total weight. However, at one point there were competing methods of measuring moisture content: one was measuring as a percent of total weight, the other was expressing the weight of the water as a percent of the weight of dry wood. The latter always struck me as odd for two reasons:
  1. You don't really know the weight of the dry wood until you actually dry it all the way out (and who ever does that?)
  2. If there was more water weight than wood weight, you would get a moisture content that was greater than 100% (for example, if you had a piece that was 5 lbs of water and 4 lbs of "wood", you'd have a moisture content that was 5/4 or 125%)
I believe that the method which used "water as a percent of total weight" is what came to be used, but I can't swear to that.

BTW - this morning I made one turn on the trail I just packed the other day. . It was 24* here. It was better than expected but a second trip would have been a mistake probably. It warmed up quickly.
I was able to get over my trails to a neighbor's place on Monday to help them start clearing a small pasture in their woods. It's about a mile through the woods, and things were finally cold enough to make that drive. (I don't own a trailer capable of hauling my tractor, and don't like the 6+mile tractor drive over the road even when the weather is good, let alone when all the idiots are out re-learning how to drive in ice and snow.) I needed to work in my own woods yesterday, but didn't get to it. Today, things have softened up too much.
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,504  
I almost started a new thread but thought I’d add to this one. When it comes to firewood moisture I always assumed you were drying the internal moisture out of it from it being a living tree. So how does rain and humidity come into play? I understand it would make it dry slower. What happens to a dry piece of firewood if it gets rained on? Does just the surface need to dry off? Does the wood soak up the rain and it takes days to dry out?
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,505  
I almost started a new thread but thought I’d add to this one. When it comes to firewood moisture I always assumed you were drying the internal moisture out of it from it being a living tree. So how does rain and humidity come into play? I understand it would make it dry slower. What happens to a dry piece of firewood if it gets rained on? Does just the surface need to dry off? Does the wood soak up the rain and it takes days to dry


There are basically two types of moisture in the wood. One is the "free moisture", Which is relatively easy to drive out. Then there is the moisture contained within the cells of the wood. That takes more time and energy to drive out of the wood.

The point where you have driven out the free moisture and have only the cellular moisture left is called the "fiber saturation point". It varies from species to species and even from tree to tree within a species, but typically that's right around the 30% moisture content range. Air drying wood down to that point usually goes fairly quickly, assuming the wood is not in contact with the ground or constantly in a high humidity area. Getting beyond that point takes more time, or you can speed it up with heat and airflow. Getting that moisture out that is within the cells of the wood generally doesn't happen much until you remove most of the free moisture.

Once the wood has dried out, getting rained on usually just replaces some of the free water in the wood. This is more easily removed, and since it is generally a surface setting, it's even more quickly removed than if that moisture were found throughout the wood. It's usually just a matter of a couple of dry days to pull that moisture back out. The longer the wood has soaked, the longer it can take to pull that moisture back out.

Different species can dry at different rates. In general, how fast wood dries is a function of heat and relative humidity at the stack of wood. One problem is that if the air is not moving, the relative humidity at the stack of wood can be significantly higher than in the ambient outdoor air. You need at least a bit of breeze to carry away the moisture that has come off the stack. Otherwise the drying process slows significantly.
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,507  
agree, that was a good explanation (y)
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,509  
I was business partners with a guy who was a wood combustion guru. Learned a lot from him.
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,511  
I almost started a new thread but thought I’d add to this one. When it comes to firewood moisture I always assumed you were drying the internal moisture out of it from it being a living tree. So how does rain and humidity come into play? I understand it would make it dry slower. What happens to a dry piece of firewood if it gets rained on? Does just the surface need to dry off? Does the wood soak up the rain and it takes days to dry out?
My take on it is based on my very limited knowledge of physics and HVAC. Winter in the Northeast are our driest time of the year, yes we can get 3' of wet snow, but the relative humidity is very low. Think dry tundra, is really a winter desert.. Now if the temp gets too cold, like in February, the moisture in the log freezes, and stays put. I know wind will dry out the ground very fast, (learned that working at a golf course when much younger) so it would do the same to split wood. I also figure the smaller the pieces, the more surface area overall, the faster it will dry. But I also think that makes it burn faster, I prefer some larger logs for the over nights. John Mc explained it quite well, thank you.
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,512  
My take on it is based on my very limited knowledge of physics and HVAC. Winter in the Northeast are our driest time of the year, yes we can get 3' of wet snow, but the relative humidity is very low. Think dry tundra, is really a winter desert.. Now if the temp gets too cold, like in February, the moisture in the log freezes, and stays put. I know wind will dry out the ground very fast, (learned that working at a golf course when much younger) so it would do the same to split wood. I also figure the smaller the pieces, the more surface area overall, the faster it will dry. But I also think that makes it burn faster, I prefer some larger logs for the over nights. John Mc explained it quite well, thank you.

Winter is great for its generally low relative humidity which tends to speed the drying process. However you are right that when the temperature gets too cold, the drying process can stall out. When the water freezes, it does not move much within the log. You can still get some surface drying through sublimation (water going directly from a solid to a gas, without passing through the liquid phase on the way). It does need to get a bit below 32˚F/0˚C to freeze things solid, since the sugars in the wood act as a sort of anti-freeze, lowering the freezing point (notice how real maple syrup - which is basically just very concentrated sap - does not turn solid until WELL below the freezing point of water.)
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,514  
Ahh, its nice to see snow again! We got 2 different dustings, one just before Christmas, that the rain promptly removed, and some wintery mix last night that the 45 degree weather took care of by 10am today. Not that I want to go plow, but it does help keep everything a bit cleaner.
76 here today, and no snow in sight, YAY!!
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,515  
The side's fold in/down flat for storage. I built in a slight over center open position so that I didn't need to have perfectly level ground to stay open. Hopefully using my head instead of getting pounded in the head 😝.
So far it's working.
Is there a thread on here or a link to dimensions and construction? I really like that concept and may adopt it and make a few.
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,516  
I really enjoyed the good weather and perfect conditions while cutting some fir this week. We didn't get any sun and it spat snow all the time but it was in the 20's with no wind. Your probably sick of my fir pictures but this one is the second biggest, board foot wise, that I have ever cut here. So I needed a pic. It was 23" at the butt and 260 BF. I can hear the laughter :) It would have been more and number one but the top was dead ended in an ash canopy so it wasn't that tall. It had the typical 5' of butt rot.

P1010469(1).JPG


P1010475(1).JPG



While I had the camera out I mounted it on the ROPS and made a video of making up a hitch, this tree and another smaller one (70 BF), and skidding them out to the landing. I'm cutting off of a new trail that I scuffed out last fall. On the skid out there are 3 sharp turns so I am keeping my wood lengths short. These are 26' to make a couple 12' saw logs. I had a bit of bad luck. When the cable releases from a snatch block the cable goes slack as it falls. This momentarily removes the locking pressure on the chokers. That little tree got caught in the cable at just the right instant to rake the loose chokers free. I saw the tree and knew it was a goner. I thought about cutting it but I didn't..... Took me 4 extra minutes to patch up the problem it caused.

The video is about 20 minutes long. Not fast paced and exciting but slow like woods work and me. You'll be able to tell from the way I walk one way vs the other that the tractor is parked on a hill with the camera facing down.


gg
 
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/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,517  
Great video Gordon, brought back a bunch of memories for me from years ago back on the farm and pulp wood logging! Thanks and stay safe, course it sure looks as if you know exactly what you're doing.
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,518  
Would like a few of these trees in my
backyard so I would have some fire wood
to keep warm and some for cooking outside


willy
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,519  
If you guys are having problems or need
a new wood splitter you might want to check
this new one out!


willy
 
/ Tractors and wood! Show your pics #19,520  
If you guys are having problems or need
a new wood splitter you might want to check
this new one out!


willy
And only $46,000!
 

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