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510kg

What was the moisture out of interest?

We've been using kramers for 20+ years. We're lucky because we share machines with our farm so we've got 2 kramers - a small 280 and a telescopic 750t, both brilliant machines. Not the best pictures but here they are.

556kg on my workings. Probably wrong though

We do the first except deliberately leaving a few big bits per load because most customers want them to keep fires going over night. The 12 way splitter isn't very effective unless you sort logs first because any small stuff that goes through just gets made into kindling by the ring then you get too much rubbish.

I doubt we're one of your suppliers and like to think we offer good value and high quality logs (nearly all of our customers are regulars) but I'll try and explain to you the production side of things. These are more random thoughts than in any order. First thing is that tote bags (not all suppliers of course) are a poor unit of measurement because they stretch over time so a 90x90x90 bag when new will hold 0.7cube but after a few uses will hold 1cube. Very few British companies offer stacked wood because it's a lot of effort for no gain so you're better off buying 6 cube and with decent suppliers that should be consistent regardless of how it's delivered although it sounds like you've had some bad experience regardless. Unfortunately UK suppliers will never be able to compete on price and quality with imported logs because the wood is so much cheaper in Europe and they can justify cutting it by hand to get more consistent logs because wages are so low. Not much can be done here of course as it's the same with any industry although I would say £110 a cube is very expensive. It's virtual impossible to get a consistent size with firewood because the diameter of timber is never the same, nor is the length but I agree it shouldn't be more than about 10% longer than listed although, while it shouldn't be massive, most of our customers ask for a range from kindling to big chunks in their loads to manage the fire. The rest I think you're right ; there should never be more than the odd bit of softwood in a hardwood load and there's currently too many units of measurement but thankfully more people are using cubic metres all the time although according to trading standards that's not allowed and we can technically only sell loads by names like small, medium and large. Best of luck finding a decent supplier anyway.

We work off 1.8cube per ton for hardwood.

Not log cutting I know but here's a few pictures of us fencing with the oak stakes I showed earlier.

I would have to double check but I remember reading somewhere that best practice is to put the netting on the public side and the barb on the other. I can't remember where it was now but that would make sense to me if you had children leaning on the fence or any issue like that.

Thanks, thought it was slightly high for loose.

Stacked or loose?

That's what I thought to and I think larch is one of the best value softwoods.

Been a couple of times, weirdly I then saw it on the new star wars film a few weeks later. It's certainly interesting to see although not as big as you would think. Some fascinating rocks and trees there.

They just need to be sharpened at different angles, I wouldn't say either was massively more difficult. In theory semi chisel stays sharp longer and full cuts slightly faster.

Thanks. We've got another little old 2 way posch splitter we use to make them. It's got 2 rams one pushes and one pulls the wedge so you can do decent lengths. My dad used to do it with splitting wedges which is how we started selling wood 20+ years ago but we've just been making them for ourselves recently until we got a bit of interest from other people.

We've only just started selling them again and just got an order for all we can make sorry. It's finding enough straight oak that's the problem. If anything changes I'll let you know.

Thanks. Don't envy you cutting on your own but it is satisfying when you get a nice load done at the end of the day. To the other comments at our prices it will be anything between £1-5 a cube after all costs and a base wage for our labour. I tend to work off 2 cube per man hour including everything from 2 people loading to stacking boxes and sharpening chains.

There's also the sherpa as940 for around 10k or 15 with a remote. It's amazing what it will go through and they're well built.

Careful costings and large amounts. And a nice bank manager

Been very busy on the logs this week, cutting firewood non stop and we made a few stakes. Also been splitting the oversized stuff,there's a quick video here. https://m.facebook.com/hormannsfirewood/?ref=bookmarks

Have you thought about recycled plastic boards? They would be strong and have a bit of flex. I think there's some called ekoply.

Still ticking over for us but only a third of peak sales. I'm happy to be honest as we're lambing at the same time so as long as we keep the orders at this level it will be a good year.

If it was me I would try and get it fixed or at least not bill you. It's obviously your risk (and reward hopefully) as a machine owner but realistically you can't do much more than tell them to slow down and hope they learn,. If you fired everyone you weren't sure of without giving them a chance it would cause more problems so they should take some responsibility for getting things wrong, especially if they ignore you.

Hopefully not for another month. Once I start it's another job to keep on top of. It struck me last year that planting a small patch of grass then mowing it repeatedly is a very strange that humans do. I'm not going to stop, just makes you think.

Agreed. A lot of our customers rely on wood for heat, if we put our prices up to say £80 a cube they wouldn't be able to afford it anymore. The firewood market varies alot between a heat source and a luxury in other areas. Having said that, with rising oil prices and more efficient fires I expect that fuel costs are getting close to even. Chip and oil/gas are similar already.