There is nothing like a big family!
I have heated with wood all my life and have always cut my own and split it by hand.
Various times either one of my eight children or one my sixteen grand children would ask me why I don't get a hydraulic log splitter, and my answer was always; "the day I can't split wood by hand is the day that I will stop heating with wood"
The year before last I had one of the nicest surprise Christmas presents that a man could get which was a thousand dollars that they had all chipped in and it was for a hydraulic log splitter.
I begrudgingly bought one and was amazed and quite pleased at how quickly it got the job done.
None of the family had ever seen it work, so at our last family cook out, I had a big stack of cut logs, and every one got to pull the handle and split logs. it was the hit of the day and they had so much fun that I think the next time I need a batch split I'll just have another cook out.
The nicest part of my whole log splitter experience wasn't the fact that I didn't have to split by hand any more. It was the love that came from them all in giving it to me.
Needless to say I am now going back on my statement about splitting wood
Jack L
