Congratulations and nice find on pulling together all the parts, this is great information for those of us who what to do the same!

Also, in reading through your previous notes and posts, I wonder if the heavier 352 CI V8, was the deciding factor on what Camper Specials got the larger spindles and brakes? I see only the V8 had the 1250 lbs front axel ratings.

 

Thanks Matt, I got those parts today from the shipper. Looking forward to making them look like new again.

For the brakes I would think there would be a note in this facts book if that were the case. It goes into all the details the salesmen at the dealership needed to know to sell them. They list the 2400 lbs. rear spring rating needed for Camper Special, but they don't mention any required brakes. They go into the detail of the mirrors being shipped loose and the "Wiring Harness - Camper (when available)" which is a mystery story in itself for 1966.

Some days I get virtually nothing done on any of my own projects - unless I count collecting firewood for the future. I had my attic reinsulated last fall and used a lot less wood this past winter so what I'm cutting up now might last me for a couple of years or more. I should have taken a pictured before I started but I was definitely into it by the time I took this one. Neighbor down the road who had the tree taken down some years ago but never did anything with it. I was talking with him the other day and he mentioned it if I wanted it. It's a little punky around the outer edges but it's good wood for the most part.



The amount of pitch in some of these burns well. A little black for a few minutes but after that it's good for hours.



The 32" bar on the MS460 is barely enough to make it in one cut. And enough resins in the wood that one slice of this largest stuff dulls the chain to the point I have to swap it out. I've got 3 chains for the 32" bar and 4 for the 25" bar and I resharpen them on my Oregon grinder at the end of each day. I'm on day two.



This much more to go plus the large cedar in the background. Probably one more day of work on this. Maybe part of a second.





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Chad, that looks like fun, I love doing that kind of work. My personal favorite is my old 026, the biggest I have ever run with a 28" bar was my brother's 036, which felt only slightly more powerful. So that MS460 must be like going from a push mower to a full fledged harvester when comparing capabilities and power. Nice looking wood too, I myself have felled probably thousands of trees at this point, and most, in my youth, became firewood or just went away. Now, I see every tree as timber to make something, with the rest, keeping the old hearths warm, but that is more about the ridiculous cost of wood, and shamefully poor quality of what solid wood is available these days.

Are you splitting everything by hand? And what, if anything are you using to save your back when loading and moving it?

Over here in Germany, as I may have mentioned in another post, the trees for firewood are harvested on a 15-20ish year cycle, and most are under 20" diameter depending on species. The Germans tend to cut everything to 1 meter lengths (39"), split it, and then stack the wood to season. The one meter lengths make the stacks stable and in our area, it is not uncommon to see firewood stacked all over along the forest roads with families name or symbol marked on the pile. I am sure sometimes someone later takes the wrong pile every once in a while, but for the most part the honour system seems to work, and most folks would rather cut off their own hand than steel someone else's wood.

First season I was living here, I spent a month and bought, cut, split by hand and stacked enough wood for 3-4 years at my mother in-laws house. I moved everything with my Land Rover and a small trailer, and stacked it close to her property, so she could retrieve it with a wheel barrow. I stacked it in a double row pile 40 feet longish, and nearly 5 feet high. Wish I had taken a photo, I was quite proud of the accomplishment. Then as it seasons, and she she needs to "cut in" more firewood, we would drag out her "Whippsäge" or whip saw, which is a 30" circular saw with a short throw table that you drop the wood onto and then cut, pull back, slid over the wood, and repeat. Once you get going, it's a steady "zing..zing..zing" as most meter pieces are cut into three, with the occasional long slow "zzzingggg.....zzzinggg.....zzzinggg" when you get to the bigger diameter pieces.

We would usually team up, I would cut, my wife or Heidi (yes, my mother in laws name is Heidi) would hand me the next piece when I finished cutting one, and the third person would be retrieving loads of wood from the pile. I never take my eyes off my hand placement and the blade, as there is no second chances. That was some 15 years ago...now my son helps out as I have so little time, and or Heidi's neighbour, Ralf, will bring down his "Fendt" tractor with the saw attachment.

Imaging a big green box driven by the PTO (or you can plug his into 3 phase power too) with a conveyer out the side and a dial or bar to set the cut length, and dust port on the end, and a rotating multi hole turning wheel, kinda like a revolver, that you load from the top. Drop in a meter lenth piece, and the revolver wheel (which is continuity turns clockwise) pulls the wood around and past the blade that is buried deep in the machine. The cut off wood piece, falls onto the conveyer, and that carries it through the side of the wood shed. We can load up to three logs at a time, and depending on the cut length, gravity and the rotation of the chamber, does the rest. Now we can fill her wood shed in about 1/4 the time....or less.... but honestly, it is less fun.

 

Ahhhh... the cutting of the wood ritual it's a constant for me also, however I'm not running the monster you are! I bought a Farm Boss 290 way back in 2000 with the 20" bar and it has worked it's ever lovin little heart out over the years. I got tired of using it for work, and then having to sharpen chains etc. when I needed to use it for me, so I made them buy me a new 311 w/25" bar... I would've gotten another Farm Boss but they didn't have any at the time, and I didn't want to miss the window. I deal in mostly oak of one variety or another so 25" is plenty, I do run into a lot that I have to hit from both sides, and have dropped a few pines that a longer bar would've been handy.

I will say, even though it is hard work and tiring, there is something therapeutic and satisfying about it

You said you had your attic re-insulated, good call! We had ALL our windows and doors rplc'd last August, it hurt at the time writing the check, but boy howdy, we went through a LOT less wood last winter, it was also milder then the last few, but still, I'd crank up the stove and it would keep the house cozy all night into the morning, whereas before, in the AM around 0530 it would be 58-60 in the house.

Growing up in MO we heated our house solely with a wood stove, so almost every Saturday in the "non-winter" mos. dad would drag me n my brother out of bed @ 0600, his buddy and his 2 sons would show up around 0630 and we'd head off to cut wood. We'd fill our truck n trailer, Norm's truck n trailer, head to either our house or theirs, unload and eat lunch, head back and do it again, then when we had the 2nd load, we'd go to the other house, unload and have dinner and enjoy the evening with them, some great memories were made, along with a strong work ethic being forged in the process as a bonus.

And Matt, that sound like quite the system y'all had worked out! I remember dad dragging us to help an older friend of his cut some wood for them, and he had an old "buzz saw" on the 3 pt. of his tractor for the BIG ones, THAT was a sketchy/scarry set-up I wanted nothing to do with! It was basically a 4' or 5' table saw like blade, maybe smaller, but seemed huge when I was a kid, I'm guessing that's similar to what you were using. As kids, we were just the worker bees for the loading and stacking, then one Christmas we got 12 lb. Monster Mauls for gifts... I really wasn't a fan of THAT present and the ensuing work it entailed! Dad just watched from sofa with a big SE grin when we say them lol.

Sorry for hijacking your thread Chad


a load on #456 before he got new tires

Maximus doing his main job

Woody getting used before I sold him to my BIL, THAT was a heavy load of wet black oak, didn't take a pic of him loaded, but Shrek had to help with the last bit of it, he was not happy with 1/2 cord of wood

a few days prior to him being put to wood hauling duty

 

Pickupmanx2, those are some great memories, drags up a few memories of my own.

The three point saw you described, is what Ralf used to use, or something like it, and you wouldn't get me near it. Reason one, Ralf is crazy and when he would run the saw, it was like machine gun fire he was cutting logs so fast, and that sound is just scary...and we would always cringed and feared the silences that followed until you could see that everyone still had all the limbs.

Nice looking fleet of Fords, but I have to admit, I like the last photo best.

Thanks for sharing, hopefully Chad doesn't feel highjacked...its his fault, he started it..

 

Yeah, nothing better than sitting next to a wood stove on a cold winter day. I've been heating with wood since I was 18...70 now. Most my life in Minnesota, we needed lotsa wood to heat house and shop. Now 2 years in Kansas for a milder winter, but hope to burn wood until I can't fetch it no more. I've had every kind of stove, antique, barrel, home made, and by far the best are cast iron. Also made a half dozen different splitters thru the years. In younger days I thought bigger was better, had a giant thing with a car engine on it for a while. I would go out in my woods with the skid steer, bring back a bucket full of big rounds, split them, load them up again, drive to the wood shed, unload and stack. Too much handling, and always a mess to clean up at the splitter sight. So, I made a smaller splitter that mounts across the back of my ancient 30 HP 4x4 Kubota, so the mess stays in the woods and you haul home the finished product in my home built trailer that dumps. I like stuff not much bigger than a basket ball for ease of handling in my old state of decline. Lots of red elm and oak back in MN. Here in Ks theres oak and elm, but mostly what folks want is called "Hedge", its very hard wood used for fence posts that last 100 years...burns good too!

 

Ahhh... the Osage Orange, a.k.a. hedge trees, that was my dads favorite wood to find, and there was plenty of it, as it used to be used as fencing, "hedge rows" would be planted, woven/groomed to make a fence, once barbed wire came along, all the hedge rows were let to grow into trees, super dense wood, mostly bug resistant, we used to keep the hedge apples in the basement windows to keep the bugs n spiders out. The indians used the wood to make bows out of, hence the name Osage Orange. I have a slab of it up in my shop, I've always loved the bright yellow color of it and just how heavy it is, and yes, it'll burn all night, dad would always have us boys bring in a few hedge logs for night, get a good bead of coals, throw on three nice hunks of hedge, they'd still be glowing in the morning. Transplanted to Cali now, and we have manzanita trees, reminds me a lot of hedge, super dense, burns all night, just not as plentiful and tall as hedge trees. I've found one hedge tree over in Mariposa, keep meaning to stop and grab some hedge apples and see if I can coax a few to grow.