I have split a fair amount of wood. The example of wood given seems frozen (easy splitting), straight grained (easy splitting), short (easy splitting) and sized to be contained in the tire (allows for multiple fast strokes).
I can see how the physics might work, but you cannot drive stakes or spikes with it (no flat back end), it takes up more space, and is more expensive. It is a replacement for a splitting maul, not an axe.
Give me a woodpile and a couple of hours with it, and I would let you know.
Hydraulic ram splitters are pretty nice, too, and only cost a few hundred. My father made one up before the were commercially common.
I will agree that spending some time with it would be nice.
I’d probably get worn out in about one minute after not doing that sort of activity in decades.
Those chucks of wood sure were even all the way around. Flat too.
In all my years as a teenager splitting wood for the winter I sure didn’t see a lot of wood that looked like that.