I’ve gotten my dad full swing into woodworking. I’m actually a little green as his newly finished shop is a lot nicer/bigger than mine.
Anyway, we have some hunting land in central Wisconsin and were both interested in having some trees milled. I’ve read the FWW article on this and contacted Woodmizer who gave me the name of a couple of sawyers in the vicinity of our land. My questions are:
We already have some felled Oaks. How long can they stay on the ground?
Has it been economical for those of you who have used it?
Where can I reference drying time for species and thickness?
Can they quarter saw?
Any other tips, suggestions, or experiences are welcome.
Replies
If you have the source for nice, large trees that are good candidates for clear wood, then you will definately save some money. I saw most of the wood I use in my woodworking business myself, and it has saved me a ton of money over the years with material costs, especially on the more expensive species like cherry, maple, and walnut.
Sawing your own logs, or having them sawn by a professional sawyer, allows you to get flitches, or bookmatched stacks of lumber that would be difficult to get from the local hardwood supplier, as well as very expensive. Having all your lumber for a large project all come from the same tree with grain and color matching will yield much better results than sorting through the piles of lumber at the lumber yard.
A very good source for sawing and drying info would be at http://www.woodweb.com. Check out the forestry forum, and the sawing and drying forum. There is loads of information in the archives that should give you a real good idea about what you're getting into, as well as plenty of drying schedules, etc.....
Lastly, if you're sawing oaks, and want quartersawn lumber, I would recommend that you check out sawyers in your area that use a swing blade mill, like a Lucas Mill or Petersen Mill. In my experience, swing blade mills are much better and FASTER (which can equate to sawing savings) when it comes to quartersawing large logs, as no frequent turning of the log to yield quartersawn lumber is required, saving a lot of strenuous work and time.
As far as those logs on the ground, they can degrade pretty quickly, so you really have to just check them for bugs. Once the bugs get in, and the rotting starts, they are pretty much firewood. I like to have my logs milled right away after they have been felled.
Hope this helps, and work safe.
Jeff
Thanks for the great response!! We are really looking forward to it. I know we have a lot to learn about this new endeavor and are counting on the sawyer for a great deal of expertise. I am looking the the woodweb but I was wondering what you mean when you say good clear wood? How can you look at a tree and tell if it will yield furniture grade boards?
Well, I am not a forestry consultant, but after some experience seeing what a tree looks like on the outside, i.e... no branches or cut off knots 10 to 15 feet high, burls telegraphing into the wood, etc...you can pretty much have a very good educated guess on what trees will yield the best wood. It might be prudent for you to get in contact with a forestry consultant in your area to come out and mark the best trees for this purpose for you, as it will take you quite a while to earn that experience yourself. You wouldn't want to waste that valuable resource that you have.
Good luck.
Jeff
Warning milling your own logs can be addicting. Once you've done one log you can't stop, ever. I've found that logs that have been sitting around for awhile tend to get pretty bug eaten around the sapwood. This may not be a problem if you cut off all the sapwood but sometimes I like to leave the wane on the boards which means keeping the sapwood. In that case be prepared to deal with the almighty Powder Post Beetle.
Jeff has nailed it dead on IMHO.
I'm fortunate to have a really good sawyer and the greatest advantage in that is you can have your logs milled exactly the way you want them. If I want figure in the wood, he'll go for grade; if I want straight grain he'll go for that too. Quartersawn - no problem.
Generally it's up to you as to how you sort them, but that's the fun part for me anyway.
Yes it can be addictive, but so isn't tool collecting! And the end result is some mighty Fine Woodworking!
Regards,
Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
Edited 5/31/2007 9:48 pm ET by KiddervilleAcres
You can find a sawyer, and a kiln here,
http://www.woodweb.com/Resources/RSSDG.html
You should paint the ends of any logs asap to keep them from checking.
If you like lifting heavy objects and getting filthy, you will love this work. If not, you might want to have the sawyer deliver the lumber to a kiln operator. From there, you can get lumber that is ready to use. Otherwise, there is a lot of hard work turning trees into good usable lumber, and it is easy to mess it up if you don't do everything right.
Scott B has a good pfd showing some ways to saw for QS. Here is a link to his site. http://www.scottbanbury.com/
I find that it is not worth my time to bother with QS unless the tree is over about 3' diameter. It is just too much work for small yield.
Good luck Keith
Keith
I very much agree with your assessment of QSawing with a bandmill. It is exactly why I mentioned finding a sawyer with a swing mill. Much, much easier and faster. I'm in the process of purchasing a Lucas now, which will handle logs up to 8' (eight feet, not a misprint) in diameter. I know that you participate over at the sawing and drying forum over at woodweb. I've been a lurker there for a few years now. Lots of good info if you can sort through the bs, which is the case with just about any forum.
During my info gathering process regarding which mill I wanted to upgrade to ( I presently have a shared situation on an old, old woodmizer) I was referred to a guy a few hours from me who was kind enough to demo the Lucas Mill. He milled up a 7 foot plus diameter log 12 feet long with ONE helper into just over 4000 bf in a little over 5 hours, much of it quartersawn. He said he could have been faster if he wasn't demo'ing it to me! To say the least, I was impressed. I break my back to get 800 bf in a day with the bandmill.
Jeff
If it is worthwhile or not depends on the cost of your labor.
I buy whole logs of cherry, oak, or walnut (clear, custom sawn and dry) from strangers for less than the value of my time crusing timber for a single log.
Here is a book that may be of some use.
Edited 6/3/2007 1:31 pm ET by byhammerandhand
I live in central wisconsin and have dabbled in this as well. We are fortunate to have many local amish woodworkers that operate kilns to dry wood. You can get your wood dried very inexpensively this way. Start asking around and i bet you will find a local kiln operator to get the job done. I would give you the phone number of the one i use, but guess what, no phone, or computer !!!
marc
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