Any woodworkers?

Needs another coat of oil but basically done

 

Still needs a handle hole, and sealed

 

Trading these two for 60 board feet of walnut and oak.

 

I gotta try one of these this summer.

 

great!

 

The glue up was interesting

 

About what thickness do you make these? Some of these are on my list to make, I've never done one before.

 

Close to 3/8", i was trying to rip a true 1" board in half to give me 1/2" but i messed up and one was 1/2" and one was about 3/8". My concern was if the glue would hold. So with sanding it seemed to hold good.

 

Picked up a couple of yellow cedar beams and some walnut today. The beams were 16’ x 8.5” x 4.5”. I had to cut them in half to haul them home.

 

Finally got to test out the saw and the mill.

 

Hickory?

 

Maple I believe.. been wrong before though! One area I totally lack knowledge about.

 

Hmm dunno, the darker color doesnt look like maple.

 

Interesting. I’ve always wanted a bandsaw mill, but those are beyond my reach in terms of cash, space, storage and the fact I would never use it enough. Maybe I need to take another look at these.

 

While not cheap either, the saw and the mill are definitely way less money than a bandsaw mill.

Obviously more manual labor involved too. So far to me it's been worth it. I purchased them last fall and am just now getting to use them.

I made up a plastic tote for all the things I need plus the saw and the mill and the ladder. I found out very quickly that I didn't have all the things needed in my tote hahaha.

I think the hardest part about all of this is waiting for the wood to dry to be able to use it!

 

I get that it takes more work and will have lower yield, but hell, if I even harvested a dozen trees with it, that might be enough for break even… As for dry time, yeah… ugh

 

I have the Granberg Alaskan Mill 36 inch with the Stihl MS 661C and a 36 inch bar. The saw was $1400 and the Mill was $220. Looks like they're running about $280 now

Even though both are 36 inches I can only mill a log about 27 1/2 inches wide. The one above was 21 at its widest point.

Depending on what you want to do you can get a return on the investment pretty quickly. I have access to a large amount of storm damaged logs and I'm not doing any of this as a business.

 

What do you keep in the tote?

I lucked out with a cheap milling setup
Bought a granberg off a buddy for $100, paired it with Holzfforma G660, currently going for $353 (carbon copy Stihl MS 660). I have a 28” bar and 36” bar for the saw. Recently purchased a wooded property in Vermont. Establishing base camp i milled a bench to pop the cherry on the saw out of a recently fallen maple. Forgot any sort of straight edge guide for the first cut so just went with it on the bark.

 

I made several 1/4 thick by running them through my planer and shaving a small amount each time