cutting clapboard siding

[Magicman]

And quite well I might add.   8)

[crowhill]

Using shims I sawed a solid wall cabin out of very small white pine poles. Sawed to 6x6 , lots of wain, shimmed one side and made a cut. Then had one angled side and one clapboard. Customer had his solid wall cabin looking as if clapboard siding and a number of clapboards for a small garden shed. Was a bit time consuming, but doable.

[78NHTFY]

Using all the great advice here on cutting claps, spent an hour total test cutting some dead pine (LT 40 manual).  From one cant, cut three 6.5" x 1/2" x 10' pcs.  Then, used a couple pieces of 1/4" iron, u-shaped, to fit over two bed rails to create 1/2" cantilever and began cutting angled claps: lift cant, slide iron under edge of cant, cut to get 1/2" at fat side, 1/8" at small; when through log, step back, release log clamp,remove iron, re-clamp, return head,begin cutting again.  I managed 8 angled claps and was left with one 1 1/8" x 6.5" board at bottom. 
Think I like the regular (angled) clapboards better.  Question: how do I sticker them?  They are pretty dry as is, but if I cut live pine cants, I think they need some sort stickering so they don't warp. Thanks for any ideas...all the best, Rob.

[Jim_Rogers]

I stacked and stickered them as if they were regular boards.

Jim Rogers

[TnAndy]

If you are going to be making a lot of tapered siding, you may wanna consider buying or making a siding attachment for your mill.
The cant will remain locked in place and all you need to do is rock it back and forth sorta.

Having bought a Woodmizer lap siding/shingle maker attachment, (not the Re-saw attachment) which after one use, hung on the wall of my saw building until somebody came along and bought it for a song, I can tell you 2 pcs of plywood shims works better, and a HECK of a lot cheaper !

The problems with an attachment are:

You saw a cant.  I saw mine 8" wide by whatever height I can get......that may be 12-18" (or more) by 8-16' long.  Care to guess what a pine cant 8"x15" x 16' weighs ?  I don't have a clue, other than to tell you "DANG" heavy !  So with plywood shims, you cock the cant with a peavy, stick the shims under one side, saw your first piece, then un-cock the cant, saw the 2nd pc, and so on.   

With an attachment, you wrestle the cant off to one side, wrestle the attachment onto the mill bed, then wrestle the cant into the attachment.  (Of course, with shims, you've avoided the wrestling match, and are already half way thru that cant)

THEN you wrestle the fool attachment off the mill bed, saw another log, and repeat the whole process.  At the end of the day, the shim method will produce 5 times the siding, with a whole lot less work.

The ONLY thing I could say good about the WM attachment was if you wanted to make sawed wood shingles, it certainly was the trick for that.  You clamp 6 blocks of wood in it, and take 6 shingles off at a pass, simply using their handle/cam deal to cock and un-cock the blocks endwise. 

But for siding, it was an overpriced PITA.  I don't think they even make them anymore, and if you run up on a used one, don't buy it for siding. I've sawed many, many thousands of linear feet of lap siding with two plywood shims and it works just fine.

[thecfarm]

Thomas Bandsaw has just a lever on top that tilts the saw head up and down. Put the log on,saw the cant and just flip the lever to tilt the head. No need to remove the cant anymore. I saw it at a show last year. I thought it was a slick idea. Kinda makes me want to sell mine and buy the newer model.  ;D

[78NHTFY]

Jim Rogers--thanks, will try just regular stickers. 
TnAndy--Yup, the (KISS) shim-the-cant method is the way to go, especially being a Mizer, huh, cheap like me :D.  All the best, Rob.

[TnAndy]

I cut mine 8" wide, leave 6" exposed, the rest covered by the next layer.  To dry, I just put on sticks the same as any lumber.   Dry 6mo or so, depending on species, time of year, etc.

Picture tutorial: (shot some black paint on the end of a poplar cant to make pics better)

Get a log down to a cant....take your side lumber off as normal.  With this log, I'll end up with an 8x13 cant.

http://

http://I cock my cant to the inside, and put two 5/8" plywood shims on the outside bed rails under the cant.  Take your first piece off.  Thickness is determined by eyeball.  Silly me, I thought that WM attachment would come with some kind of gauge....nope.....eyeball it.....




Take shims out, cant flat on bedrail.  Saw next pc.

http://Repeat until you run out of cant.




Makes great siding.....every building around my place has it.

One of four 4cord firewood sheds:

http://Shop building:



Gas Station:




Well, apparently there is a rather complicated trick to posting pictures here I clearly don't know....and am not inclined to learn......

[PC-Urban-Sawyer]

...
Well, apparently there is a rather complicated trick to posting pictures here I clearly don't know....and am not inclined to learn......

TnAndy,

The Forestry Forum does have a "different" method of using photos in posts than most other forums. The reason it has this method and rule is that it essentially eliminates the situation where you get the dreaded error due to the photo being removed for the external site after it has been posted here.

The process requires you to upload photos to a gallery located at the FF and then reference that photo. This way the photo want go missing here when it's deleted from sutterfly or any other external service.

The process is actually quite easy to master. You can find all the instructions here: https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php/topic,61788.0.html

I'm sure we'd all like to see your photos if you could manage to make the time to master the process here.

Herb