Slabber vs bandsaw mill?

[Drebs]

Hey guys I started a wood slab business a year ago and have been outsourcing my wood to a friend with a 24" woodmizer. The problem it 1) I often get logs larger than his 24" throat deep and often end up cutting so much waste off.
2) I'm getting busy enough where it's beginning to make sense for me to get my own.

I've searched and searched and searched and can't find my advantages/ disadvantages of a Peterson type Slabber (actually a turbosaw swing mill with both the swing mill and dedicated Slabber and planing blade) vs a band sawmill.

I'm stuck between the Hudson Oscar 52" with a 48" throat inch clearance(35 hp) or a turbosaw 10" swing mill with a dedicated Slabber attachment(Honda 13 hp gas motor with a 51" wide cut capacity) and planning blade. Here's what I can't figure out and can't find document of but seems to be very evident in videos ... the bandmill seems to cut 2-3x faster than a Slabber attachment. What I like about the Slabber is I can quarter saw deminsional lumber when I want then switch over to the Slabber then flatten boards after they dry with the planner blade. 

The Hudson 52' sounds awesome but it not quite portable without a trailer with my forklift I would need a big trailer then I would be over 26,000 lbs with mill fork and lumber  and need my cdl. And without hydraulics if I want to edge or cut quarter out of a 6" slab cut it will take maneuvering. 

So it all comes down to I know what the bandmill does well. Slabs is a bigger priority over deminsional. (But then we all know I will spend a ton of time on the router sled vs the planner blade attachment). So how much better (faster) is a bandmill than a Slabber plus the ease of resharpening the Slabber and lifespan and cost of Slabber blades/chains? 

They both seem to have major advantages and might at the end of the day get the Oscar and then a cheapest swingmill with a planner attachment. 

Any advice, knowledge, or alternative perspectives would be greatly appreciated! FYI cost is roughly similar for the swing with planer,Slabber as Oscar. So the main question here is Slabber vs band

[NZJake]

Hi Drebs,

The dedicated slabber has a width capacity of 61" (sorry if this wasnt clear on my site). The real benefit of the slabber is for wide slabs which can fetch a premium. The planer blade is value adding as it takes your dry slabs and makes them dimensionally smooth and accurate.

With regard to quarter sawing the swing-blade would be the easiest route to achieving this. 

I believe a bandsaw would produce smaller/average width slabs a lot quicker, but the offset of re-handling into dimensional boards, blade cost and timber consistency would be a trade off you would need to consider.

[JustinW_NZ]

Big slabbers are cool because you can obviously go wide.
BUT
Bandsaws will blitz them for speed by a huge margin...
And thats comparing to much bigger powered ones also.

best solution - one of each

Cheers
Justin

[DR Buck]

I have both.  A Wood-Mizer LT40 and Lucas 60"  DSM.   If you want the ability to do slabs and dimenational lumber you either need both or a swing mill with slabber attachment.    Both Lucas and Peterson offer these and both can be fitted with planer attachments.

[Weekend_Sawyer]

Your buddy has the bandsawmill, you should get the slabber.

[thelogsmith]

Also take into account the amount lost to the kerf. I have an Alaskan mill w/ a 66" bar that's good for 56" wide slabs, and a 84" that's good for 72" run by 2- husky 2100's (double ended bars). Had one slab job that we provided 180 3" thick x 8' long slabs minimum 30" on the butt. A bandmill would have handled most of what we were sawing and got us one or more slabs per 8' chunk. At $325 apiece that adds up quick.  

[Ianab]

BIG advantage of the slabber / swingblade combo is that it's very portable. Moving a 4ft dia log is a mission without some heavy machinery, which can be problematic to get to some locations. A lot of those big logs are one offs, and come up in backyards, swamps or some other forgotten out of the way spot. There aren't many places you can't get a swing blade mill too, even if you have to use a bit of ingenuity. 

Then there is the logistics of normal sawing a ~48" log on a manual band mill? How the heck do your turn the thing. OK, not so bad if you are just slabbing it, once you get it loaded it can just sit there, and yes the band mill would then saw it faster, and maybe get another slab out of it. But what if you don't want it slabbed?

What would push me towards the swing blade and accessories is the sheer versatility of what you end up with. You can saw pretty much any log, big or small. (*OK it's not always the optimum machine, but you can do the job). You can flat saw, quarter saw or slab, anything, anywhere. Woods that scare band saws? You might have to slow down in the cut, but you get it done. 

Then you have the planer (and there is a sander option?) to finish off the slabs once they are dry. Not many folks have the gear to joint and plane a 4ft wide board. You will, for minimal extra cost. 

I know you are thinking just about slabs, but there are lots of other opportunities that may come up. And you will have a machine that can do them (and make a decent job of cutting the slabs you want too)

[TKehl]

Biggest thing that slows down the slabber is HP and kerf.  Yes bandmills, with few exceptions, are faster.
 
Really two troubles with wide bandmills.  One is they are hard to make portable.  Cooks talks about that with their new wide ones when the wheels and cut width are added up, it's a wide load.  Hopefully they are working to turn the carriage at an angle during transport, then issue solved...  Second, a band will move more than a slabber bar.  One can argue about the movement of the band shouldn't exceed the kerf of a slabber, but in the end, if there are a lot of knots or irregularities in the wood (bark inclusions, irregular grain, etc.), the slabber will keep it flatter.
 
The downside with a slabber, is there is always something bigger that comes up...  Once you can cut 4', you start turning down the 5 and 6' logs...   ;)

[chep]

Swingmills are wickedly portable. Yes thats a 2004 tacoma..4 cyl...100 mile roundtrip saw job in the pouring rain today.

[mad murdock]

I bought a turbosawmill for the reasons stated by Ianab and NZJake. Ultra portability and maximum versatility. Much less running cost while working. No need to change bands every cut. I have milled next to and also had to true up boards cut on a band mill, never seen such wavy cuts. I I'd erstand a lot may well have to do with operator technique, but all in all, for what you are looking to accomplish a swing blade will be a choice you will never regret making, especially the turbosawmill, which offers the best in workability around the mill with a single beam setup. Good luck in your quest!

[Ianab]

Don't even need a pickup  ;)

[logboy]

There are a lot of pluses and drawbacks to slabbers and bandsaws. I have experience on both. Unlike a lot of guys who just cut their slabs and sell them, I build finished furniture out of mine. Outside of cutting the trees down, I do everything in house. Unfortunately the myth that you're going to save a lot more material and money with a bandsaw because of the kerf is one I see repeated far too often. Yes, your average bandsaw has a 1/8" kerf while a slabber has a 3/8" kerf. Unlike a slabber, a bandsaw can get wavy in the cut, especially as the blade guides get further apart. It's not the fault of the machine, it's just the methodology. Most bandsaws are only running a 1.25" blade so they're going to flex and wave a bit in the cut, especially with knots and defects. It's basic physics. Obviously a rigid 3/8" slabber bar isn't going to do that, but it's going to cut slower. I've cut thousands of slabs on my slabber, and had the opportunity to put a wide cut bandsaw through the paces. What I noticed is the slabs cut on the bandsaw have wave that need to be surfaced out. Because I'm building finished furniture out of mine, they need to be flattened after they come out of the kiln. If I was just flipping them down the road and I didn't care about the rest of the work, that would be one thing. But mine need to be dead flat after drying which is done either on my CNC router or my Lucas 827 swing blade with the planer attachment. So while you might save on the kerf and the speed on the cutting, you'll have to spend a lot more time surfacing it flat to get rid of the wave on the backend. In the end the whole argument of kerf becomes mute. You're comparing six of one to half a dozen of the other. If you're doing everything from the cutting to the drying to the finished furniture in house like I am, the argument doesn't hold a lot of weight. I would rather have dead flat slabs coming off the mill. There are enough issues to deal with in drying slabs, like cupping and warping that need to be surfaced out without adding waves. At the end of the day it all boils down to time and money.

One thing you'll have to keep in mind about cutting with a bandsaw versus a slabber is that if you encounter any metal or foreign debris, you'll have to stop and change the bandsaw blade immediately. With the slabber you can typically finish the cut. With the bandsaw if you try to ram it forward it will climb and dive all over the place and ruin the slab. I've cut through a dozen nails with a slabber in one pass on 32" walnut and it still cut a dead flat slab. You can't do that with a bandsaw.

In the end I think both have their pluses and minuses, but after a decade of owning my slabber it would be my single tool of choice. 

[Drebs]

There are a lot of pluses and drawbacks to slabbers and bandsaws. I have experience on both. Unlike a lot of guys who just cut their slabs and sell them, I build finished furniture out of mine. Outside of cutting the trees down, I do everything in house. Unfortunately the myth that you're going to save a lot more material and money with a bandsaw because of the kerf is one I see repeated far too often. Yes, your average bandsaw has a 1/8" kerf while a slabber has a 3/8" kerf. Unlike a slabber, a bandsaw can get wavy in the cut, especially as the blade guides get further apart. It's not the fault of the machine, it's just the methodology. Most bandsaws are only running a 1.25" blade so they're going to flex and wave a bit in the cut, especially with knots and defects. It's basic physics. Obviously a rigid 3/8" slabber bar isn't going to do that, but it's going to cut slower. I've cut thousands of slabs on my slabber, and had the opportunity to put a wide cut bandsaw through the paces. What I noticed is the slabs cut on the bandsaw have wave that need to be surfaced out. Because I'm building finished furniture out of mine, they need to be flattened after they come out of the kiln. If I was just flipping them down the road and I didn't care about the rest of the work, that would be one thing. But mine need to be dead flat after drying which is done either on my CNC router or my Lucas 827 swing blade with the planer attachment. So while you might save on the kerf and the speed on the cutting, you'll have to spend a lot more time surfacing it flat to get rid of the wave on the backend. In the end the whole argument of kerf becomes mute. You're comparing six of one to half a dozen of the other. If you're doing everything from the cutting to the drying to the finished furniture in house like I am, the argument doesn't hold a lot of weight. I would rather have dead flat slabs coming off the mill. There are enough issues to deal with in drying slabs, like cupping and warping that need to be surfaced out without adding waves. At the end of the day it all boils down to time and money.

One thing you'll have to keep in mind about cutting with a bandsaw versus a slabber is that if you encounter any metal or foreign debris, you'll have to stop and change the bandsaw blade immediately. With the slabber you can typically finish the cut. With the bandsaw if you try to ram it forward it will climb and dive all over the place and ruin the slab. I've cut through a dozen nails with a slabber in one pass on 32" walnut and it still cut a dead flat slab. You can't do that with a bandsaw.

In the end I think both have their pluses and minuses, but after a decade of owning my slabber it would be my single tool of choice.

That answers a lot of my questions... I'm not quite sure how much will be done in house and how much flipped yet... Here is a question for you how long per cut do you think it would take to cut a 48' wide slab on a bandmill vs a slabber ? once you factor in..
1) Speed of cut on bandsaw mill vs slabber
2) changing of blades
3) cost of blades
I guess my question is if I'm in this for the long run is it cheaper/ more cost efficient to only use a dedicated slabber or to cut on a bandmill and flatten on a swing mill planer right when it comes off the bandmill or after it comes out of the kiln? Maybe I'm off in assuming it takes over twice as long to cut on a slabber than bandmill meaning 300 hrs on the bandmill vs 600 on the slabber for the same amount of work down the road which if you time is say worth $50 an hour the planer blade on a swing mill will pay for itself over time vs a straight slabber.. Thanks, Drew

[Bruno of NH]

Thomas Bandsaw mills has a portable wide cut bandmill

[redbeard]

Our Hud-Son 60 that has 30" band wheels and uses a .055 thick 1-1/2" wide with 7/8 tpi  that are 272" long blades can  slab 48"wide slabs faster than chainsaw slabber. Dead flat no waves it all comes down to sharp bands just like sharp chains.
30" band wheels is the key element in wide bandsaw Mills, 28" above blade will also make quartering big logs, slicing 12" cants or just squareing up big and 33' long logs.  We have milled 15 or better 40"+wide    2-1/2" thich Madrone, Gerry Oak, Cherry, maple, logs in 3-4 hrs. 
Removing and stickering in log form is what takes up the time. 
Just giving a perspective of band mill slabing.
Swing Mills with slabber bars have a huge advantage of being portable and way less overhead on blade expenses. Both give same end results with sharp chains or band blade.

[thelogsmith]

Agree with redbeard 100%. Sharp is the key. And it is possible to get a messed up cut with a slabber. That same slab job I mentioned above, the company had bought a dog bone shaped red oak online that was 68" at its widest, it was band milled and had no waves.(they paid $7000 for it! ). We were splitting it in half for them. Used an 84" double ended bar and had it pull down in the center of the cut a good 1/2"-3/4". Bar and ripping chain both brand new. Figured maybe bar came from the factory w/ rail not square. After flipping bar, regrinding bar, checking chain sharp never could come up with reason. Made several more cuts on different log and same result. Cannon said to ship it back and they would check it but never did account not much call for 6' slabs in this part of the world, and logs that big using them to trouble shoot not very cost effective for us(not as elusive as unicorns but close). Lucky for us they were hewing these to make them rustic looking so wasn't an issue. Never had any issue w/ 66" bar, 4' wide slabs came out w/ 1/16" of less variation in ponderosa pines w/ 8" dia knots. Good luck whichever way you go.

[logboy]

There are a lot of pluses and drawbacks to slabbers and bandsaws. I have experience on both. Unlike a lot of guys who just cut their slabs and sell them, I build finished furniture out of mine. Outside of cutting the trees down, I do everything in house. Unfortunately the myth that you're going to save a lot more material and money with a bandsaw because of the kerf is one I see repeated far too often. Yes, your average bandsaw has a 1/8" kerf while a slabber has a 3/8" kerf. Unlike a slabber, a bandsaw can get wavy in the cut, especially as the blade guides get further apart. It's not the fault of the machine, it's just the methodology. Most bandsaws are only running a 1.25" blade so they're going to flex and wave a bit in the cut, especially with knots and defects. It's basic physics. Obviously a rigid 3/8" slabber bar isn't going to do that, but it's going to cut slower. I've cut thousands of slabs on my slabber, and had the opportunity to put a wide cut bandsaw through the paces. What I noticed is the slabs cut on the bandsaw have wave that need to be surfaced out. Because I'm building finished furniture out of mine, they need to be flattened after they come out of the kiln. If I was just flipping them down the road and I didn't care about the rest of the work, that would be one thing. But mine need to be dead flat after drying which is done either on my CNC router or my Lucas 827 swing blade with the planer attachment. So while you might save on the kerf and the speed on the cutting, you'll have to spend a lot more time surfacing it flat to get rid of the wave on the backend. In the end the whole argument of kerf becomes mute. You're comparing six of one to half a dozen of the other. If you're doing everything from the cutting to the drying to the finished furniture in house like I am, the argument doesn't hold a lot of weight. I would rather have dead flat slabs coming off the mill. There are enough issues to deal with in drying slabs, like cupping and warping that need to be surfaced out without adding waves. At the end of the day it all boils down to time and money.

One thing you'll have to keep in mind about cutting with a bandsaw versus a slabber is that if you encounter any metal or foreign debris, you'll have to stop and change the bandsaw blade immediately. With the slabber you can typically finish the cut. With the bandsaw if you try to ram it forward it will climb and dive all over the place and ruin the slab. I've cut through a dozen nails with a slabber in one pass on 32" walnut and it still cut a dead flat slab. You can't do that with a bandsaw.

In the end I think both have their pluses and minuses, but after a decade of owning my slabber it would be my single tool of choice.

That answers a lot of my questions... I'm not quite sure how much will be done in house and how much flipped yet... Here is a question for you how long per cut do you think it would take to cut a 48' wide slab on a bandmill vs a slabber ? once you factor in..
1) Speed of cut on bandsaw mill vs slabber
2) changing of blades
3) cost of blades
I guess my question is if I'm in this for the long run is it cheaper/ more cost efficient to only use a dedicated slabber or to cut on a bandmill and flatten on a swing mill planer right when it comes off the bandmill or after it comes out of the kiln? Maybe I'm off in assuming it takes over twice as long to cut on a slabber than bandmill meaning 300 hrs on the bandmill vs 600 on the slabber for the same amount of work down the road which if you time is say worth $50 an hour the planer blade on a swing mill will pay for itself over time vs a straight slabber.. Thanks, Drew

We need to take a step back here. What exactly are you trying to do? Are you trying to cut and sell green slabs, or sell dry slabs that can be used immediately? Or are you looking to build furniture from slabs like I do? The reality is, it doesn't matter if it takes one hour to cut a log or two because it can take years to dry thick slabs. The bottleneck isn't in the cutting, its in the drying. So like I said, what are you trying to do?

[Drebs]

There are a lot of pluses and drawbacks to slabbers and bandsaws. I have experience on both. Unlike a lot of guys who just cut their slabs and sell them, I build finished furniture out of mine. Outside of cutting the trees down, I do everything in house. Unfortunately the myth that you're going to save a lot more material and money with a bandsaw because of the kerf is one I see repeated far too often. Yes, your average bandsaw has a 1/8" kerf while a slabber has a 3/8" kerf. Unlike a slabber, a bandsaw can get wavy in the cut, especially as the blade guides get further apart. It's not the fault of the machine, it's just the methodology. Most bandsaws are only running a 1.25" blade so they're going to flex and wave a bit in the cut, especially with knots and defects. It's basic physics. Obviously a rigid 3/8" slabber bar isn't going to do that, but it's going to cut slower. I've cut thousands of slabs on my slabber, and had the opportunity to put a wide cut bandsaw through the paces. What I noticed is the slabs cut on the bandsaw have wave that need to be surfaced out. Because I'm building finished furniture out of mine, they need to be flattened after they come out of the kiln. If I was just flipping them down the road and I didn't care about the rest of the work, that would be one thing. But mine need to be dead flat after drying which is done either on my CNC router or my Lucas 827 swing blade with the planer attachment. So while you might save on the kerf and the speed on the cutting, you'll have to spend a lot more time surfacing it flat to get rid of the wave on the backend. In the end the whole argument of kerf becomes mute. You're comparing six of one to half a dozen of the other. If you're doing everything from the cutting to the drying to the finished furniture in house like I am, the argument doesn't hold a lot of weight. I would rather have dead flat slabs coming off the mill. There are enough issues to deal with in drying slabs, like cupping and warping that need to be surfaced out without adding waves. At the end of the day it all boils down to time and money.

One thing you'll have to keep in mind about cutting with a bandsaw versus a slabber is that if you encounter any metal or foreign debris, you'll have to stop and change the bandsaw blade immediately. With the slabber you can typically finish the cut. With the bandsaw if you try to ram it forward it will climb and dive all over the place and ruin the slab. I've cut through a dozen nails with a slabber in one pass on 32" walnut and it still cut a dead flat slab. You can't do that with a bandsaw.

In the end I think both have their pluses and minuses, but after a decade of owning my slabber it would be my single tool of choice.

That answers a lot of my questions... I'm not quite sure how much will be done in house and how much flipped yet... Here is a question for you how long per cut do you think it would take to cut a 48' wide slab on a bandmill vs a slabber ? once you factor in..
1) Speed of cut on bandsaw mill vs slabber
2) changing of blades
3) cost of blades
I guess my question is if I'm in this for the long run is it cheaper/ more cost efficient to only use a dedicated slabber or to cut on a bandmill and flatten on a swing mill planer right when it comes off the bandmill or after it comes out of the kiln? Maybe I'm off in assuming it takes over twice as long to cut on a slabber than bandmill meaning 300 hrs on the bandmill vs 600 on the slabber for the same amount of work down the road which if you time is say worth $50 an hour the planer blade on a swing mill will pay for itself over time vs a straight slabber.. Thanks, Drew

We need to take a step back here. What exactly are you trying to do? Are you trying to cut and sell green slabs, or sell dry slabs that can be used immediately? Or are you looking to build furniture from slabs like I do? The reality is, it doesn't matter if it takes one hour to cut a log or two because it can take years to dry thick slabs. The bottleneck isn't in the cutting, its in the drying. So like I said, what are you trying to do?

Understood, Yeh i am cutting green wood, I have a kiln 20' x 7', my drying is down to about 1-1.25 year.. 6-9 months air drying 3 months in the kiln. 
Im not quite sure yet as I haven't decided if we can scale to furniture ( i gotta find the right people to help out i don't have the time) right now I've been selling slabs and beams to DIY customers i know at the end of the day being realistic i will have to do both to make this work.
However something I've been playing with ... there are lots of dead elms around here that have been sitting in vacant lots thats are many many years dry cut one of them on a buddy's band mill they are bone dry 7% MC and beautiful... if I can cut these (and there is more than plenty).. they will have no down time ready to go now.. i like the idea of that I also know dry wood like that would be much better suited for a bandmill over chain slabber (I think).. However right now getting many green trees form local arborist so based on what I'm doing now green wood .
I'm justing thinking I would rather have 6 not 8 hours (fictitious numbers) into a few logs (minus the drying) better margins. However if you have to spend 6 on the bandmill then spend 4 hours flattening(10 hours). vs 8 on the slabber then 2 flattening(10 hours) then its a dime a dozen one way or another...Unless it with a bandmill and a swingmill planer its 6 hours cutting and 2 hours on the swing planer (saving 2 hours) %20 of time which as we all know adds up over time.  Thanks for the insight... 

[Drebs]

There are a lot of pluses and drawbacks to slabbers and bandsaws. I have experience on both. Unlike a lot of guys who just cut their slabs and sell them, I build finished furniture out of mine. Outside of cutting the trees down, I do everything in house. Unfortunately the myth that you're going to save a lot more material and money with a bandsaw because of the kerf is one I see repeated far too often. Yes, your average bandsaw has a 1/8" kerf while a slabber has a 3/8" kerf. Unlike a slabber, a bandsaw can get wavy in the cut, especially as the blade guides get further apart. It's not the fault of the machine, it's just the methodology. Most bandsaws are only running a 1.25" blade so they're going to flex and wave a bit in the cut, especially with knots and defects. It's basic physics. Obviously a rigid 3/8" slabber bar isn't going to do that, but it's going to cut slower. I've cut thousands of slabs on my slabber, and had the opportunity to put a wide cut bandsaw through the paces. What I noticed is the slabs cut on the bandsaw have wave that need to be surfaced out. Because I'm building finished furniture out of mine, they need to be flattened after they come out of the kiln. If I was just flipping them down the road and I didn't care about the rest of the work, that would be one thing. But mine need to be dead flat after drying which is done either on my CNC router or my Lucas 827 swing blade with the planer attachment. So while you might save on the kerf and the speed on the cutting, you'll have to spend a lot more time surfacing it flat to get rid of the wave on the backend. In the end the whole argument of kerf becomes mute. You're comparing six of one to half a dozen of the other. If you're doing everything from the cutting to the drying to the finished furniture in house like I am, the argument doesn't hold a lot of weight. I would rather have dead flat slabs coming off the mill. There are enough issues to deal with in drying slabs, like cupping and warping that need to be surfaced out without adding waves. At the end of the day it all boils down to time and money.

One thing you'll have to keep in mind about cutting with a bandsaw versus a slabber is that if you encounter any metal or foreign debris, you'll have to stop and change the bandsaw blade immediately. With the slabber you can typically finish the cut. With the bandsaw if you try to ram it forward it will climb and dive all over the place and ruin the slab. I've cut through a dozen nails with a slabber in one pass on 32" walnut and it still cut a dead flat slab. You can't do that with a bandsaw.

In the end I think both have their pluses and minuses, but after a decade of owning my slabber it would be my single tool of choice.

That answers a lot of my questions... I'm not quite sure how much will be done in house and how much flipped yet... Here is a question for you how long per cut do you think it would take to cut a 48' wide slab on a bandmill vs a slabber ? once you factor in..
1) Speed of cut on bandsaw mill vs slabber
2) changing of blades
3) cost of blades
I guess my question is if I'm in this for the long run is it cheaper/ more cost efficient to only use a dedicated slabber or to cut on a bandmill and flatten on a swing mill planer right when it comes off the bandmill or after it comes out of the kiln? Maybe I'm off in assuming it takes over twice as long to cut on a slabber than bandmill meaning 300 hrs on the bandmill vs 600 on the slabber for the same amount of work down the road which if you time is say worth $50 an hour the planer blade on a swing mill will pay for itself over time vs a straight slabber.. Thanks, Drew

We need to take a step back here. What exactly are you trying to do? Are you trying to cut and sell green slabs, or sell dry slabs that can be used immediately? Or are you looking to build furniture from slabs like I do? The reality is, it doesn't matter if it takes one hour to cut a log or two because it can take years to dry thick slabs. The bottleneck isn't in the cutting, its in the drying. So like I said, what are you trying to do?

Trying to revive this thread as I'm the OP and I am drying them and I will be getting a slabmizer flattener either way for the shop and kiln at the shop. The mill will be in another location 5 miles away and I will transport the slabs to the shop to dry in the kiln then flatten .
I suppose the main concern in time and effort vs money .. the Lucas dedicated slab Miller is 11k vs the Hudson 52 28,000 with all the options and power feed I want... I suppose the question is how hard is it to push a Lucas mill I see guys putting a lot of weight into then I hear guys just say it's an easy walk .. 
2nd question would be with 2 logs the same size how much longer does the Lucas take than the band mill 
And finally cost of buying blades/ chains and effort of re sharpening chains. How many times can you resharpen a chain for the cost of buying a blade and sending it off the get sharpened what's the price benefit ?
Thanks, Drew

[terrifictimbersllc]

I put a lot of time on a Peterson using the chain slabber.  I could never see how to efficiently sharpen a chain on the mill so I made up and carried 10-20 chains with me, changing them on the job and sharpening with a chain grinder back at home. Unless you hit something the sharpening of a chain takes off very little material, they can be sharpened many times, it's not like resharpeing a band where you can get 5-10 sharpenings on the good side or they break earlier.

Chain slabbing is very hard noisy dusty work compared to bandsawing with power feed.  You're right next to the engine during most or at least some of the cut and ought to be wearing double ear protection and an efficient dust mask.  Compared to a power feed bandsaw, chain slabbing is much more difficult and time consuming work.  In my opinion this is the biggest difference between your two choices.  I think the more slabbing you wish to do the more the choice becomes a bandsaw. 

Also it's not so much chain wear that is your expense (not counting initial chain purchase), but bar wear.  Even if you carefully maintain and tension the chain the bar will wear out perhaps every 100-150 hours of slabbing and need replacing.  The wear that causes bar demise is not the loss of depth of the groove but the groove being worn wider at the bottom, which isnt overcome by closing the groove at the top.

[longtime lurker]

I put a lot of time on a Peterson using the chain slabber.  I could never see how to efficiently sharpen a chain on the mill so I made up and carried 10-20 chains with me, changing them on the job and sharpening with a chain grinder back at home. Unless you hit something the sharpening of a chain takes off very little material, they can be sharpened many times, it's not like resharpeing a band where you can get 5-10 sharpenings on the good side or they break earlier.

Chain slabbing is very hard noisy dusty work compared to bandsawing with power feed.  You're right next to the engine during most or at least some of the cut and ought to be wearing double ear protection and an efficient dust mask.  Compared to a power feed bandsaw, chain slabbing is much more difficult and time consuming work.  In my opinion this is the biggest difference between your two choices.  I think the more slabbing you wish to do the more the choice becomes a bandsaw.

Also it's not so much chain wear that is your expense (not counting initial chain purchase), but bar wear.  Even if you carefully maintain and tension the chain the bar will wear out perhaps every 100-150 hours of slabbing and need replacing.  The wear that causes bar demise is not the loss of depth of the groove but the groove being worn wider at the bottom, which isnt overcome by closing the groove at the top.

^^^ WHAT HE SAID!!!

but I'll add a couple of caveats:

I mighta cut a few slabs over the years but not a lot because I had a defacto policy of not competing with alla other guys hacking small logs into slabs. We only ever played with the biguns.
I never worked real hard pushing the Lucas in some of the toughest timbers in the world. When slabbing I mostly tried to align the log downhill in the bush the few times I did it out there and wasn't above making my own downhills with a dozer.  Gravity assist was pretty good, but at home which was always my preferred place to work from due to proximity to other things worth doing I had it set up on a concrete shed floor and I'd put a rope bridle on the saw frame connected to a coil spring, then I had a hand winch set on a post out the end. Knew another guy had a better setup that had a series of pulleys on a post and a set of tractor counterweights he'd winch up and down. (even pressure helps make for consistent cutting speed and smooth finishes) Nurse the saw into the cut, then walk around, wind the winch up until I had tension on the spring, and go run the other saw or do some other useful thing... remembering to keep walking back every couple minutes to tap wedges into the cut behind the saw and put a few more turns on the winch handle. I'm just too lazy for alla that working hard stuff I guess.

Another is that I always used to buy my chains in sets of three or four, and run them as a set. Because I was at home I had a chain grinder close handy (oregon) and it meant I could rotate through all my chains without having to reset the grinder for individual chains, do 4 left sides, 4 right sides, do the rakers and start cutting again. Kept it nice and simple that way. I know couple guys who have shifted from .404 chain to 3/8" Tungsten chain on their slabbers... they hate sharpening chains more than me obviously.

Another is that if you take the time to dial your chains and slabber in right you can get them to cut billiard table flat, which is no small feat in cuts 5' wide. Me I always figured a dead flat 1/2" wide cut didn't waste any more log than allowing for a crowned up 0.055" one and yanno... it was just easier to cut them flat at the start rather than having to gouge it out with a router type thingy attached to whatever later. As I said... I'm lazy. It also helps them sell when you can bang a straight edge over a rough slab and the customer doesn't see too much work for him to do either.

The last is that with $28k for the bandmill and $11k for the Lucas Slabber unit.... you will cut quicker with the bandmill. But you can also buy a whole whack of good slabbing logs for $17k. That's a pretty tough call and individual businesses can fall either side of it.

FWIW I don't own a Lucas anymore - and I won't presume to say which way anyone should jump on a mill purchase - but I gotta say that company (Lucas) are the best business hands down ever for standing behind their product. I wore out parts on mine that I don't think they'd ever replaced on a mill before and when I sold it it was still going strong....  call me a satisfied ex customer

[customsawyer]

I have 2 LT70 band mills and neither of them is the wide head. I also have the 76" Lucus dedicated slabber. I use the band mills when the log fits through the throat and the Lucus when it don't. With all the talk about flatter cuts VS. thinner kerf, I feel it is a mute point. When drying these big slabs they are going to move some. A 1/4" cup on a 24" wide slab is more than double the problem on a 48". I put several thousand pounds of weight on top of the slabs and they still move when drying. When it comes to the speed of the mills. I don't think that should factor in either. You will spend more time handling the log and slabs than you will cutting.

[Nebraska]

Just a thought  that has changed since you started this thread, take a look look at an EZ Boardwalk  50. Pushing my Boardwalk  isn't hard work at all in fact I do more holding back if the blade is sharp if I start  pushing very much its time to change blades.  It should be much faster than a chain slabber.  

[John S]

Since you indicated that you will be purchasing a Slabmizer, why not consider the LX250?  It lists for about the same dollar amount that you mentioned form the EZ Boardwalk 50.  Maybe WM would give you a discount for purchasing both.

[Nebraska]

Yes getting a discount from WM for buying two pieces would make sense, as I doubt there would be much difference in capabilities of the two machines.