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Picked up my mill yesterday!

Started by WoodenHead, October 05, 2011, 08:26:20 PM

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WoodenHead

I picked up my mill yesterday!  8) 8) 8)  It's an LT28 with 18HP diesel and logdeck package.  ;D 

Myself and a couple of my guys went through WM's instruction session on how to use the mill.   :P
It was a good 6 hours long, but we went through everything from setup to adjustment to towing and got to saw our first boards.  8) I would highly recommend taking the training (it is optional) if you're new at the sawdust game like me.

Since I know you guys like pics....

Here is a picture of the mill at the WM training session:



This is a closer view of the diesel engine:



And this is my first load of cedar logs:


WDH

That is a whack of cedar logs!  Congrats on the mill, you are going to be very busy soon.  I hope that you have a whack of stickers ;D.
Woodmizer LT40HDD35, John Deere 2155, Kubota M5-111, Kubota L2501, Nyle L53 Dehumidification Kiln, and a passion for all things with leafs, twigs, and bark.  hamsleyhardwood.com

Jasperfield

Congratulations!

That is one fine mill.

fishpharmer

We were all newbee's once, welcome to FF!! 8)  Heck of a fine mill you got yourself.  Plenty of practice logs too.  What are the plans for the lumber?
Built my own band mill with the help of Forestry Forum. 
Lucas 618 with 50" slabber
WoodmizerLT-40 Super Hydraulic
Deere 5065E mfwd w/553 loader

The reason a lot of people do not recognize opportunity is because it usually goes around wearing overalls looking like hard work. --Tom A. Edison

cypresskayaksllc

I got to wear a pair of sunglasses to look at that mill.
LT40HDDR, JD950FEL, Weimaraner

WoodenHead

I hope to turn the EWC into 4"x4" and 6"x6" as well as some 5/4 decking.  Some is for myself (replacing the back deck) and some is for others.  The 4"x4" is primarily for ground mounted solar (PV) stuctures (my primary line of work).  We typically use steel and aluminum, but some of my competitors have had success with wood.  The EWC has decent longevity and stability.

As for stickers....  that is our next challenge.  I welcome some adivce on this.  I have seen recommendations from 1" strips of 3/4" plywood to kiln dried spruce to green stickers cut from the same batch of logs being sawn.  Should the stickers match the species of the logs? 

WDH

No, you do not have to match the species.  They can be cut from most any wood.  Pine is good, and I have to say, I have cut some from eastern red cedar, and I like them.  The good thing in you favor is that you almost can't mess up eastern red cedar.  It does not stain bad and it dries faster than a speeding bullet almost any other species.

If it was me, I would cut stickers from the edgings off the lumber as you square up the slabs and use these for the first time.  After this first batch, they will be good and dry and you will be set.  However, let me say that I would not use the edgings as fresh cut stickers for any other type of wood that I can think of except for dry pine. 

If you do cut stickers from the edgings, take care and cut them to make quality stickers and they will serve you well in the future.  If you were a commercial operation, I would not recommend ERC for stickers as they will not stand up to the abuse of the automatic stickering equipment that the bigger commercial sawmills use.  But, for cutting and air drying your own wood, I would use them.
Woodmizer LT40HDD35, John Deere 2155, Kubota M5-111, Kubota L2501, Nyle L53 Dehumidification Kiln, and a passion for all things with leafs, twigs, and bark.  hamsleyhardwood.com

zopi

Buck a log to six feet...saw to a cant, saw 4/4 all the way to the deck...stand em up, saw 4/4 all the way to the deck...whack o stickers...easy.
Congrats on the mill....it will serve you well for many years.
Got Wood?
LT-15G GO chassis added.
WM sharpener and setter
And lots of junk.

sparky1

what does a mill like this run for a price? Im not to knowledgable on milling, but im deffinetly getting intrigued by alot of posts on this site.. I like to tinker and these look like something id like to dabble with a bit..
Shaun J

jueston

that is a heck of a pile of logs for someone who just got the mill. Congrats, I'm very jealous....


Bill Gaiche

newbee , nice logs. Thats one fine looking mill. Hope you enjoy it to the max.bg

schakey

 smiley_clapping smiley_turkey_dancing
Think-Dream-Plan-Do

Chuck White

Congratulations on the LT28.

Nice machine.
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

thecfarm

newbee,you'll be changing your name in no time.  ;D  Nice mill.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

ladylake


Nice mill, you'll like that diesel. Mine uses 1/2 gph less than my 27hp Kohler did which doesn't seem like much but with 3000 hours on the diesel I saved 1500 gals of fuel at over $3 a gallon thats $4500.   Steve
Timberking B20  18000  hours +  Case75xt grapple + forks+8" snow bucket + dirt bucket   770 Oliver   Lots(too many) of chainsaws, Like the Echo saws and the Stihl and Husky     W5  Case loader   1  trailers  Wright sharpener     Suffolk  setter Volvo MCT125c skid loader

WoodenHead

Thanks for the encouragement and the advice.  The diesel is great - purrs quite nicely.  :)

Sparky1 - checkout Woodmizer's website for pricing.  The LT28 was very comparable to the TK1400.

It is a pile of logs.  I don't have enough white cedar on my own property so I purchased some...and it came by the truckload. ;D  I seem to have caught the tail end of the season for cedar because everyone was out and not cutting again until next year.  I found someone who had some left, but had to take a substantial amount.

The railing of the deck of my home was originially white pine and starting to rot after six years.  It is becoming a safety issue for my kids.  The deck (and wrap around porch) are fairly large so it was a great way to help justify a mill  ;)  I bought the most mill I could afford.  

I was pleased to find out the the LT28 deck is the same frame that is used for the LT40 on up through to the LT70 so it should be rugged.  Perhaps some of the WM hydraulic log turning features can be added later with some creative thinking  ???

timbuck2

You should easily be able to "sharpen" your skills on that pile of cedar!

tcsmpsi

That's one fine looking mill, and mess of cedar.  Which should make for a great beginning.  Throughout what I have cut, that cedar behaves the best.

Welcome!   :)
\\\"In the end, it is a moral question as to whether man applies what he has learned or not.\\\" - C. Jung

Magicman

Congratulations on the new sawmill and the beginning of your sawyer life.   :)
Knothole Sawmill, LLC     '98 Wood-Mizer LT40SuperHydraulic   WM Million BF Club Member   WM Pro Sawyer Network

It's Weird being the Same Age as Old People

Never allow your "need" to make money to exceed your "desire" to provide quality service.....The Magicman

Tom L

good luck with the mill! I have the exact make and model. really is a nice machine.
hope you have a better area to store all of you wood than I do. trying to save some money now to buy a big enough shed to store the stuff in. you should see my garage, it looks like one of those hording tv shows, wood stacked everywhere. no where to walk. tried to take over my enclosed porch but the old lady would have none of it. 

WoodenHead

I'm in the planning stages of a shed.  My wife has set a few rules for me.  The most important being that I'm not allowed to have piles of sawdust, lumber and logs everywhere.  So, I'm looking at building something that is good for air drying lumber and operating the mill.  We use a lot of steel 4"x4" square tubing, so I had considered using that to fabricate the frame of the building (like post and beam, but with steel instead).  However, I need to confirm that I can span 20 feet without support.  The mill would go on the south end of the building with a dividing wall inside to perhaps provide a little bit more shelter.  The long edge would run roughly north-south and I'm looking at about 24' in width.

zopi

She said what? Bwahahahahahaha! She will learn.
Got Wood?
LT-15G GO chassis added.
WM sharpener and setter
And lots of junk.

zopi

Quote from: Tom L on October 06, 2011, 02:52:08 PM
good luck with the mill! I have the exact make and model. really is a nice machine.
hope you have a better area to store all of you wood than I do. trying to save some money now to buy a big enough shed to store the stuff in. you should see my garage, it looks like one of those hording tv shows, wood stacked everywhere. no where to walk. tried to take over my enclosed porch but the old lady would have none of it. 

"Buy?" You have a sawmill...."Build." Go getcha a whack of roofing metal and a bucket of nails and get busy...
Got Wood?
LT-15G GO chassis added.
WM sharpener and setter
And lots of junk.

Tom L

Quote from: zopi on October 06, 2011, 10:04:39 PM
Quote from: Tom L on October 06, 2011, 02:52:08 PM
good luck with the mill! I have the exact make and model. really is a nice machine.
hope you have a better area to store all of you wood than I do. trying to save some money now to buy a big enough shed to store the stuff in. you should see my garage, it looks like one of those hording tv shows, wood stacked everywhere. no where to walk. tried to take over my enclosed porch but the old lady would have none of it. 

"Buy?" You have a sawmill...."Build." Go getcha a whack of roofing metal and a bucket of nails and get busy...

wish it was that easy here in NJ, I can build anything I want but the taxes go thru the roof, I have a friend in town put up a 20 x 30 bld on a slab and it cost's him $5000 per year in extra taxes. the stuff you put up here has to be portable. not permanent. I would love to put up a nice saw shed like a lot of guy's here have. but the taxes don't justify the use. If I keep a structure under 800 sq. ft and keep it portable there is no taxes on it

can have two or three if I want. too many nosey township employees here who get paid overtime on saturdays to ride around and make trouble for illegal non permitted. not taxed buildings and sheds

so there is a cost to make everything work, and overhead for me is one cost I would do without. I can't make it so expensive to live here that I can no longer afford it.

so I will continue to save up to buy one or two portable sheds. that I can use that don't cost an arm and a leg for the lifetime of the buildings


paul case

i bet you could build porable sheds yourself too. probably just as good as the ones you can buy except fitted more to your needs. if overhead is a concern then you could even save some money by building it yourself. just build it on cants so it can be moved and dont tie it down. your local home improvement store probably sells plans and instructions.  pc
life is too short to be too serious. (some idiot)
2013 LT40SHE25 and Riehl edger,  WM 94 LT40 hd E15. Cut my sawing ''teeth'' on an EZ Boardwalk
sawing oak.hickory,ERC,walnut and almost anything else that shows up.
Don't get phylosophical with me. you will loose me for sure.
pc

WoodenHead

Although I am along a busy route, I am tucked in about 1500 ft. in the woods on my property (my driveway is exactly half a mile long).  So I'm not too worried about nosey inspectors  :)

I do like the suggestion of milling my own shed, even if it is only part of it.  I was thinking about pine post and beam with purchased trusses designed for the span.  The only issue I see is the spans that I would like.  Since I will have 16 foot material coming off the mill, I figured 20 ft openings would be wise.  What size of pine beams/posts would I need for that kind of span?

I buy steel regularly so I can get that for a reasonable price in lengths up to 48 ft (up to 60ft for I-beam).  Of course steel is still more expensive than wood.  And I would like to maximize the use of the mill.  I'm not sure I have enough experience with post and beam construction.

Here's a quick sketch of what I had in mind:


whitepe

Newbee   congrats on the new LT28 and diesel too even better.   Hmmm  Maybe it's time to consider a trade-up of my LT15.  Does WM do trade ins?   Anyway I can remember picking
up my LT15 back in 2002.   Took a day off work to drive to Indy to get it and stopped at the beef house restaurant on I-74 near lllinois/Indiana border for dinner that night. I always
wished I had a few extra bucks back then to get the trailer option but it was not to be.   Good luck with trying to keep the wife happy by not having any piles of logs/lumber/sawdust laying around.
I failed miserably in that respect except for the sawdust which I do get picked up.  I tell people that I bought a sawmill and ever since then logs have been falling from the sky.
For years now I have to listen to my wife harass me with her favorite saying.  Got Wood?   in the theme of the Got Milk?  commercials.    I never could get my wife interested
in doing much with the sawmill.  She grumbles if I ask her to help whenever I saw a log.   Maybe I should have picked up a few head of Holsteins a while back because when
I visited Brother Noble back in 2003 she rolled up her sleeves and helped Brother Noble's Mom with the milking while Brother Noble was showing me around his farm to look
at the equipment.   
blue by day, orange by night and green in between

zopi

Yeah, wm does trade ins, but you will be better off to sell on the open market...plus if you do a trade in you lose your two percent repeat offen.....err....customer discount...
A nice lady told me that awhile back..
Tom, I did not notice you were in joisey...bloody tax jockeys there...we need fewer nosy bureauRats....got a few here...
You can certainly build portable....about to build some "portable" here too, of course, how you would move a six or eight ton timber frame structure..I dunno....
They did not say, easily portable.
Got Wood?
LT-15G GO chassis added.
WM sharpener and setter
And lots of junk.

Slingshot



     But of course a 6 or 8 ton timber frame structure sitting on skids so it can be hooked up
to a bull dozer and scooted around is not likely to be blown over in a little windstorm. :D :D



_________________________
sling_shot




sparky1

we have the same crappy taxes here in wisconsin.. hard enough to afford the mortgage, let alone the taxes (which are already at 4grand a year) that keep climbing! yet our country is still trillions in the hole... It blows my mind!!
Shaun J

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