Sinker Cypress Job

[Magicman]

During this Spring's high Mississippi water, this customer was busy floating partially sunken Cypress logs out with a 16' flat bottom boat.  He said that it sometimes took hours to move 100 yards

We finally got our schedules together.  Twenty-four logs from about 13" to over 30".  Some are pecky and some solid.  I'm sawing it all 5/4 in 8" and 6" widths of course with a few 4's thrown in.
 


Nice lineup.



Another view.
 


This one was over 30" and had very nice color.

[jueston]

those look like some fine logs, great color in that one that was opened up. any idea what the lumber will be used for? flooring maybe?

[WDH]

Are they as gritty as they look?

[Magicman]

Wall paneling and gritty.....yes.   :-\  Why 5/4 for wall paneling??  I don't question a customer when he has his mind made up.  I'll try to get some "pecky" pictures tomorrow.

[Bill Gaiche]

MM, looks like a good job to do. Tell me what do you mean by pecky? bg

[Jeff]

My definition of pecky is "decoratively rotten".

[Bill Gaiche]

Jeff, is the term you use rotten a bad thing or is the wood stabile or hard enough to make worthy projects. Thanks for your answer. bg

[Magicman]

Jeff's answer is 100% correct.  Structural strength is not necessary for paneling, etc.   I should have some pictures of pecky and possible burly tonight.  There is one big forked log that should be interesting.

There are also 4 Sinker Poplar logs.

[ladylake]

Nice looking lumber, what are those vertical lines.     Steve

[Buck]

MM, the last job I did like that I had a water hose close by. made the job a lot more pleasant. We cleaned and washed the logs and the mill the whole time we sawed. Sure is some fine looking wood. I took pics of my last one and never posted. My guy was a furniture builder.

[clww]

That should become great looking wood. Any idea how long it was submerged?

[Magicman]

Nice looking lumber, what are those vertical lines.     Steve 

Even though the logs were completely wet on the inside, I still leave the LubeMizer on.  Soapy water is cheap.  The customer had 10 of these logs in his pond for about 20 years.  The Mississippi River logs,  there is no way of knowing how long they had been submerged.  You can tell by the saw marks that the grit and dirt was not kind to my blades.

Tell me what do you mean by pecky? bg

Here are a couple of pictures of Pecky Cypress.



You know that it is pecky before you open a face because of the pock marks.






Two examples of typical Pecky Cypress.



This ugly log sawed out a couple hundred bf.



This is a 33" crotch log, and this was inside.









I finished the day and this job with this Honey Locust.



Total lumber actually scaled 3819 bf.  There was a nice stack of 4X4's, etc. that I did not scale.  My gift to him.

But he gave me a nice tip.   

[paul case]

W O W!!!!!!!

that is some kinda wacked out grain on that crotch log! kewl. 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 

i had a old red oak log given to me a few years back that had been down for about 8 years. it was pecky inside like those cypress but i threw it away cause i thought it was rotten. if i had only known ???        pc

[Bill Gaiche]

MM that crotch lumber will surley make some pretty furniture or something. Very pretty grain. Do you know what the customer is going to use it for? bg

[cypresskayaksllc]

that a good find.

[SwampDonkey]

Just never know what's inside a log.  8) Nice work. 

[WDH]

Pecky cypress is hard to find and highly valuable.  That crotch grain is awesome.  This will be a memorable job, for sure.

[Holmes]

 That is some beautiful wood . Thanks for the pics.

[Taylortractornut]

I used to have pics  from the 80's of my dad in Port Gibsom MS building  onto the port.    They  did a big dirt job and unearthed some  giant Cypress trees.       They made a levee so another company could dredge  out the land for the new port.   In digging down they hit thses giant trees  some as big around as scraper tires.       One of the pics showed 2 D8Ks and a 245 Cat hoe  pulling them out.  The owner of the company had them  milled for a  house.

[zopi]

Nice! I >love< to saw cypress...

[Magicman]

With the proper marketing the lumber that I sawed in two days could be worth $20K-$30K, but he is using it as paneling in his new home.   

[mandolin]

Magicman, there's a man who lives close to me at East Lincoln who had a bunch of cypress logs piled up close to the road. His last name is Acey. Do you know him? Somebody told me that he had a man with a Woodmizer sawing for him.

[metalspinner]

Beautiful looking stuff, Magicman!  I wish we had cypress up here.

My uncle panelled his living room with pecky cypress 30 years ago.  Every Christmas holiday while sitting around his house, he tells the tale of how difficult it was obtaining the pecky cypress. :D  It is a very intersting look on a large scale project, though. He also made a bar top with some of the thicker pieces and poured on a thick coating of epoxy to fill in the peck plus another 1/2" or so.

[millwright]

Thats some really pretty grain on them boards, we dont get to much cypress here in northern Wi.

[Magicman]

Do you know him? Somebody told me that he had a man with a Woodmizer sawing for him. 

You should have stopped by and said hello. https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php/topic,51744.0.html