Whatcha Sawin' 2021 ??

[Beavertooth]

Thanks Lynn

[richhiway]

This morning's sawing began here last week


 
When my customer showed me this 46" butt Water Oak log that indicated metal.  


 
I parked the sawmill beside it Saturday, and we returned this morning.


 
The first order of business was to 'jump butt' 5' from the butt and 3' from the top end leaving a nice 12' log.


 
The log was sorta egg shaped and 36" on both the butt and top end.  The weight calculator shows 5428 lbs. but that would be a log with taper.  This log had none


 
The Kubota rolled it onto the loading arms and I would take over from there.  The Magic Hook is secured to the log clamp with no slack.


 
And the loader & clamp working together loaded the log.  


 
So now let the 'gunbarreling' begin.


 
And continue.


 
Until I had three 6" cants for the saw through.  Notice that the pith check runs horizontal with the boards.

The heat forced us to quit at 10:30 so we will return Friday to edge the flitches and saw his last log.  It will be interesting to see how many board feet this log yielded.

Nice work. I have always taken pleasure in watching a professional at work. The ease at which a skilled person can accomplish a hard task is as study that more should undertake.. If I wasn't so far away I would come give you a hand. 

[richhiway]

Have not sawn much lately. Hot, Rain, busy at work. Did cut 6 nice ash logs into 5/4 boards for a friend. We did not think to take pictures. We have a tremendous amount of dead ash from the borer around here.
I did build a nice maple an cherry table for a friend

 who did some no charge real estate legal work for me though. 

[WV Sawmiller]

 

Before  

In between  

After

  94.5 mile round trip trip to resume interrupted sawing job from my failed coils. 12 hours from arrival to departure. Did not scale the lumber. Mostly ash, a little poplar one small walnut. 4/4 & 5/4 boards. I'm guessing around 1500-1800 bf. 7.7 hours on the engine, one full tank of gas used. Several large logs that had to be gun barreled to fit the mill. 8 blades but one was out of set and replaced at the start. Plan on finishing tomorrow.

  Nearly wiped out 3 deer at 8:07 pm on the way home. Locked the brakes set on the horn and they barely cleared the area.

[terrifictimbersllc]

Trips and days like that are getting old for me. Yours an hr each way not too bad.  I've had 2.5 hr each way plus extra on the way home in rush hour traffic. 

[HemlockKing]

That long of a drive and by the time I get there I'd be getting out of the cab of the truck like a cripple lol . Dang back pain. At least it goes away as I start moving 

[terrifictimbersllc]

You and me both. Also other issues if I didn't make a pitstop several times on the way back. Wife asks what's wrong with you? I tell her I'm not really home yet.🥵

[WV Sawmiller]

   No pictures today. It was after dark when I quit and too late to take a picture. Very similar to yesterday with 7.5 hours on the mill. One gnarly ash I whittled down 2 sides and cut some one side LE 8/4 for bookmatching to make wide tables or such. Customer did not know what he would do with them. 

   My debarker quit while working on the contrary ash log. I am sure it is a loose or broken wire. I fixed one broken wire. early on today and just need to do basic troubleshooting. I think we have 6 more small logs to saw but it was just too dark to safely continue so one more trip to finish, tally and collect my pay. We started with a slight rain delay, I had to move to mill about 5-6 ft up the hill to get more working room and had to jack it up and re-level it after one large knocked it off its shims at the rear.

[burdman_22]

Maybe not the right thread, but I was planning to buy a clean sweetgum log tomorrow and was wondering what a fair price was. It is 35 ft long, 18 inches in diameter on the big end and 14 on the little end (also pretty straight). No limbs from what I can tell in the picture. Is $75 too much or too little or about right?

[Southside]

Well that's about 355 board feet.  Right now around here that log delivered to a mill would bring $300 or so per 1000 BF, or $0.30 per BF, multiply that by 355 and you have $106.50, delivered, assuming it does not have any rot, sweep, or other defect that deducts from the measurement.  

Gum has a twisted grain to it, as such it moves a lot so best to quarter saw it for flat lumber.  That log is too small to quarter saw.  Really it's two switch ties with a little pallet wood.  

Guess it depends on what you need is the answer.  

[burdman_22]

I'm just sawing into 1x6s. My initial offer to the guy was $50, but I went up to $75 when he said no. Probably should have just passed on it when he said no to $50

[Magicman]

Personally I would say no and move on, that is unless you have a need for twisty 1X6's. 

[Tom King]

The last Sweetgum I sold, I got $1 a ton for it.  It was a leftover load from a thinning job.  I was just glad they got it away from here.  Otherwise, it would have just laid there and rotted.

[WDH]

The log weighs about 1.5 tons.  In the timber market as stumpage for low grade or pallet wood, it is worth on the stump $25 per ton.  That is the only market for Sweetgum logs.  So, on a timber sale as a standing tree in the woods it is worth about $38.  Add about $25 per ton for logging and delivery to a commercial hardwood mill which is another $38. The log is worth about $76 and your offer is spot on. 

Of course you cannot sell one log to a commercial hardwood mill in Alabama, so actually, commercially the log is worthless. It sucks as firewood and is a poor wood for cooking or smoking meat.  It is only worth what an individual like you is willing to pay.  The seller has no other alternative except to let it lay and rot or use it as poor firewood with low heating value.  

[John1946]

 trying out new Predator engine on chestnut oak 10 5/8" x 11" x 21'

[WV Sawmiller]

%$*&@#U#: fat fingered another response off into cyber space. I'm going to remove or tape over that button as I can't think of anything else I use it for.

  I returned to the site 50 miles away and sawed 5-6 more small logs this morning to finish nearly 5K bf over just over 3 days hard sawing and 5 round trips involved. Mostly 4/4, a few 5/4 stair treads and a few 8/4 and even a handful of 4X4 posts. Mostly ash, walnut, a couple of old poplar and a few cedars and even one small cherry.


A handful of cedar to be stacked. I sure wish I had some pretty cedar like Patrick down in NC gets.


Mostly ash, a few walnut to be stacked.


Mostly walnut with a few 4-8 ft long 4X4 posts


Ash and maybe even a handful of poplar boards. A few 5/4 on the right stack. Stack got too high for my customer so he got the ladder to help. Customer was showing his wife the pretty spalting in some of these boards first thing yesterday morning. They were both real happy with them.


Mostly walnut. Some really pretty lumber in this stack.

 Got home and unhooked the mill, a passer-by stopped and talked. Looks like another small, part of 1 day job I'll get in a few weeks and it is only 8-9 miles up the road and the kind I really like. (I swallowed a gnat while talking with him and nearly strangled to death! How can something so small cause so much havoc?)

 I did a service on the mill till near dark which was about 8 hours overdue. I'll change the oil and filter in the morning ahead of schedule and saw one 4' long WO log for a repeat customer.

  Need to send a BOM to my log supplier and see if he can provide about 5K bf of poplar the sizes listed. I suspect he can and that will be an October project.

[donbj]

Nice job, but someone needs to teach them how to properly sticker. There can be quite a bit of degrade by sloppy stickering

[WDH]

Your customer is going to have to move quite a whack of wood.   Left in place it may not fare well.  I HATE re-work. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   He put some separator strips in some of the some of the stacks so he can lift them with the forks on his tractor which is not running right now.

  I had a repeat customer bring me this gnarly white oak "log" to cut into 8/4 stair treads. I told him if he'd cut it 3" longer it would have fit across the loading arms so I used the chains as a sling. I used about every trick I knew to rotate it and move it a few inches at a time. Ended up with about 7 - 2" X 10"  treads and several 2X6's he can join to make a couple more if he wants. He said he was only expecting a couple so I did not feel as bad for not getting a lot more.

[Peter Drouin]

32' W pine for a timber frame. The next frame will only have 22'


 

  

[HemlockKing]

 

 

 

  Cutting atv road and slabbing what I take out for swamp and creek bridge material. Absolutely hate rutting up land

[firefighter ontheside]

Last summer I milled some elm logs.  Today my wife and I loaded it all into the kiln.  This was the first time she has helped me load wood.  I was impressed as she was able to help me carry live edge slabs that were 10' long, 18" wide and 8/4.  She's a little one.  I was very happy with how the elm dried.  Over 10' they have a little twist and a little bow, but not much for being long.  There is no cup.  Even the 1 x 10s dried pretty flat.  On top of that we stacked a bunch of 4/4 quartersawn walnut.  I love the way those boards turned out with half heart and half sapwood.

[HemlockKing]

  He put some separator strips in some of the some of the stacks so he can lift them with the forks on his tractor which is not running right now.

 I had a repeat customer bring me this gnarly white oak "log" to cut into 8/4 stair treads. I told him if he'd cut it 3" longer it would have fit across the loading arms so I used the chains as a sling. I used about every trick I knew to rotate it and move it a few inches at a time. Ended up with about 7 - 2" X 10"  treads and several 2X6's he can join to make a couple more if he wants. He said he was only expecting a couple so I did not feel as bad for not getting a lot more.

That's a billet of wood more than a log lol 

[Magicman]

Nice job, but someone needs to teach them how to properly sticker. There can be quite a bit of degrade by sloppy stickering

It may not be a case of not knowing how, but an instance where the lumber will have to be moved to it's final drying spot after the sawing is done.  This is the case very often when the logs are sawn at the landing.
Yes a second handlings but the customer may be doing the best that he can with the help that he has.

[donbj]

Nice job, but someone needs to teach them how to properly sticker. There can be quite a bit of degrade by sloppy stickering

It may not be a case of not knowing how, but an instance where the lumber will have to be moved to it's final drying spot after the sawing is done.  This is the case very often when the logs are sawn at the landing.
Yes a second handlings but the customer may be doing the best that he can with the help that he has.

That's a good point.