i have gotten a few questions on edging side lumber on a bandmill as of late so i decided to try to show how i do it. maybe someone else has a system they would like to share here too.
first while sawing i try to sort the boards needing edged into sizes and if they need edged on one side or on both. my examples are from edging pallet material 4'' and 6'' wide. i slide the boards off the end of my mill so they are easy to slide back for edging.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0072.JPG)
i stack serveral up on the mill flat and then stand up serveral boards at once and clamp them in place.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0080.JPG)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0074.JPG)
i then do some math. i allow 2'' for bark on the bottom then a 5 5/8 board plus 1/8 kerf plus a 3 5/8 board with anothe 1/8 kerf. first cut on this stack was 11 1/2''.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0076.JPG)
second cut was at 7 3/4'' yeilding a few good 3 5/8'' boards.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0077.JPG)
all the boards left under the clamp then need flipped over and all the good sorted from the junk and it looks like this.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0078.JPG)
then a cut at 5 3/4 finishes off the whole stack.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/SANY0079.JPG)
this is how i do it. i save it up so i can do serveral boards at once. pc
The single blade edger from woodmizer is very reasonable. I have one and it sure does save A LOT of time
Any way you do it, it's still a pain, too much handling. I do pretty much like pc, except on a woodmizer. I may be a little bit lazier. Instead of pushing the boards off the end of the mill, I throw them off the side onto the forks on a fel. Then I can use the tractor to dump the whole stack back on the mill.
Home made jig with a worm drive works good.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/26275/3670/Sept_Pics_012.JPG)
250
Are we looking at a worm drive? Interested in what you have.
I always (when doing 1 inch lumber) slide all flitches over onto the loading arms.
Then when the cant is sawed down to 6 inches, I loosen the clamp and put all of the flitches up on edge between the clamp and the cant!
Then I figure what height will give me a clean cut on at least one of the flitches. Once that cut is done, I loosen the clamp and take that board and flip it and place it next to the cant.
Then I will lower the blade 1 inch and make another cut.
If I have a clean edge, I will flip each clean edged board and place them next to the cant.
When I get to an even increment on one of the trimmed flitches (that is 12, 10, 8, 6) that board will be pulled off and stacked.
And it continues until all of the boards are clean on both sides.
When doing 2 inch or thicker, I edge one at a time.
I work in a log rich environment and make a slab cut to get a 6" board.I have a dead deck and the bark edge boards are stacked on it.I like to cut down to a 5" cant on the mill then throw the boards on to be edged gives them some support and no backstops to hit. Frank C.
Although we have an edger, we still edge our heavy and long stuff on the mill.
We accumulate the flitches to be edged on the loading arms. When we saw down to a small enough cant, we put the flitches back on the mill against the cant. We put the tallest ones against the cant that may have one clean edge - that way they don't need to be turned. The rest of the process is like in your pictures above. When the flitches are edged and off the mill, we then continue to saw the cant.
We don't save up the flitches. We edge them all before the next log rolls on the mill.
I do much the same as Chuck. I find it a whole lot better to stay right after them.
with the 70 and hydraulic clamp, edging on the mill alone isa dream compared to the 2 plane clamp on the 40
and I have an edger................. :D
i will have to take another pic or 2 . i piled those flitches real high today. i was trying to get a bundle of ties without stopping to edge and i did. 2 piles must be 5' tall of all 5/8'' boards.
i have almost got the old corely edger i bought from larry a year ago ready to roll. i will get some pics of it too when it is up and running. pc
Yes beenthere it's a 7-1/4 dewalt worm drive. The jig is a simple 12 foot table with a hinged straight edge also with 3 stop pins at 1" incraments.
We put a slab in and leave about 1-1/2" sticking out as that is what the saw cuts past the straight edge.
Flip it over and set the stop pins to whatever size we ca get fromthe slab.
I hate to see a guy stand still while I'm sawing so this does the trick pretty well.
I was always saving the slabs to edge last on the mill but never did look forward to moving them a bunch of times.
Also we rip stickers as we go with some of the off cuts.
Paul, are you just edging side lumber? In other words you cut these boards to obtain the cant size you wanted? Therefore all of the cant boards are already edged. Your stack therefore comes from many logs.
If this is the case then in a days work you may end up with just a handful of boards. At least that is what I found after doing about 2000 bf. I would edge those at the end of the day. Using the stack and cut, pull the good ones and keep dropping and pulling. At some point flip and repeat. Not much value here for material less that 6" so there is a limit to how low to go.
steve,
my edging is a width size for pallet material. so cutting various width edged boards dont really help. i will cut 5/8'' boards down to where i can cut either the tie face or a cant face of the dimension i need for an order. if i was cutting grade i would roll the log/cant more and end up with more edged boards off the mill as i go.
i am still working on the edger. i did get it moved into the mill building and lined up with the mill. i still have to get the moveable blade to move but i have run a board or 2 through it before having carb trouble again. i am about disgusted with this motor and ready to go get something more reliable. here is some pics of the corely edger.
is anyone else using one of these artifacts?
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/004.JPG)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/003.JPG)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/002.JPG)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/20540/2953/001.JPG)
pc
I've never used an edger, but that engine looks like a wisconsin, I thought those were some of the most reliable engines around?
Looks like an onan to me...never met an onan engine I liked...
That sounds like the start of a Briggs and Stratton, Tecumsah discussion. No hydro in your building Paul?
kohler. hydro? just mucking through some issues. we will eventually get it fixed.
i bought the edger when my wife had told me she wanted to help. then after about 2 hours or less cutting off boards she changed her mind. i would still like to get it going. i think it would speed things up some and less handling. pc
Oh...duh...got one like it in an old mower...vert shaft jobby...
You are going to feel like that you are on vacation when you start using that edger!
so far it is the one on vacation. i am still working on it, but i hope you are right.
i set it up so that the longet flitches could be slid off the end of the mill and still have room to walk between the edged and the pile, and that the length that i cut the most of could fall off the other end of the edger. i hope this will allow me to edge out a pile of flitches and not have to go to the other end to catch any of them till i am done. i may have to changeout the 3 rollers on the outfeed side for some skate rollers because they are too far apart and will let a bowed flitch hang up.
this edger has powered in and out feed and they are much faster than i expected. i bet it feeds a 10 ft flitch through in about 8 seconds. the moveable blade is stuck on the shaft. anyone got any good ideas how to get it loosened up besides pb blaster and the schorch wrench? pc
Quote from: paul case on October 03, 2011, 09:25:56 AM
............... the moveable blade is stuck on the shaft. anyone got any good ideas how to get it loosened up besides pb blaster and the schorch wrench? pc
Bluecreeper!!!!!!!!!!
the onan on my LT 40 was sweet
I agree with Bluecreeper. I bet that it will loosen it up.
Quote from: paul case on October 03, 2011, 09:25:56 AM
The moveable blade is stuck on the shaft. anyone got any good ideas how to get it loosened up besides pb blaster and the schorch wrench? pc
Rust Reaper
Flat coca cola...soak it...wait a day..tap it some...soak it again. Works like a charm...just be sure to rinse it when it comes loose...then grease it...
A few times in the past I tried setting aside all my flitches for a week, and then edging them on the mill in big batches. Bad idea. It gave the illusion that I was pumping out timbers faster but my overall production was lower and it was a back killer.
After I figured out that batch edging wasn't the way to go I made it a practice to edge after every log. Up until last year, that is. That's when I bought a twin-blade edger. Now I pull the flitches off the mill and stack them next to the edger infeed. I spend a fraction of the time batch-edging then when I did it on the mill. My back loves me.
my hope with the edger is i wont have to pick up the whole flitch at once. i hope to be able to pull one end to the edger rollers and the pick up the other end and guide it in. with batch edging or otherwise quite often i have to pick up a whole flitch to get it where i want it.
when i get the thing up and running i have plans to fix a rack to catch the boards and edgings so i can pick up the whole mess with the forklift and carry it to the slab rack, sort off the trimmings and carry the boards to the cuttoff table. pc