Last winter my dad and I felled a small plantation of red pines in his yard. I milled them on my LT15 and made 2 3/8" x 8' and 12' boards. This was my first saw milling experience. I hired a FF member to kiln dry and tongue and groove these into flooring. I think the fellow did a very nice job with the lumber.
The down side is that a fair amount of lumber twisted and bowed before and during the drying process. So here is my question for the Forum: Can I take a twisted board 2 3/8" and put it in the mill and cut each face to get a 1" board and if I do that will the one inch board be stable? I would like to salvage as much from this lumber as I can.
John.
I don't do it very often with thin material.
I routinely resaw larger timbers (6" and up) that people bring me because they have twisted. With Douglas-Fir and Larch they are usually stable after I saw them :). I've squared up Grand Fir only to have twist some more ???.
I only do this with fully dried timbers -- I suspect a partly dried timber will continue to twist.
Here's my procedure:
- put the timber on the bed of the mill and see how it lies.
- shim the two corners that are lifting off the bed - shim them the same amount.
- clamp securely and saw off the top face.
- pull out the shims and rotate 180°.
- the timber should sit flat. Saw off the second face parallel to the first cut.
- turn 90° and hold it against the side stops.
- square up the third face, flip 180° and finish the last face.
I have had good luck resawing twisted Douglas Fir and ending up stable. Not so with Grey (Digger) Pine.
I do it exactly as brucer does. Since the only softwood I saw is for myself, I always saw 9/4 in the widest dimension the log will give and put in the stacks to dry. it may be a year or so before I ever need them, but when I do, I just pull what I need and re-saw. boards with slight twist will make full 8/4, while boards with more twist usually still make 6/4. I have never had trouble with additional movement after I have resawed them, but by then the core is usually at EMC. I usually get Doug fir, ponderosa pine, Austrian pine or spruce. Also, I saw all my pine between Sept. and March. Not a fan of mold.
There is 2 possible outcomes.
If the wood has simply shrunk unevenly as it dries, then it should now be fairly stable. If you resaw or machine the boards straight, they should stay that way unless they get a large moisture change.
OR, there could be internal tension still in the wood. When you resaw that, it will twist into some crazy new shape.
I would suggest you get a handful of boards, and try. If they saw and stay flat, good, they will probably stay that way and be usable. Process the rest and recover what you can. If they try and twist off the saw, then it's doomed to fail.
Ian
I sawed a few 9/4 white oak planks that were slightly twisted down to one inch boards and the results were not good.
Just make stuff that you can from short pieces. Each piece will have less twist and you can joint it out. ;D
Twisted lumber has a high PITA factor and a lot of waste. :-\
I have never been very successful with resawing twisted boards. :-\
Sounds like this could go either way. I guess it is worth a shot since I already paid to have them dried. I will never know unless I try and it will always make fire wood as a last resort.
John.
Do you have an idea what kept the boards from drying straight?
Too much time before air dry stickering/stacking?
Stickers too far apart?
Not enough weight on the stickered stack?
Or was it straight before going into the kiln?
And if so, once in the kiln were the above needs met?
Just wondering why they didn't come out straight.
And maybe there was spiral grain in the trees.
I resaw a lot of stuff. Timbers are one thing, but I won't touch anything small that isn't perfectly straight. The failure factor is just too high. Even when the customer says he understands the risks... When the job is done and it's bad, it's your fault in his mind.
I have never had any luck with Red pine staying straight after it is dried
I have had very poor luck with trying to straighten out a warped and twisted board, no matter the method.
well, i know how the lumber was dried :) we did the job.
when i first started talking to john about drying his lumber i asked if the trees were plantation yes, not a big platation though. at that time i espressed concern about twisting and bowing.
like all jobs we restickered the lumber after it came so, i know that was not a issue. even before the lumber went into the kiln you could start to see some movement. some boards at the bottom of 3 bundles moved so, lack of weight was not a issue.
iv'e said it before red pine plantation trees are like dancing with the devil its not if the wood will move its how much :)
this being john's first lumber he sawed, the lumber came in very consistant and clean so i say good job!!
let me also add , the 12' material had more twist and bow than the 8 ' material.
To support the results of twisted and warped lumber from plantation grown red pine, one can read the conclusions of a study in ME. The juvenile wood in the early years has different drying and shrinking characteristics from more mature wood, and fast-grown trees can have a significant effect due to the volume of juvenile wood (i.e. large juvenile core).
It is the nature of the beast, so to speak.
If interested, some reading here.
http://library.umaine.edu/MaineAES/TechnicalBulletin/tb61.pdf
Most older growth Red pine I have sawn is quite stable, it hardly even looks like the same wood as young plantation stuff. Most plantation wood has a high sapwood to heartwood ratio, the old growth is almost all heartwood. Slick, if your material is already dried, I'd say it's worth a shot.
No
my thoughts for dealing with the remaining lumber. run it through a resaw to split in half, make wp4 v-groove t&g, then cut the twist out of each piece by making shorter pieces, then end match it . we have done this alot with great results. this is usally done starting with 1" lumber. its been my experiance that once its dry it dosent move much.
i'm not trying to sollicite on getting more work, just throwing a option out. :)
If I wanted to get two finished boards from my 2 3/8" stock how thin can I have them re sawn? Should I saw them at 3/4" and end up with 5/8" finished product?
John
Trying to follow along here. Are the twisted boards with T&G now, or are these some that couldn't be moulded because of twist?
Depending on how much twist, and how/where a resaw cut relates to the twist, would dictate if you get one or two boards from each twisted blank.
And "how much" twist affecting the boards produced will depend on what length you are going to trim these twisted ones before resawing.
We aren't seeing the boards so very hard to visualize and suggest a recovery plan.
I'd think running the twisted boards over a jointer first to give a flat face, then clamp on your WM to make the board at a desired thickness from that face. At that time, you will know if there are two boards in your 1 3/8" stock or not.
i would set the resaw at a full inch and let it feed. with pressure feed rolls the board will go thru the r saw fairly flat, once out the twist will still be in there but, thats not the end of the world.
if i remember correctly the twist was gradual the length of the board. imagine the board laying flat on a long table, you can see where to make cuts (cross) to make the peices lay flat. this only can happen once the lumber has been finished machined to 3/4"
If your red pine is our Norway pine, (pinus resinosa), you may well end up with twisted thin boards. My best luck with small logs/younger trees is to saw the largest cant I can with the pith centered, end seal it and let it sit under cover for 6 months to a year then re-saw it. I still get about 20% waste because the cants twist. Old growth, if and when I find it makes much better lumber. Short story is... I find it hard/extra work to make anything of good value out of it, I saw it when It shows up, but don't really like doing it. On the other hand, I hate to waste anything.
If you make it into 3/4" wp4 you should be able to work with the twist as you install it.
macpower is right. I had some norway pine close to the mill for the wife's Graden shed. I sawed some 8x8's. They wanted to twist on me. :( I went back to the hemlock. Much better.
I thought I would post a pic of some Red pine I was working with today to highlight the difference between plantation pine and naturally grown wood, as this subject has came up in a few different threads lately. The board on the left is plantation wood, notice the wide growth rings and light color. On the right is wood from a 90 year old tree, see the tight rings, and the orange/reddish color. This board is all heartwood, the other is all sapwood.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/11286/20140720_161213.jpg)
Don't think I would use the fast grown red pine for what looks like a stair stringer where they are notched out and also needed for high strength.
Hope that they both function ok for you.