My first time processing lumber

[kristosig]

Today, we headed for the woods again. Only had two friends with me this time, and one of them had to leave at lunchtime. 

But we were much better prepared. The winch worked much better. I had arranged for a farmer nearby to bring his tractor and help us. We just felled the trees, cut them to 3.5 metre (11.5 feet) logs, cut away some limbs/branches. He did the rest. Gathered the logs, stacked them at one location. He even cut the tree crowns and larger branches down with his own chainsaw and gathered all that for disposal.

There's sunlight from 7:30 - 16:30 now. We were a bit delayed, and this place is one and a half hour away, well, we were there 9:30 and we left at about 15:00. During this time, we felled five trees.

Here's a picture that shows the first two or three trees stacked. Before we took the really big ones. What you see here is about one third of the logs we ended up with. I estimate the size of the biggest one to 80 cm (31 inches) in diameter.



 

[firefighter ontheside]

Are you in Sweden as your profile says or in America?  I can't find any reference to Cherry trees in Sweden.

[kristosig]

Are you in Sweden as your profile says or in America?  I can't find any reference to Cherry trees in Sweden.

I live in Sweden. We have cherry trees in the southern part of the country.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prunus_avium

[Ianab]

Prunus avium is what the Americans know as "Wild Cherry", and originally comes from Europe. It's a different species from the Black cherry, but the wood properties are pretty similar. 

[kristosig]

Just got the logs delivered to my home.



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Old Greenhorn]

Glad to see you are still at it. You've got a lot of milling to do now!

[kristosig]

A little child labour...applying Anchorseal.



 

 

 

[kristosig]

Still preparing, haven't milled anything yet.

The drying chamber / kiln is almost ready. Just need to put in an outflow vent and a little rack for the planks.



 

 



 

 

 

Also added a water cooling system (ie leaky hose and duct tape) to the sawmill.



 
 

 
 

[Old Greenhorn]

You ARE making progress! Wonder how it is fitting with your original expectations (you may recall, I thought your plan was pretty aggressive) but you are really moving along!
 I don't understand the water cooling thing. I do not CSM but we have a lot of folks here who do and I have never heard of this coming up before, mostly the issue is getting enough oil on the chain in those long cuts. How did you come to this idea?

[kristosig]

You ARE making progress! Wonder how it is fitting with your original expectations (you may recall, I thought your plan was pretty aggressive) but you are really moving along!

Thanks! It's starting to feel quite real now. My plan was and is pretty aggressive. I want to have all those trees felled, milled, dried to 6-8% and sold before early spring.

The trees are now in my garden, cut to 3.5 metre (11.5 feet) logs.

The sawmill will be ready this evening.

The kiln is almost ready. I have even sealed all joints with silicon sealant. The kiln will be able to take about 1/5 of my lumber-to-be per drying cycle. Each drying cycle will be about 25 days.

I've already sold two planks, the buyer is not in a hurry to get them. I've told him they'll be ready around Christmas.

I'm setting up an online store, which  will be a "base" in my sales, but I also have social media channels I will use. Also have two local small businesses that want to come take a look when I have some product to show them. Small scale furniture makers. Custom jobs.

I have contracts in place for payment processing and shipping. I can already accept payments with card, 14 day invoice, and payments in installments up to one year (via a financial company that does the credit checks in realtime, approves/denies, and pays me within two weeks whichever option the customer chooses). The payment system is already active in my online store.

My todo list:

1. Sawmill
a) Finish putting together a dust extractor to handle the saw dust.

2. Kiln
a) Sealing strip around the door opening.
b) Install the outflow vent. Just sawing out a hole and placing the aluminium vent in it.
c) Drain in the floor, as I will often be putting in water for the first stage of the drying process and then draining the rest out. Nothing fancy. Just a hole in the floor, garden hose cut to be level with the floor, and silicon sealant to seal the hole around the hose. I have a tap to put on the other end of the hose to open/close it.
d) A lumber rack.
e) Stickers. I have some air dry spruce boards, approximately 25x155 mm (1x6 inches). My sawmill's debut will be sawing those into 25x18 mm (1x3/4 inch) stickers, which will be placed with 300 mm (one foot) intervals.

3. Storage for dried lumber.
I know how I will do it and I have most of the material. It will be exactly like the kiln, just double height and shelves instead of a rack on the floor. Dehumidifier instead of wood drying unit.

4. Sales
I will notify the two interested businesses when I have something to show them. I still need more text and pictures for the online store, and some legal disclaimers etc. I have the social media channels and will post pictures etc when I have something to show.

Items one and two will be ready this week, and then I will start milling, fill the kiln, and start drying.

I have my next three week stint abroad weeks 49-51, leaving on the 29th of November. I want to have my first batch in the kiln by then, the first four day "steaming phase" finished, and airflow through the outflow vent stabilised.

I can work on my online store while I am away.

I may be able to start the storage chamber before leaving, but that only needs to be done before emptying the kiln and putting in the second batch.

All in all, I'd say I am sticking to my timeline, but it's still aggressive and I need to keep at it.

[kristosig]

I don't understand the water cooling thing. I do not CSM but we have a lot of folks here who do and I have never heard of this coming up before, mostly the issue is getting enough oil on the chain in those long cuts. How did you come to this idea?

The basic premise is that the bar and chain become very hot, which accelerates wear and tear on both. Also makes the chains dull sooner, the sawing becomes slower and the surface of the milled lumber a little more course.
Having water spraying continuously from multiple holes on the hose above the bar will help with this.
The other end of the hose attaches to my garden hose, which is connected to a tap on the outside wall of my house.

[kantuckid]

You bought ash? I thought those were all give away these days as folks have to take them down anyway.

Does the Emerald Ash Borer thing go on in Sweden?

[Old Greenhorn]

Does the Emerald Ash Borer thing go on in Sweden?

No, the closest infestation is in Moscow, Russia.

[kristosig]

 

 

 

 The sawmill is now assembled and ready. I am not going to use it until I've assembled the dust collector, though.

With a little luck, I can start milling in 1-2 days.

[Nebraska]

I didn't have my cheater  glasses on when I read this the first time, and in his drying shed/chamber I thought I saw a chicken sitting in there in the shed..... It's a miter saw I think, but my first thought was "wow sawdust and chickens he's got it really bad"..... ;)

Good progress there Kristosig.

[Old Greenhorn]

Some folks see chickens wherever they look. :D

[YellowHammer]

Excellent progress.  You are doing great.

When I was doing my stint at chainsaw milling, I taped a garden hose to my blade.  It made quite a mess but worked.

I notice the children around the logs painting them.  It's good to have them participate but working around stacked logs is very dangerous for both children and adults.  Kids want to play in or around them and adults like to lean or walk on them but there is a reason they are called "deadstacked" and "deadfalls."  Even a seemingly solid pile of logs can shift without notice or even avalanche.  I've seen it many times.  If you haven't done it, it's a good time to teach them how to stay out of the "bite". 

[kristosig]

I notice the children around the logs painting them.  It's good to have them participate but working around stacked logs is very dangerous for both children and adults.  Kids want to play in or around them and adults like to lean or walk on them but there is a reason they are called "deadstacked" and "deadfalls."  Even a seemingly solid pile of logs can shift without notice or even avalanche.  I've seen it many times.  If you haven't done it, it's a good time to teach them how to stay out of the "bite".

Glad to see I am not alone in thinking this. Got the "yes dad, we know we are not allowed to play near the logs", complete with the rolling eyes, from my six year old daughter yesterday, indicating that I was beating a thoroughly dead horse there. But this is something I am a bit nervous about.

Thanks for the encouragement; nice to know the garden hose is a tested method that has worked before.

[Old Greenhorn]

Yellowhammer makes a serious point. You cannot let children be in the area if they don't respect the danger. I grew up around such stuff and now my grandchildren are too. Just as with firearms this is something you cannot let go of until they demonstrate that they understand the danger. It is one of the very few things I will YELL at my grandsons about if they 'forget'. You have to push it as far as necessary until they get it. If you have to, take surveyors paint or tape and lay a line down on the ground showing the safety zone and be very strict about it. I see you have little ones and I know how they can be, you will have to be consistent until they get it. Adults can be a tad harder to train than the younger ones, but you can be more firm with them. ;D
 Also, a tip for you, I see your pile has a few wonky logs in it and the stack 'could be better'.  (I know the driver was in a hurry.) Take your cant hook and straighten those out, even flatten the pile to make it more stable. I also shove small cutoff's between some logs and drive them in a bit to prevent roll downs, or at least slow them down, like wheel chocks. My pile is on the side of my driveway and a modest stack like yours, and the kids are playing in the area often, so I take no chance. As I pull logs to the mill, I roll others down to maintain a stable stack. While you are rolling logs, get the kids to watch and see how much force is involved when they tumble. The is a safety issue that cannot be ignored and your children need to understand you are firm on it, not because you don't want them to have fun, but because you love them and want to keep them around a little longer. Starting out and building good safety habits goes a long way toward making their and your life easier as other things come along. My Grandson's took a while to learn that when I said "stand here so you can watch, but don't leave this spot" it was not debatable and if they moved, we were done for a while until they learned. Don't let those cute kids blow you off, you will not be doing them a favor. We read too many horrible tragedy's about farm and logging accidents. They are quick, severe, and irreversible. You and your family are just starting out, so start out on the right foot, please.

[Old Greenhorn]

I found one of the threads I was thinking about in reference to this. Reading the linked article drives the point home.
https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=56157.msg813016#msg813016

[mike_belben]

NEVER fail to scream at a child who is coming up unannounced to a running machine, especially from behind.  Even the screwiest snowflake parent will realize you might be saving their babies life.  I chew out all my kids and their friends for it.  


Teach them to never enter the zone of operation until they have waved to abd made eye contact with the operator(s) so it is known that they are in the workspace.  And never stand in front of or behind a running wheeled or tracked machine while parked.  Old iron has old linkages, they can engage on their own. 

[kristosig]

Thank you all for your concern. I completely agree with all of you. My children do not approach my machines, whether they are running or not. Someone compared them to firearms, and I agree. My guns are in a locked weapon cabinet, unloaded, bolts out where applicable and keys elsewhere. My children do not touch my guns, that's unthinkable to them, I've made sure of that.

I allow them to join me when DIY'ing, but always with a heavy focus on safety. Safe distance when I use any kind of power tool. I take every opportunity to teach them this and I strive to lead by example, taking every precaution myself, use protective equipment etc. They get to use certain things themselves, but have to ask every time. Things like driving nails into scrap pieces of wood, applying glue for me when I assemble etc.

As for the logs, I continuously stress that they are not to be near it without direct supervision, like when we applied the anchorseal. I have seen nothing that would suggest they disobey this rule, but I watch closely and will react strongly to the slightest indication of that.

Some of you have suggested further safety enhancing action, such as evening out the pile and letting them see the forces at play when I roll them. I will go through those suggestions and implement what I can.

[kristosig]

Update.

Kiln is built and is ready to accept green lumber. I may or may not install a sensor for temperature and humidity that is connected to my alarm system. Might be interesting.



 



 

I put together a dust collector "on the run". Some scrap 18 mm (3/4 inch) plywood that was leftover from building a doll house. Spiral pipes. The usual parts. Hastily thrown together.



 

 

Got everything ready for milling. Took some time, had some hiccups.

Here I am fixing some bolt in the mechanism.



 

 


Didn't have time to make stickers, so I just threw in the first layer of planks, just to be able to say to myself that I have officially started loading the kiln.

[kristosig]

Did a little sawing today as well. But not much. Spent most of the day with the wife and kids, as I am going away for three weeks next weekend.

Most of the pictures are of European ash (Fraxinus excelsior) but the last picture is of what I call cherry and most of you know as Wild Cherry (Prunus avium).



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Walnut Beast]

Quite a little operation you got going 👍