What's everyone do with their slabs?

[ohsoloco]

For at least a year since I've been sawing, I was giving my slabwood away to friends or whoever would take it off my hands...it doesn't take long to make a big stack after a weekend of sawing.  One guy that was supposed to take some a few weeks ago never showed up, so I decided to put an ad in the paper and try to sell them.  I sold truckloads pretty cheap.  Too bad I didn't have more!  I've had so many calls in the past week from people wanting truckloads, and others begging me to call them when I get more.  Just curious to hear what y'all are doing with yours...

[Bibbyman]

In the summer months a lot go up in smoke.  

In the fall we start saving up the meatier ones and through fall and winter cut them up for firewood on our Blockbuster firewood processor along with cull logs and bad heartsaws.  

Not many people around here will take slabs for firewood even if you give them away because of the work cutting them up.  We've developed a few customers who will buy them cutup and delivered.  

There is a place not too far away that will buy red cedar slabs to grind into something.  But they have to be bundled and banded and delivered.  Sad to say, it's more economical to burn them than put that much time and expense into taking them to market.

[Bro. Noble]

We tried selling them with very little success.  Then offered to give them away without getting rid of many.  We now sell to a charcoal company.  We get about $170 for a semi load.  Pay $120 to have them hauled.  We are getting rich real slow on this deal.  We are thankful to be rid of them and glad the charcoal kiln is 50 miles away.

Right now we are sawing walnut and have to burn the slabs and the charcoal company doesn't want walnut or cedar.  We sell pine slabs to a place that is nearer who grinds them.  We come out a little better on those.

Noble

[GarryW]

I try to give my slabs to the local sugar houses. When I can't do that I try to cut the slabs less than 6" wide and chip them up. I them give the chips to friends. But I still have a pile laying around.

[Tom]

We cook on an open fire very frequently and use up a lot of hardwood slab-wood and log trimmings.  I give as much away as I can but they want me to cut it and deliver it.  I keep it for myself rather than do that. Softwood slabs either go to the monthly bonfire and weiner roast or to the backside of the property with the hopes that they will rot quickly.

I wish I could chip them. It makes for some rich ground and I would spread the compost in my pine plantation.

[GarryW]

Tom,
 If you were closer I'd bring the tractor over and we could chip 'em up for you.

[Weekend_Sawyer]

 A couple of my friends pick up most of them, the rest goes in my Fathers fireplace and my Brothers fireplace.

[Norm]

I have tried selling them and giving them away and both were a hassle. We cut ours for firewood if they are thick enough, otherwise we have a big burn pile that we stack them up on and have a nice big bonfire. One of my favorite things is to have friends over when we get a big pile built up. It's amazing how a big fire at nite is so messmerizing.

[Larry]

Guess I am lucky getting rid of my slabs.  I have one guy that I made a deal with -- he takes all or none.  He comes with one of those 8' X 14' dump trailers with the high sides and saws slabs until he gets the pickup and the trailer both full.  He only comes when the ground is dry or froze so he doesn't make a mess.  I also can trust him so I don't have to be home when he shows up.  I also log on my ground and when I can I pull the whole tree out of the hollars and cut the tops off right at the edge of the field and he cleans up the tops to.

Got some friends that have a deer camp all season long and burn both a woodstove and firepit and they take a bunch.  I usually end up with a freezer full of deer sausage.

Saved some nice slabs for the Boy Scouts and they made some kind of rustic shelter with them.

When I saw power poles I take heavy slab cuts so I don't have to cut through the dirt in the cracks and avoid some nails.  Those are in high demand for horse stalls.
Larry

[Den Socling]

I don't know much about this part of the forest industry but most or all of our customers chip their slabs. I see them being blown into trucks. Some, at least, sell to OSB manufacturers or paper companies. I know this only because I've noticed signs over waste belts warning of what can and can't go in. Not even a gum wrapper is allowed. yeah! a gum wrapper and a chewed wad could make the OSB look bad at the local Home Depot.

[dewwood]

GARRYW,
 
What kind of chipper do you have? How big of pieces can you run throught it?  Does the JD run it without any problems?  I have thought about a PTO drive chipper for my tractor but have not talked to anyone  who has used one to chip with.  Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Dewey

[Ron Wenrich]

We used to sell most of our slabs, when we weren't sawing a whole lot.  But, that got to be a problem, especially in the spring and summer when nobody needed wood.  We were selling for $20/cord.

Eventually, we got a chipper.  Our production is about a trailerload in 1 1/2 days.  Depends on what we are sawing. The chips go to another operation that hogs them into mulch.

A wood hog can be a better investment than a chipper.  Hogged material can be used for either mulch or animal bedding.  The larger slabs may be hard on a hog, but you don't have to worry about dull knives from dirty logs.

Forestall used to make a machine called a duster.  It worked on the same principle as a hog, but has a horizontal feed.  I run one with a 671 Detroit, but you could get away with a smaller power unit.  It makes coarse animal bedding or fine mulch.  These can be gotten pretty cheap.

What I started to do was mix mushroom soil with the output from the duster.  It turned a lot quicker and looked like double ground mulch.

[GarryW]

Dewey,
 I have a Patu DC-65HF that mounts on the PTO of my John Deere 5310 (55 hp, 50 or so at the PTO). The tractor has never even slowed down even when I was chipping 6-7 inch trees with it. The tractor did slow down once, that was when I hit a tree with the chipper while I was driving.  :( That hurt.
 The chipper is rated at 6.5" and has a hydraulic feed on it. It works okay for round pieces but the slabs are sometimes a pain with it. That is why I try to narrow the slabs down to 6" or so on the mill. The hydraulic motor runs off of the tractor and required a cut over box to run it. When it is engaged I lose my up on the bucket. And every spring, the switch seems to get shorted out. The dealer has replaced it each time, and they finally moved the control box the last time. We'll see next spring if that worked.
 Patu now has a self contained 10" chipper with dual feed rollers. It looks rather nice but it is around $10-11K.

[GarryW]

Dewey,
 Here is what the chipper looks like.

[Russ]

I have no problem giving slabs away if I cut them 16" to 18"long. If I deliver about $35 a truck load. Hard wood I'll mix in with the cordwood.Nobody takes the long slabs.Oh yea, I built a dog house from slabs looks like a log home. It takes some extra time but if you make straight edges on them there's many crafty things that can be built from them.
Woodlot assc. slab handling
click here>>http://www.woodlot.mb.ca/sawnotes.htm#Handling%20slabs

[Bro. Noble]

Tom,

If I lived closer, I'd come over and help you eat hot dogs.

Noble

[Tom]

Wooeeee Noble,  you should see the size of some of my hot dog fires. fun-n-n-n.  You wouldn't believe some of the lies....er.. stories that are concocted while sitting around one.  Yep, if you lived closer we could have a good old time. :D

[Brian_Rhoad]

All of our slabs and other scrap gets made into mulch. We could sell more than we make. In April,May and June some days all I get done is making mulch deliveries.

[ohsoloco]

The fires are definitely a nice occasion. This summer I supplied all of the wood for a couple of bonfires at a friend's place.  I got to clean up the yard, and we all got to enjoy a nice roaring fire all night     I always cut the big slabs up for my own firewood...or wood to sell next fall.

Sounds like I'm kinda lucky I can sell these things....I thought it was funny that I couldn't give them away, but now they're lined up to buy them  :D   I've seen other people advertise slabs in the past at $5 a truckload, and I figured what the heck, so I advertised them for $8 a truckload, $15 delivered....haven't had the request, but would charge another ten to cut them to length.  Last weekend I delivered a load to a guy that is using them to smoke his venison...perfect for him since they're still green.  He was so tickled with it he had me deliver another load to him.  I think there's now three people that are on my call list when I get more.

[woodmills1]

here is a shot of mom getting ready to help burn up some slabs.

[Fla._Deadheader]

Near a hunnerd years ago, when I had my Circle mill, customers were lazy then, too !!!  I sold to the local charcoal plant, by the strapped bundle. Towards winter, I would chainsaw them up to heat our home. That would get ya a thrown chain, occasionally and a pinched bar more occasionally. THEN, I found an old BENCH SAW. you know the kind. It has a push pull table mounted so you can saw across the slab, or in them days, the "Cordwood". I put a "peckerwood" motor on it, and we could saw a bundle of slabs like they was on fire. Keep the blade filed sharp. Customers (lazy ones) would catch the end and pitch it into their truck. Offer the cut stuff as "All you can put in yer pick-up or equivalent trailer". Human nature dictates that " the more I get for the same price, the more I want it."  Had some people stack it very tight in their truck, and they would "Bumper Grade" my road on the way out !!! :D :D

  Demand went WAY up, and we used to saw on Sat. afternoon only. Worked well into dark every Sat. nearly all winter. Course, back then, CASH was the only way to do business. NEVER had a problem selling slabs. The charcoal guy got sore, because we were one of his better suppliers. We were only 7 miles away !!!

  Hey Arky, they still in business ?? Produced the best chunk charcoal I ever cooked over !!!  Some days, you could smell the wood "Cookin".

[bull]

Yo bon fire Man  8)
 We burn the majority of our soft wood slabs the ash is then added to our end product compost *( More Carbon)* add the
K....."NPK"
All hardwood slab is kept for firewood / heat for the house and the shop...
 The bonfires are great we burned 2, 60+ cord piles the other day flames wer 50 feet in the air, temperature was in
the single digit it was 90 degrees 50' away from the pile and the ground was dry.. no snow or mud. Piles burn for about 7 days if left alone.   We had 5 deer standing around the fire on the morning that was 2 below... what a site deer season and we didn't even take a shot :-/

[bull]

Our compost is made of all wood waste  *( bark,sawdust,leaves,dunnage)*  it sells for $25.00 a yard and we sell about 50 yards annually 8)

[Bibbyman]

I've got a cousin coming up over Chirstmas to get a load of sawdust for growing mushrooms.  I know some of the slabs will grow mushrooms too - I've seen them  

[MrMoo]

We use our slabs as kindling for the woodstove. We cut them to length & stack them. In the winter we go out & get an armful but before we bring them in we split them up into small pieces. The problem is that even just sawing on weekends we can produce far more than we can use although we do burn more than a cubic yard per season.
We have tried giving them away but most of our slabs are softwood. In our area nobody is willing to burn softwood in their stoves. With the way people act you would think the stuff is toxic waste or something.
At some point I figure we will need to find some one to take them but until them we have the best kindling around.

[Noble_Ma]

I cut the hardwood up to stove length and  we take the soft wood for campfires.  Nothing goes to waste here.

[Jeff]

Wooeeee Noble,  you should see the size of some of my hot dog fires. fun-n-n-n.  You wouldn't believe some of the lies....er.. stories that are concocted while sitting around one.  Yep, if you lived closer we could have a good old time. :D

Noble, if'n yer goin, swing by and pick me up. I been to one of his fires. If we take our own Hotdog sticks, and they are fairly long, we won't have to get any closer then georgia befroe we can start cookin. I'll bring the onions ;D

[J_T]

Here on the Ky Tn border tobacco farmers uese slabs and sawdust to fire darkfired tobacco.  Hickery sold to bq pits .Otrerwise you can sell a semi load for about a hunderd bucks to be chiped up.

[Ron Wenrich]

At one time, Campbell soup was looking for white oak to raise Shitake mushrooms.  They couldn't do it on a commerical basis.  But, there is money in raising mushrooms for the local trade.  

[Frank_Pender]

I built a jig for the larger/thicker material.  it is 8' long, 2' wide and 2' high.  I locate the slabs in the unit and when full cut the slabs to length. It is divided so that I can cut 16" material or 32" material  I cut most into 32" material as my two Taylor stoves take that length very well.  One stove for the house another for the kil.  the smaller materil is put into anther jig and when full placed at the trim saw to be made into bundled kindling.  Easch bundle is 1.5 cbft and sell for $5.  When I do not want to make the kindling I have a Valby chipper similar to wth one shown on the John Deere  (same as mine) shown earlier.  I sell all of the sawdust and chips to local cridder owners (horse, cattle, dogs) for bedding etc.

[Frank_Pender]

I failed to mention the jig for the ldarger slabes is fitted with 2 x 6 toobing for the forks on the loader that are hinged at the opposite side of the jig and allows for dumping as if it was a regular bucket attatchment to the loader.  

[ARKANSAWYER]

Yep! the charcoal plant is in full swing but they do not want my slabs.  Says that they are to thin and just bark does not make good charcoal.    :(   I just sell it as fire wood or make a bon fire out of it.  The pine and cedar I can sell for $22 a bundel and it pays to haul it as I can haul 9 bundels at a time.
  I have looked at the chipper route and think that if I mix in my sawdust and some turkey droppings I could compost some soil.  Now I just have to figure out how to keep it on top of the hill.
ARKANSAWYER

[Tom]

That's what you use a bunch of the slabs for, Arkansawyer.  Make a pen to corral your compost. ;D  It's biodegradable too and when it goes you just push it into the compost heap and put up some more.

[ohsoloco]

Speaking of compost, how much sawdust can I put in my garden every year?  After a weekend of sawing I fill up a couple 55 gallon drums with sawdust, and I used to dump them in the garden and till it in.  I began to worry about seriously messing up the ph in the soil, so I quit doing this.  I do use some of the dust when I make batches of compost in the tumbler.  The garden is about 30x50...is it safe to dump more sawdust in there (except walnut, of course)?  If so, how much?

[Tom]

I would keep the composting pile separate from the growing plants because decomposition ties up the nitrogen in the soil.  Once the compost matures, you can add lime to sweeten it, a little nitrogen maybe, and other nutrients if you wish, and turn it into the garden.  As long as you have enough sand in the mix so that it drains well, I wouldn't think that you could get too much compost.  Putting a garden in that stuff is like putting a drunk in tub of White lightening. :D

The more humus you add, the more water the soil retains. That's why it's not a good idea to use sawdust, leaves and the like for filling holes in the driveway. Eventually you end up with a mudhole that never dries.

If you have access to Chicken Manure, put some of that in your compost pile.  I've friends with Chicken farms that grow gardens that you have to seed and run less they knock you down.  Saw a fella that turned his back for a minute and a corn stalk ran up his leg and lifted him off of the ground.  He was there all day waiting for his wife to get back from the church meeting to get him down. :-/

[dewwood]

Putting too much sawdust on your garden will definitely mess up your PH.  Especially if you saw a lot of oak, however most wood will change the PH if used in larger quantities.  Take a soil test to best determine where you are at with the PH and go from there.

[Haytrader]

Now Tom, you don't spect us to beleive you, do ya?
 :D              :D                :D

I used to sell a fertilizer additive. Made the stuff work better. We would put on dinner meetings for the prospective customers. I always liked to open the talk with a joke and end with one. After telling them how good this product was and showing them slides to prove it I would tell them there were only two plants you couldn't use it on.........cucumbers and watermelon........cause the vines would get to growin so fast, it would wear holes in the bottom of them draggin them along.........  8)     8)     8)

[Geoff]

Slabs:  Put 'em in the frame that's like the setup mentioned earlier.  We call them bales.  Wrap them with that nylon strapping which lets you tighten after they are cut.  Each bale's about 20 lbs.  40 of them fills the Dodge 4x4 and sells for $60.  Keeps the yard clean for sure, but we're trying new ways to make it work faster.  When you put out constant production everyday, it gets to be a headache.  Gotta keep remembering that the profit's sitting in the pile of slabs sometimes.

Sawdust.  Big ole' pile out back.  Mix in all the horse s ;D ;Dt from the past winter, and turn it over with the loader every few weeks.  Voila!  The best dirt you could ask for.  Some of the cedar & pine sawdust goes for bedding around the farm.

[Geoff]

By the way, we use the feed bags to store the sawdust for the bedding.  Great way to handle it, and easier to throw than a 45-gal drum.

[WV_hillbilly]

Hey Guys and gals I have come up with a way to use slabs so that they stay around alot longer .But they look alot better than laying around the yard. I buy the slabs from a farmer that has his lumber sawn by a mobile mill. He used to throw them in a big pile and have a bon fire. I pay $20 for as much as I can load on a pick up. I think it is pretty cheap on my end for what I make on the finished product. This one in the picture just came of the scrollsaw and has no varnish on it.I think you will like it. I make them as a stress relief from daily life. It is a scene of a pack train returning out of the mountains after a sucessful elk hunt.




Take a look Tom and see if I have improved on pics If not let me know. 8)

Hillbilly

[Fla._Deadheader]

I like that !!!  How long does it take and exactly what parts are scroll sawed-sawn ?? Hard to tell from the pic.

[WV_hillbilly]

Thanks  Deadheader   the moutain range, horses ,and trees are all scrollsawed out of the slab .  That slab is 10 " wide and 40" long and the horses are only 1"x 1 1/2 " in size for reference. I'll take some guesses on what what wood it is from yall. The wood is from northern WV and has a real spicy smell when cut or planed . Around here people also make something from the roots. I Know what it is . The picture doesn't do it justice . It takes me about 3 hours to go from a rough slab to what you see in the pic. It takes me another 1/2 hour to sand and finish it the rest of the way. ;D

Hillbilly

[cut2size]

Sassafrass

[WV_hillbilly]

  Oh  :D  We have a winner on the first guess.  Boy that didn't take too long. Congrats Cut2size.


Hillbilly

[cut2size]

Hillbilly,
Where in WV are you?  I grew up in WV and just live on the other side of the boarder now.  In fact, WV is only about 500 yards away from my back door.  I saw some very large sassafras trees near Cheat Lake about 30 years ago.  The largest that I have sawn was only 14" in diameter.  It is definately worth sawing.
Cut2size

[WV_hillbilly]

Actually  Cut2size I live in Ohio. I can look out my kitchen window and see the Ohio River and Wheeling WV. I was born and raised in Dallas Pike WV . Its off  I-70  when you come into WV from PA. I'm only 15 minutes from where I grew up.  The price was right for the property so I got married and moved here. I wish I still owned all 3 of the family farms in WV  there is alot of great memories there. But you can take the boy out of WV but can't take WV out of the man. ;D If I find some good property I will be a WV resident again.

The guy I buy slabs from has some Sassafrass boards that won't go thru a 20" planer. Those are real nice ones. He build Cabinets out of Sass and you should see them. He won't sell me any of those but I get plenty of other wood from him. In the last year I have bought about 1500 Bd/ft of lumber from him.

Hillbilly

[Tom]

Sure looks good to me.

[Ron Scott]

Have you guys been to Richwood West Virginia; the Cranberry BackCountry (now the Cranberry Wilderness); Falls of Hills Creek, Seneca Rocks, etc. ???

[Fla._Deadheader]

Hillbilly. How much would you take for that piece, before ya mess it up with Varnish?? Or, one similar to it ??

[cut2size]

I've been to Richwood, Cranberry Glades Wilderness Area, and to Seneca Rocks.  The Cranberry River has some great trout fishing.  My father used to take us camping in the wilderness for vacations--no camper or other modern conveniences.  Cass is another good site to visit.  There used to be a gigantic saw mill there (a museum now) There is a picture there of 21 men standing or sitting on a single maple stump.  There are flora and fauna in the Cranberry bogs and Seneca Rocks found only in the fartherest north of North America.  Richwood is still operating a large mill that I think is owned by GP.  It was a wild and wooley lumber town in the early part of the twentieth century.

[WV_hillbilly]

 Ron Why yes I have . We have a time share condo by Cannan State Park . We Go the week before Memorial Day and The last week in Oct. That way we get to trout fish some of the best times of the year , and in the fall the leaves are real pretty.We have family that lives in Bartow , Durbin Dunmore, and other parts of Webster , Greenbrier, and Pocahontas counties.I've been to Cass probably 25 times and I'm only 33years old. I have some good pics from this year. I'll try to post them soon.I've also watched people climb up Seneca Rocks many times. I don't understand wanting to do that. To me I lump it in with Bungie jumping , parachuting and other extreme sports. Beautiful scenery down there just not many well paying jobs , If it weren't for the job thing I'd probably live down there.

Deadheader   I 'll get in touch with you on price and a time frame for one of them. I have one a little smaller that is shaped like an arrowheadright now . The one in the picture is already spoken for.I don't varnish those pieces I use spray on polyurethane. I just said varnish cause most people can identify with that.

[Jeff]

Hillbilly have you ever tried doing any logging scenes?

[Haytrader]

Hillbilly,

Do you use a pattern or freehand the scenes. My wife is a good hand with a scroll saw and a slab of cedar with somthing like that on it would sure look good on my wall.

[Ron Scott]

I forgot to mention the Cass Scenic Railroad,  the Cranberry Bogs Natural National Landmark, Summit Lake, Sherwood Lake, The New River Gorge (the daring use to parachute off the bridge crossing the gorge right after it was built) , The Geenbrier, Snowshoe etc. West Virginia has a lot of unique areas.

We lived in Richwood, W VA ;1974-78; on the Ranger Station there on the Cherry River while I was the Gauley District Ranger on the Monongahela National Forest.

There also was a Boise Cascade Mill in Richwood along with the GP Mill. It went out during the clear cutting controversy there.

The Nation's Bi-Centennial Capital Christma Tree came from up on Kennison Mountain in 1976.  

[WV_hillbilly]

Jeff
 I haven't tried any yet but ,I am trying to set up a piece to cut a LT-70 out of.I have  taken pictures and drawings to cut out things before.

Haytrader
 That particular  one is a pattern out of Creative Woodworks and Crafts   June 2001  issue.

Ron you forgot GreenBanks National Obsevatory also is a neat place to visit .

[Ron Scott]

I sure did; also, the Highland Scenic Highway and Parkway and all the fine State Parks.

[ohsoloco]

After all of the calls I got in past years, I decided to run another ad for my slabs...and charge a little more for them.  About a month ago I put an ad in the paper.  They will let you advertise for free for anything less than $100, so I ran an ad for hardwood slabs @ $30 per truckload delivered, with three available.  Sold those right off the bat, and started a list of people wanting them.  Now I can take the slabs right from the mill and into the back of the truck and deliver them when I'm done for the day.  

Also found a guy that does scrollsaw work, and he is buying all of the this pieces I make when truing...trueing...true...uh, making a face square or flat  :D  I'm hoping to have him make me something for the house.

One man's trash.... ;)

[shopteacher]

The hardwood slabs I cut  between 18 to 24" and sell them at 50.00 a pickup load.  Two dump truck loads of pine  went to the high school for the school football bonfire. The rest of the pine I give away to whoever wants to load and haul them away.

[Swede]

I made a *örhrummmmm*  Sågbock tonight. Think you say öööööööööh ?????? horse......eh.... something.
A box without walls in the ends, 16" high, 14" wide and 14' long. The boards are vertical, 1x6" and some space between them.  I´m going to buy a chan saw, cut the slabs and try to sell some fire wood.  8)

Swede.