I started cutting beams for my house build in 2014 and cut till about 2021. I still cut a little bit but nothing like I was now I am working to process all the jacket boards from all those beam logs. This is the second time filling a local guys kiln. I know I'll fill it at least two more times after this, as openings permit. He has two of these kilns. Once they come out of the kiln, I haul them about 25 minutes away to another guy who S3S's them.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/16191/IMG_0275.jpeg?easyrotate_cache=1702399459)
very industrious!
I have palletized all to the same height(bottom two layers), 34", and strapped them tight. After they were air dried I tightened the straps, As the dry air of winter set in they got looser so I tightened them just before hauling them to the kiln on Sunday. The top two layers are 18" high. Max height in the kiln is 88". This makes for easy loading of the kiln. When they are cooked, I'll tighten the straps again and haul them over to the guy who will S3S them, making the material available for me to use in my house when I start it. I hope I can use up most of this wood. It takes up a lot of inside space. I may have to sell some in the end.
I don't have any idea of your built but you always need a boat load of lumber to build a house, and then some more! it almost never stops :D
Especially if you're boarding walls and roof, that's a mountain of boards. ;D Is it oak lumber? You guys in the south like heavy and rugged. :D
I'm in Indiana. Most of this load is Ash. Half of my last load was Walnut, about 10% Cherry, and 40% white and red Quartersawn oak. The rest of what I need to dry is mostly Ash and a little Cherry. I may make some flooring, furniture Etc. Planning to use White pine T&G for ceiling transparent white stained like in my previous projects. I buy that.
Where you using the walnut? Cupboards and trim wood? I don't blame you for using all that lumber for construction and trim, when you have all kinds of it at your disposal. Up this way using hardwood for construction would quadruple cost. :D A hard maple interior door is $800 plus. The down side is too much wood makes a place awfully dark.
@SwampDonkey (https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?action=profile;u=1009) I agree with you totally. Too much wood is overwhelming and will detract from the wood you want to be seen. I really want the timberframe to stand out hence the lightness of the tansparent white stained white pine ceiling boards where the ceiling is vaulted. Walls will be tall windows or drywall/painted. I like oak barnwood and have used it for window and door trim and baseboard in my shop as well as for the shop vanity and the bathroom vanity. My great room/living room will be a lot of tall windows, drywall, vaulted ceiling with the white pine, and either barnwood or walnut trim. There will be 2 master bedrooms and one will be all ash in the timberframe, drywall, light creams in the floor and vanity top. Probably a lighter floor with a white/cream rug on it. It will be a room on the brighter side. The great/living room will use walnut timbers, and probably a darker floor with the tall windows and light painted drywall.
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My daughters house build will have 18" x 8" exposed beams in most of the ceilings about 20 feet long. They require a rather substantial log to come out of (although not considered a "huge" log).
We have stacks of jacket boards stickered and stacked up all over the place and each stack has a tin rain shield. I have only been at it for a couple of years, but it gives the larger material time to air dry somewhat.
The beams will be Red Oak, Sugar and/or Red Maple, Hickory, Pine, Hemlock, Cherry, and White Oak for outdoors. The different species are for different rooms on different floor levels. We have stayed away from Walnut due to its darkness as she wishes for lighter rooms. The windows will be quite large as they will supply the heat for this certified passive solar house.
I am not sure how successful I will be making 20 foot long oak and maple floor boards. I suspect that it will be a time consuming challenge, and I will not be surprised if I do indeed fail. But if a few turn out ok, I can mix them in with normal shorter ones as conversation pieces. Of just cut them to match the shorter ones.
I am somewhat confused (my normal state of mind) with your above post implying that you had quarter sawn jacket boards from your beam production. When I cut a beam out of the center of a log I find myself working down to the desired dimension from the outside and rotating that log many times over and over to find the correct size beam with the heart in the center. Those jacket boards, here, are most always flat sawn from the outside of the log. Those jacket boards are very nice boards air drying at the moment.
How did you manage to get quarter sawn boards while making your beams?
We are also cutting the framing material (soft wood) and are using the kiln for sterilization just now. The jacket boards can be in the kiln at a later date.
Thanks for sharing your project.
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You are correct, jacket boards are flat sawn. I had come across 5 high grade oak logs that were 8' and 10' long, that I RRQS quarter sawed. Those ended up in that first kiln load. I normally don't saw entire logs for just 4/4 or 5/4. My 4/4 and 5/4 are byproducts of sawing beams (jacket boards). While cutting beams, we also cut down all the dead Ash on our 68 acres and I spent almost a year in there cutting those into 2x8 and 2x6 boards that ended up as T&G for all of the interior walls of our barn and 3 run-ins, as well as the infill for all the stall walls and doors, and the big end doors on both ends of the main barn. There were a lot of jacket boards from that that sawing as well. I basically had about 300-400 logs that I cut into that, or beams, and some of the small or ones with bacterial rot ended up as firewood. All of the slabs from the ash got run through a chipper and used in all the tree lines and along the edges of the woods for weed control. Nothing went to waste.
You can dry walnut and quarter sawn white oak in the same load? I would have thought the white oak would take so much more kiln time than walnut.
Probably have to dry at the White Oak safe speed, where walnut alone you could push things a bit faster. Within reason you can mix species, and set the kiln to the most conservative settings for the various species.
Both the Oak and the walnut were already air dried down to ambient MC. I know he had his probes in the White oak, Can't remember if he had any in Walnut? He has 3 sets of probes. Using the white oak as the bench mark, I think if the MC on the White oak is 6-8%, the walnut should be too.
I've been told that once they are completely air dried, finishing them together is fine. Watch someone contradict that now haha. They seemed to turn out fine anyhow. All of the first load is already S3S'd.
I would NOT try to dry White Oak and walnut together if they were a higher MC than ambient. As I hear, that is where you would have problems. Drying schedules for green WO and Walnut are different.
Quote from: Brad_bb on December 27, 2023, 11:34:17 PMDrying schedules for green WO and Walnut are different
Yes, but if you use the White Oak schedule it probably wont harm the Walnut. It's just not very efficient to slow the drying of the Walnut. Better to run a full load of WO, then a load of Walnut.
But when wood is air dried, under 15%, it's hard to mess up that last bit, so mixing wood isn't a problem.