cabin logs

[trapper]

guy wants me to saw couple logs left over from log house build.  any chemicals to be 
cautious about like in power poles?

[Don P]

You can find out the company and check with them, typically nothing or borate but I did work on one a month or so ago that had some type of copper treatment. I will say it was impressive, they had never applied any other finish in 35 years and I saw zero decay.

[Stephen1]

I would think being house logs that hey would not put anything to serious on them. As don says Borate for sure,I used it on mine.

[kantuckid]

In the early 1980's I had an adult student who built a kit log house on contract, which was pressure treated (green) log walls. It had interior studded walls with drywall, etc.. 
BTW, it's still there in a small sub-division of Mt. Sterling, KY. I have zero notion of what company made them. Only one I've heard of ever. Back when they also used a few other now banned chemicals such as "Penta", AKA pentachlorophenol was commonly found in many store bought wood treatment products. 
But like said, it's very doubtful a recently built structure has anything nasty. 

[Don P]

This one was an Appalachian Log Structures kit, I think up around Princeton/Beckley WV area. I built for a dozen or so companies, something north of 50 homes, back in the day and never ran into anything other than borate. Even his scrap chunks on the ground under firewood were still looking good. The chunks I brought home and did that with are long gone. Uhh yeah on the penta, we used to dip things like shutters in it. Good preservative but wicked stuff, we used to soak the cells of block with chloridane back then too. I guess I'm pre enbalmed  :

[Magicman]

I have split many "kit" logs in half for starter/finisher logs for log home builders.  The bundle does not come with split logs and the builders have to get that done locally.

[D6c]

I've found that I'm very sensitive to the current MCA (micronized copper azole)
treatment in lumber.  Built a couple of sets of porch steps and ended up with swollen throat / lymph nodes for weeks but finally got over it with steroid treatment.  The older I get the more things I seem to be sensitive to.

[trapper]

He wanted 4 in out of the center of each for shelfs.  6 cuts and he was on his way.  straightest roundest logs i have ever cut.  took picture but cover on his truck caused it to not turn out.

[TimW]

You can find out the company and check with them, typically nothing or borate but I did work on one a month or so ago that had some type of copper treatment. I will say it was impressive, they had never applied any other finish in 35 years and I saw zero decay.

Don,
     Was it Copper Naphthenate Concentrate?  I have been dipping 4x4 and 6x6 posts in it.  It is nasty stuff and I have to wear a respirator, rubber gloves, and safety glasses while handling it.  But it dries brown and is paintable.  It comes out dipped with a green color on it.  After turning brown, you can not smell it.
hugs,  Brandi

[kantuckid]

As an oil it's a wood preservative but as a mixed spray it's a fungicide which as I remember is allowable 4 times during a season on plants such as tomatoes, not that you don't wash it off the fruit. I mostly use it in rainy spells for early blights well before edible stage.

[Don P]

@Bindian , I'm not sure what it was, the house was old enough he couldn't remember what it was. I think I have some old log home buyer guides from then, I'll holler if I find anything. The green in most of those is from copper.

D6c- it sounds like the route was inhaling the dust?