First Real Weekend of Sawing.

Chris Burchfield · October 09, 2005, 09:43:00 PM

First let me say for all of you and especially the "old saw dust in the veins" group, I really enjoy my morning coffee with what you've put on the board, 05:30 til 07:00. I'm usually up early 05:30 - 06:00 hrs, go to take my shower at 07:00 and off to work at 07:30 starting at 08:00. Sometimes home at lunch and I'll check the board. Then, about every evening check the board again. Last week end I cut up a ten inch sweetgum cause the power company said it was a threat to the incoming line. It wasn't real sawing just play. Some of you might remember back in July when after I picked up my mill from Will and the guys in Mt. Vernon, Mo. I had the oportunity to tail for the proffessor aka "Arky" in the Great Ozarks. He put the pressure on by loading me with three cherry logs after tailing for him during that morning in which he cut the available cedar for a couple of porch orders. The following is the first, what I'd call sawing I did over the weekend .
Well now,my Aunt had a Red Oak taken out by an arborist and left the log for me. About 32" in diameter and thirteen feet in length. He cut it low to the ground which left flair wider than the log itself. My SH40lt Command Control has all the horns and whistles. I just began whitling at it till I could begin to do some good. The pattern feature was real neat and did what it was suppose to do. However. I had cut some one inch boards for spacers to dry with first from the outer sap part of the log. I then cut real 2 X 6"ers I'll be using for a shop I'm building from the heart wood. The loader arms only hold so much, I was kind of getting the cart before the horse in terms of production. Slowly but shurely, I completed the job. Aside from the bundle of spacer airing strips, I managed eighteen 2 X 6's and three 1 3/4" boards 13 feet in length. Now, short of what I'll call the wreck, backing up and pulling the blade off in the cut, things went pretty good. The wreck ate off a couple of the aluminum rivits at the dust deflector shoot. Ruined the blade by removing several teeth. I then stacked off eight cinder blocks with spacer strips about every sixteen inches. After stacking, I used the scrap slabs to cap the stack of lumber. One for water runoff till I can get back and cover it with plastic and two for weight.

Sorry I don't have pictures, but the red heard wood looks so fine and smells good too. I going back to cover the stack with plastic hope to get pics then but there's not much to see. I just don't know if I should use black or clear plastic, any suggestions would be appreciated. One, I know the log was larger in diameter than the maximum opening in the mill. At one point it looked like I might be going for a hexigon post, which would have been close to three thousand pounds and thirteen feet in length. There is no way I could approach the board feet per hour while I'm still learning. I have a real problem remembering direction of the hydraulics from what I think it should be to what it really is. Last, I put down a good role of heavy plastic to catch the saw dust. Now the pile is about 12 inches triangular shaped. I was going to pull this 13' on the plastic and spread it about the yard. Well, no way! My 21 YOA son who was helping me said "dad, that's like a green log laying there." No da! I wish ya'll could enjoy reading this as much as I did living it. One day I'll improve the productions level. She's having another taken out tomorrow, it measures 10' 10" around the outer diameter, I figure close to 38" through the middle and about 14' in length. My son said he'd quarter it so I could get it on the mill. All in all, it was a good weekend.

Tom · October 09, 2005, 10:02:15 PM

You're on the way to more fun than you've ever had in your life. Taking your son with you too. That's great.

You mention covering the lumber with a piece of plastic. I'm not sure what you mean, but, don't wrap it up in plastic. It will mold in a heart beat.

Green lumber needs to have a lot of air flow to get the wet air out of the stack.

If you cover it, cover it with a flat roof. If you use plastic, make a shelter that doesn't impede air flow.

If you let it droop even a few inches over the side of the stack, that few inches will make a greenhouse and you will have a wonderful environment for moldy wood.

CHARLIE · October 09, 2005, 10:06:46 PM

Tom also forgot to mention to keep a few cans of peas and sliced peaches and a can openter under the seat of your truck...........for lunches. ;)

Chris Burchfield · October 09, 2005, 10:16:38 PM

I did plan on just covering the top against rain. I usually get by on just coffee in the morning. I'm a pretty good sized guy at 260 lbs. But , I was having so much fun, I didn't take time for lunch either day.