Woodland Mills HM126 Preparing for Shipment

[MattVT]

We placed an order for a Woodland Mills HM126 Woodlander on July 14th with an anticipated ship date of October 31st. This morning we had an email to say that the order has been submitted to the warehouse for processing and is estimated to ship in the next 4 weeks, so that sounds right on schedule - maybe even a little early.

Since my last post, I've been reading posts and researching as much as I can - it's given me a lot of great answers, but also a ton more questions.

Anyway, before I get into that, I just wanted to say a huge thank you to @GAB who invited me to see his setup and help him mill some red oak logs after my last post. I spent the afternoon with him and learned so much - not least because it was my first time seeing a mill in action (albeit his is somewhat significantly larger than the one we're getting). So yes, thank you @GAB !

Our property is ~40 acres of raw land in central Vermont - nothing but trees and dirt - and our plan is to build our dream home on it. Progress has been slow due to permits and things taking longer than usual, but we hit a big milestone a few weeks ago when our ~1,000ft driveway was built, giving us vehicular access to the house-site - it's a really solid road that'll have no problems with big vehicles.



As part of installing the road, quite a few trees were felled and we bucked anything suitable for milling. By a rough estimate, we have already stacked up about 4,000 board-feet of logs and there are a bunch we still need to buck and move up. The photo below shows some of the logs - for scale, the bottom log in the furthest pile is 17ft long and 30" diameter at the butt end. Most of the wood is white pine, spruce and maple, although we have also some birch, beech, ash and black cherry.



One challenge is that we don't have a lot of cleared space or flat ground yet, so finding a location for the mill and piles of milled lumber is a little tricky. We'll figure something out!

Once the mill arrives, we'll have until about Thanksgiving to play with it before we're going to head south with our RV for winter. We'd like to use this time to get the mill set up, practice with it and hopefully build some simple projects. Roughly speaking, we're thinking of:

• Cants (4x6?) to stack our milled lumber on
• Stickers (1x1s cut from white pine)
• Saw horses (per the YouTube video that someone referred me to in my last post)
• Virginia Tech solar kiln

The last one is obviously the most complex! Our thinking is to build the floor structure out of pressure treated pine, use plywood for the floor and interior walls, and then use our own green lumber for studs and board & batten exterior siding. We'd like to build the solar kiln before winter so it's all ready to go first thing next spring when we return.

There are a few reasons we want to build a solar kiln: it seems like a fun project, it doesn't have the same exacting standards as a more significant building, it'll let us dry our lumber faster (obviously!), and it'll help set the pitch as we have a LOT of spruce.

I have some questions I'm hoping to get some help with:

• Since most of the ground is pretty uneven at the moment, I'm looking for suggestions on how to support my lumber stacks. My best thinking is some large cants (6" x 6" x 16ft long) on some concrete blocks to act as rails that I can lay my shorter cants across and stack / sticker lumber on top of those. Does this make sense? Is there a better way? Should I put pressure treated lumber under my ground-contacting rails?
• If we use green EWP for the board & batten siding, will it be OK air-drying without being painted / coated?

Thanks in advance!

[GAB]

Matt:
Thank You. 
If there is anything else I can help you with you have my number and you know where I live.
I had scheduled to saw two red oak logs the same afternoon as Matt had said he would be over.
Matt and I discussed different topics until the log owner showed up then we went and sawed.
True to form, yard tree logs are prone to metal and one of these logs had dry wall screws in it and of course I hit one and bent the teeth of the blade like I had never seen before (close to 45° from the blade body).  Also the butt end of the log had no sign of metal which I had looked for.
Matt got his battery operated chainsaw and we freed up the mill and cut the log into two pieces.  Where the log was cut there was a blue spot like I was looking for on the end of the butt log.
Matt got to see and experience a metal strike and the trouble it causes etc., etc.
Matt thanks for you assistance in sawing those two logs, and the demonstration of your battery powered chainsaw.
Matt counting the annual rings estimated that the screws had been in the tree approx. 24 years and the lady said my sons would of been 8 and 10.
GAB

[MattVT]

It was truly astonishing to see how such a tiny screw was able to completely destroy the blade on such a powerful mill. While it was a shame that it happened, it was a valuable opportunity for me to see nonetheless - albeit one I'm not keen on repeating any time soon!

Since you mentioned the battery-powered chainsaw, a quick update. When we bought the land, we bought a Dewalt DCCS670 60V cordless chainsaw. In my opinion, battery-powered chainsaws have a lot of advantages - they're quieter, require less maintenance, don't require us to carry around gasoline, they're smaller, lighter, etc.

Unfortunately, the Dewalt chainsaw just wasn't up to the task. Arguably it had the power for what we needed - I felled several trees in the 16-20" range without issue. The problem was just the durability. The Dewalt chainsaw retails for ~$300 including a battery and charger, so when you subtract those from the price, the chainsaw itself is ~$150.

Our Dewalt chainsaw broke - specifically, there is a small (~1/2") screw that holds the sprocket onto the motor driveshaft and it stripped completely bare. It's a reverse-threaded screw so not an easy part to replace. Home Depot swapped our entire chainsaw for us and with the second one I kept a very close eye on that screw to make sure it wasn't working loose. We said we'd give it one more go before giving up on batteries.

Unfortunately the same thing happened again. It seems to be cutting very hard woods (e.g. hard maple) that causes issues.

So about a month ago I went out and bought a new, gas chainsaw - the Husqvarna 550 XP Mark II. At almost $700, this is in a different league to the Dewalt, and it shows. While I miss the advantages of the cordless chainsaw, I really like this new one!

[GAB]

Matt:
To me that sounds like you just described a major design flaw.
As a side note since you were here I sawed a cherry log for a bowl turner and he cut the turning pieces with a battery operated chainsaw and he had to pull the battery out and put it back in a few times as it would just stop.  I did not note the brand.  I do not know if that saw had a design flaw or a manufacturing defect.
I'd be curious to hear from others on their battery powered chainsaw experiences.  As for me I think I'll wait a few years before buying one.
GAB

[VB-Milling]

Matt,

I am very excited to see your journey with your land and house.  A driveway is a huge step!

I'm not very picky, so I'll take an acre or two of where ever you want to put me on your property.  :D

Its really awesome that you got to see a mill in operation and provide some labor to boot.

I'm not sure what part or how far south for the winter you are heading, but you're welcome to stop in Virginia Beach as see an HM126 in action.  It sounds like you'll have yours and have been playing with it for about a month before you have to leave it all sad and alone to fend for itself in the unfamiliar wilderness.  Unfortunately, an unattended mill makes no lumber!

I'm not sure about your skillset or how complex you want to get with your lumber drying base, but one of the best solutions I've seen for making dead straight/level bases is Matt Cremona's.  Check out his YT channel if not familiar.  For the guys who don't have pavement or concrete pads to stack on, it seems like a winner.  I'm using pallets on ground that I did my best to flatten.  Its definitely not ideal.  

Looking forward to updates and the spring when you really kick this project off.

[MattVT]

Thanks @VB-Milling ! Funnily enough, our plan is to head to Virginia this winter. No idea where yet, but if we find ourselves anywhere near Virginia Beach I'll drop you a message - it'd be great to meet up!

We picked up some free pallets a couple of weeks ago from a CraigsList ad and plan to use those to stack firewood on. We only need firewood for campfires so don't need anything too fancy.

I hadn't seen Matt Cremona's channel before but I've just scanned through and it looks like he has some great videos! His leveling system is more elaborate than I think I want to make right now, but it looks awesome - aspirations for later I think.

If our ground were more level, I think I'd go with just the pallets, but I'm not sure our ground is flat enough. It's somewhat ironic that despite having 40+ acres, we're struggling to find a couple of hundred square feet of flat space! It'll be much easier once we've cleared some more trees, but cleared space is a premium right now!

We have reserved a spot on the driveway for a 40ft shipping container that arrives this week. The space is on hard packed crushed rock and is flat with a very gentle slope (a few inches over the length of the container). I'm thinking about stacking the milled lumber along the side of that - it's not as much air flow as I'd like, but it's flat at least.

Anyway, thanks for the message, and as I say, I'd love to stop by if we find ourselves in the area!

[VB-Milling]

Crazy idea, but I'm thinking outside the box...literally.  What about stacking on TOP of the container ???

If you're only cutting enough to get your small projects kicked off, but not the house lumber, it could be an option.

[MattVT]

I won't lie, the thought had occurred to me. We have a tractor so it would in theory be doable. Don't know how much weight the container can take in the center of the roof vs the edges though.

[kevin5055]

I'd be curious to hear from others on their battery powered chainsaw experiences.

I have two: a 40v Ryobi brushless (14" bar) and a 80v Greenworks brushless (18" bar). My work flow is slow/steady which seems be conducive to battery saws (at least the non-commercial grade ones). I like not having to dealing with gas (storing, mixing, starting, smelling, etc.). While you're not buying gas, you're going to have to buy batteries because they will eventually get old/stop working. The charging cost is minimal so you're basically replacing the cost of gas/oil with batteries. As a result, I think the quality of the batteries are the most important part.

Ryobi: The Ryobi is about 6 years old now. I think I bought it right after they started coming out with their brushless tools, but they lagged with their brushless battery technology. I have a couple old batteries (6-7 years old) with their old technology and then a newer technology battery (maybe 4 years old now). I think they are all 2.0ah or 2.5ah. With the newer battery, it is my go to for removing branches and cutting anything under 8" diameter. With the older batteries, the speed/performance drops noticeably and I have to limit my cuts to 2-3" diameter; it also cuts slower. I guess I haven't tried to use the oldest battery I have in a while, but I wouldn't be surprised if it barely cut. I do have some other tools that I use it in and it still works.

If you push the saw, it will stop and you have to remove the battery for a few seconds. I think this was mainly an issue with the older batteries if I recall correctly. If you also try to make a ton of consecutive cuts or push it a lot, the battery will hit its thermal cutoff and you won't be able to use it for an hour. As a result, I had to adjust my work flow to make a few cuts and then move/stack to give the saw some down time. It also helps if you keep the saw in the shade when you're not using it! The charging time for this saw was a real killer for me though at 90 minutes.  Even with two chargers, I still had down time. With all that being said, I definitely was using the saw harder than they probably envisioned when they designed it. I did use it to buck up to 20" diameter logs, but it causes a lot of down time. As a result, I probably could have gotten some more use out of the batteries if I didn't push them so hard. With that being said, I will probably upgrade the battery at some point to the larger 6ah if it fits.

Greenworks: I bought this one after I realized I was trying pushing the 40v one way beyond what it was designed for. I was also heavily considering an ECHO timberwolf, but ended up going with another cordless. I purchased it online during black Friday for $280 and a couple batteries half off for $60 each I think. Again, all batteries are 2.0ah or 2.5ah. I only have one charger but the batteries only take 30 minutes to charge. The charger also has a fan which helps keep the batteries cool. As a result, I don't really have any down time with the saw. It will shut off if the kerf closes or if you try to push the saw down hard to cut faster. When that happens, you just have to hit the power button off and then back on. This rarely happens if you're cognizant of the kerf and basically "guide" the saw. I use this one to cut anything over 8" and have used it on logs up to 24". It works great and I really don't have any complaints. I do have a hand-me-down ~40cc Craftsman saw and the Greenworks definitely cuts better. No fumes, no vibration, and no noise. It is probably comparable in weight to the gas saw.

Overall, I like both of the cordless saws. Both of the saws have met my expectations and the shortfalls I've encountered can mainly be tied to me exceeding their design purpose. I haven't received my mill yet but have used it to cut a decent amount of firewood. Everything I've cut has been red oak, hickory, maple, or walnut.

[Rybot]

Crazy idea, but I'm thinking outside the box...literally.  What about stacking on TOP of the container  If you're only cutting enough to get your small projects kicked off, but not the house lumber, it could be an option.

I think this is a great idea. If you place a couple cants across the container (from sidewall to sidewall) then set palletized wood on top of the cants it would transfer the entire load to the sidewalls which would hold all the weight you could stack up there with a tractor.