Portable Bandmill Throat capacity

[dad2nine]

Got a WM LT40, dogs up I can saw a through the center of a  24 x 28 1/2" sq cant. Dogs down I can squeeze through the cent of a 28" diam log. Was wondering when I read about some of the other band mill manufactures specs, when they say "Will cut a 36" round log" or "36" saw throat" Does that mean the mill will be able to rip through the pith of a 36" diameter (big end) log. Wood Mizer also says log size 36" It can cut 36" logs, I've done it before you just have to nibble a little off the top and roll the log over it a little, nibble some more, etc... till you can get it down to size for the mill to start kicking off boards. It's a lot of wasted wood especially when I prefer to QS my logs.

I have to turn down big logs because my mill won't saw them. I would like to be able to saw those bigger logs into quarters. But with my wood mizer I'm really limited to a 28" dia log if I want to QS, which is a 14" wide QS board limit.  :(

Trying to think a little and can only come up with 3 options here.

#1 Buy a swinger with a slabbing attachment, rip the logs in half. load the 1/2 on the wood mizer and hope I can get some good QS lumber. Since the depth of cut on my WM is 14 1/2 from the top of the blade to the bottom of the head frame. I'm still left with a 14" quarter on one face. Remove the 14" quarter from the WM and continue to saw down from the top till I run out of QS grain or 14" from the bed, flip the quarter and saw boards off the bottom like I like to do anyways because it's a lot of monkey'ing around to get the quarter faces flat to saw boards off the top of the quarters.

Split the logs into quarters with a chainsaw - been doing that, it's getting old real fast.

Build something custom to cut big logs - not to keen on that either...

Right now I have a 45" diam (small end) Red Oak that I would love to QS into full width boards (20 ~ 22" wide at it's widest). But I'm scratching my head on how to get it done with my wood mizer and husky chainsaw.

I've heard a swinger can only cut 10" wide boards without the slabbing attchment, is that true? What the biggest diam log that a swinger can rip down the pith without the slabbing attachment?

I would like to QS boards upto 36" wide as I have yet to see a tree around here and bigger than 6" in diameter. Please share with me how how to QS the big logs, I'm probably missing something really easy.

Thanks

[Dan_Shade]

bust them down with a big chainsaw or bottle jacks, or dynamite (!).

do a search on Urban_Logger (Scott Banbury), he has some info on splitting big logs.

Splitting them on the ground is the easiest/smartest way to handle them.

[Brad_S.]

#1 Buy a swinger with a slabbing attachment, rip the logs in half

A swinger with a slabbing bar can only cut as deep as it's rated capacity, which is usually 6,8 or 10 inches. You are not able to halve a log with a slabbing bar.

[dad2nine]

I have seriously considered dynamite, honestly it's not very practical, nor is chainsaw or jacks.

That tosses out the swinger option  :

[Brad_S.]

Deja vu all over again.
https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=24814.0

[Ianab]

Nope, not missing any easy options  :P

The swinger / slabber does have some limitations in the size cut. It wont do exactly what you want. The cut depth on the normal slabbers is usually 8" (I think), so you wont be able to slice a big log in 1/2   :(

You could however recover SOME wide Q sawn boards, and plenty of narrower (8") qsawn and rift sawn boards from a big log.

How I would attack a log like that would be to level the top off and then cut vertical boards 8" deep. There would be some rift sawn stuff on either side, but the middle ones would be nicely qsawn.
Then switch to horizontal cutting as I got to the middle of the log. Now you could double cut to get one 16" board from each layer, and 2 x 8" ones. Again your boards would vary from rift, through 90deg qsawn, and back toward rift again. Do the double cutting on the best looking side of the pith once you see whats inside the log.

If you had a slabber you could cut slabs from this middle 1/3rd and then just edge the pith out of the best ones to have some of the biggest qsawn boards possible. However the slabbers are much slower and the circle blade, so unless you are getting a real premium for the wide boards, is it worth the extra time.

The last 1/3rd, you switch back to vertical cuts and recover the rest of the 8" qsawn stuff. Or flip the remains of the log over and cut from the other side leaving a beaut full width live edge slab + whatever you cut from the other side.

OK, you haven't got the maximum of wide boards possible, but you have got some, and the rest is still good quality product. You can have some usefull rift sawn 2x stock, some stray flatsawn boards from the outside, and usually a big hunk of firewood from the core. Main advantage, you did no more work than sawing the log any other pattern, you never had to move the log at all. MUCH less work than breaking it into halves/quarters and moving those around to resaw.

Thinking outside the square though... You could saw the first part of the log, roll it over and saw the other side, leaving an 8" thick slab from the centre of the log. Edge that and saw out the pith leaving 2 8" x 22" cants that you could then resaw on the woodmizer.

Anyone with a swingblade nearby that would like to help you out?

Cheers

Ian

[dad2nine]

Ian wow that's very detailed thanks! Scott Smith is pretty close and has a Patterson. I'm going to talk to him about sawing up a few.

Thanks

[Firebass]

OK I am going to give a little support to the swing mills.  I am totally independent and just think theres allot of branding that gets done here. And since I made my own mill and I dont have a brand  I thought I'd share my observations. So here goes.  And No, I don't sell saw mills.
The thing about a swinger is you can double cut.  Down and Back..  See Peterson site.. D&L makes a great saw as well and you might check out Brand X.  If you are not familiar with a swing blade it's a bit confusing but large logs are easy with a swing blade.  Without moving the log a 10" swing blade can cut a 10" x 20" inch cant or beam. 10 being the depth of the blade.  I made my swing blade mill myself and I can cut a 8 x 16.  its considered a 8 inch machine.  I can get a 72" log on my mill and not have to touch it till its all cut up.  Drawbacks I see are wood chips add up.  Kerf is a issue but if you keep in mind that the circle blade with its carbide tips doesn't deflect when it hit a knots or grain and boards come off the machine at  less than +or - 1/32"  Plaining is minimal.  If at all needed.

No disrespect to the orange guys or any other.  I'd think both would be Ideal ;D
But then again I'm a green horn ;D
Firebass

[AusLJW]

Hello
I sometimes need to cut very large Eucalypt logs.  I'm not going for Qsawn boards particularly.  I have a woodmizer and an automated swing mill.  You would think I would go straight for the swing mill but there are a few points which sometimes stop me.

Rotten pipes up the centre of large old logs are very common in Australia.  Termites get into the log and convert this pipe into mud.  You have to work through this with a swing blade.  A lot of work for no wood and a blunt blade.

To get the best out of a log with a swing blade you have to very carefully set the log up and wedge or dog it.  To do this right takes time and effort even with the help of machinery.  Some swing mills allow you shift end frames and adjust the rails to work around a heart or pipe .  This is a good thing.  Some swing blades don't.  So log set up time is very significant.  If you want to flip the log mid way through then the set up time increases.

Swing blade mills produce a lot of sawdust compared to a band saw.  Its a fact.  If you can leave the sawdust then no worries.  If you have a fixed site and have to pick up and dispose of said sawdust then it becomes a pertinent issue.

So what do I do?  Rip the log with the chainsaw. String line one cut, roll the log and mark the next to get the log in half.  Make the cut then pick up log with loader and drop it.  It drops in half due to the pipe.  If the half is manageable it can go on the bandsaw.  If not further cutting to make it into quaters.

Recovery is good because you can turn the piece and adjust it at will with the hydraulic set up on the bandsaw.  That is the important difference between a swing mill and some bandsaws.  Any loss of wood caused by poor chainsaw cut is made up for by this factor.  You work round the rotten heart without wasting time putting a cut into it.

How could this be improved?  1 Modify a dedicated slabber to make a deeper cut so that a log could be halved,  2 Use a chainsaw rail type mill.  3 Don't do those thumping big logs in the first place.

Now I sound like pro band and anti swing blade and I'm not.  I own both.  My circumstance means that the bandsaw (plus edger) does 95% of my work.

This is by far the longest post I have written

Regards

[thecfarm]

Probaly alot more money than what you want to spend,but didn't Sanborn have a good size band mill that would cut big logs?They use to be in Waterford,ME.I saw one at a field day for sawmills.Wasn't all that big,but the capacity was gthere to cut the big logs.Seems like it had a 6 inch bandsaw blade on it.This was 10 years ago.

[Dan_Shade]

http://www.scottbanbury.com/quartersawing.html

check that out

[Modat22]

I had a saywer contact me about squaring up 50 inchers for him. I told him that if he'd haul em over, get them loaded on my mill and take care of turning and removing them off the mill I'd do it  :D

My homemade mill could possibly cut thru the center of a 50inch log but I have no way of getting em loaded on the deck or getting them off. I actually hate working on 30inch logs due to the weight.

[fencerowphil (Phil L.)]

Come on, now, Dad,

  that's PETERSON, not patterson.   Peterson swingblade.

If Scott has a 10" Peterson, you can get 20" double cuts.
Ian's method is exactly what I do when I want mostly rift & QS
out of a big log ( and I just happen to usually want that out of big logs)

When I want mainly flat sawn and rift,  I simply reverse the method:

    1.  Flatten top and squeeze out all the flat sawn I can from the top.
    2.  Continue flat sawning down to a selected distance from heart.
          With planning, max width board = 20"
    3.  Cut deep for a set of flat sawn boards all the way across the log.
          These boards can range from 6" wide to 10" wide.
    4.  Cut up the rest (bottom third) flat sawn.
          With planning,  once again, max width =20"


Thanks, Ian, and AUS!
Excellent!

Phil L.