Slabs, it's what I do!

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SDB777

SDB777

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Didn't get any during photo's, just after the clean up. Sorry, but I only had one(1) cup of coffee before getting started today......
Cut up two(2) nasty pieces of Cherry, had some okay grain in it, but wasn't really anything super special. The crotch pieces went with John, I have enough small stuff to cut into blank and whatnot to last for a good while!! Then we both eyeballed the smallest chunk of Hickory......a little effort(always good on a day off) and the chunk was on the mill. For a mostly dry piece of Hickory, I was expecting something a lot harder then what I encountered. But I won't complain, it cutt like butter!


Anyway, some highlights!
Close-up first.....eye candy!




Had to do a little trimming on the knots I had, and the ends were cracked enough that I decided to just lop them off and not even bother with them. Will make someone some good firewood....for free.

Some semi-close ups....meduim eye-candy!






And the group shot!




Special thanks to John for giving a helping hand, sure makes it easier to move them things around the yard. And I hope you find room for these new pieces in a dry place!

BTW, you can click on the photo's for larger versions(at least bigger).

Scott (had fun, little sore) B
 
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robutacion

robutacion

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Some very pretty boards you have there...!

One of the disadvantages of making pen blanks out of this type of boards is that, you lose most of the beautiful effects within the wood grain and the natural wood pattern distribution, the smaller the wood the less effects will show...!

However, most people have no use for boards of such size so they endup cut up into little pieces, the most important thing and the only time (last chance) one has the opportunity to keep some sort of records of what it looked as a board, is to just do what you did, take some pics with the wood rinsed with water to clean and enhance the wood. Is always nice to go back one day and admire the pics...!:wink:

One of the most rewarding steps of the wood processing, is to be behind/beside a ripping machine...!

Well done, thanks for showing us...!

Cheers
George
 
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Haynie

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Holy crap, Batman! You just made my decision for a chair for me. I was looking for pictures of hickory to see what kind of character it had and WOW!
 
BSea

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How did I miss this? John told me you cut this up, but I didn't know you posted the pics.

Everyone within comfortable driving distance really should try & stop by when you run that saw. It's more fun than . . . . . well, maybe not that. But it's fun!! And when an ugly old log with mushrooms all over it gets made into a slab, it's just plain amazing.
 
SDB777

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The most recent cutting from the backyard sawyer! These book matched sets are Pignut Hickory that I picked up and brought home back in the fall of 2011. Just for reference, the fence these are leaning on is 45" tall and them 'holes' are 3x3inches!

How about a close-up?







Scott (haven't forgot how to run tha mill) B
 
Bob Wemm

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Scott, that is not fair man.

Those are fabulous, especially the left side pair. TOTALLY FREAKIN AWESOME.
I wonder if they would fit in my luggage.

Thanks for causing a double DROOL!!!!!!


Bob.
 
David Keller

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Looks like some beautiful live edge table material, or maybe you could find a luthier to make something out of those book matched beauties!
 
SDB777

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Figured I'd just keep this topic rolling along.

I happened to get everything done the other day and decided to get a bigger log onto the bunk of the mill. Sometimes I bite off more then I can chew!





After about three or four minutes everything is turned so that she can at least fit between the uprights. Just by keeping the braces on the left hand side and using a 60" cant hook, I can roll just about any log on the bunk I need to roll....this one still weighs around 2,900 lbs!
Although a little trimming on the far end with the little Stihl MS250 helps.





My least favorite thing to do is to remove the bark. Never fun, and always little surprises come crawling out....mostly water bug looking things and centipedes aplenty!






Only had time to make four passes on this log before I had to clean-up and get ready for some pork chops, mashed 'taters and corn! But here's a closing shot of a grain pattern that I am lovin'!






I'll try to remember to take the camera out back to the mill more often....thanks for looking!






Scott (now to roll that piece 90* and book-match some chunks) B
 
SDB777

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Whew, seems like when your having a good time....you forget to pace yourself and end up doing more then you should. Needless to say, just a little sore now. But that is to be expected after moving a 'green' Wild Black Cherry(Prunus serotina) log around the end of the stack and putting it on the mill, rolling it around for about an hour(okay, maybe it was like 20minutes-but it sure felt like an hour).

First things first. Finished the Pignut Hickory(Carya glabra) log up. I had to cut a 3" slab off the opposite side and then I flipped that 90* and made a bunch of 15-1/4" wide, 1" thickness boards. The neighbor down the street is going to use a few of them to make a king size bed.....so I made sure he had enough that would 'book-match' nicely and then I made some 4x4's for the postings.



and let's flip them over!




The smaller slices are 6" wide, and will end up as pen blanks! Unless someone needs some turkey slate blanks before I get carried away!

Then it was time to do some heavy rolling! The Wild Black Cherry(Prunus serotina) was a series of endless crotches, and I wanted to slice right through the center of the crotch to get that 'flaming' effect....sometimes it's really awesome, sometimes not so much. But here is a photo of it sitting on the mill bunk(before trimming down to get the saw head to pass over).



Needless to say, I should have quite right after this one was loaded and clamped. Those 'green' fletches are heavy....really heavy! The max width the mill can handle is 20", and this one rubbed the guides on both sides at a few spots! Again, I cut them 1" thickness.




continued.....
 
SDB777

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And the close-up of the crotch area....






While not really what I'd consider 'awesomeness'....in a way it's just....nice.

Some other photo's from today, just to keep everyone happy until the boring video can be downloaded and processed(battery needs recharging before that can happen).





More Pignut?



Thanks for looking! I'm glad the sun came out!!


Scott (who wants 'em) B
 
BSea

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WOW Scott, you should have called me. Of course, I couldn't have come over. SWMBO had me planting bushes . . . . . . . . . . across the street. So in 10 years we won't be able to see our neighbor's back yard.:confused:

But those all look fantastic.
 
SDB777

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Trickrick said:
That's some nice wood Scott!
I heard that a little of it got scavenged before you were done:-0
Click to expand...


You heard right, and I even helped carry some of it to the front yard too! But at least I didn't have to help take it out of his truck!!! Stuff was heavy!!!






Scott (trying to upload to YouTube now) B
 
SDB777

SDB777

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Today was awesome, at least until it got too warm for me. Ever notice how the heat just sneaks up on ya? One minute everything is going okay, and the next you can find any more breeze and shade!

I gave up when it got to 95*F/46% humidity....or the sissy thing(heat index) got to 104*F
Honestly, lunch was ready, and I was really hungry...so I figured it was as good a time as any. Never been known to be the sharpest stick in the pile...and I would have just stayed outside cutting until someone found me passed out from heat exhaustion(my wife knew I was hot and made some hamburger helper-and I'm a sucker for that stuff)!


It's going to take the rest of the day to upload the video into YouTube that I shot, so you'll just have to look at a few snapshots of some Pignut Hickory.
The thinner looking sticks will be cut down to 4x4(they are at a rough cut of 1-1/8" thickness already), and I'll probably list them here as turkey pot call blanks?




I like to stand them vertically over thebench to drain the water(I have to wash off the drip mix from the mill to keep from staining the timber). Besides, I'm cutting them down in the tomorrow morning....they won't move before then.




Just a different angle...




The backside... Dang, I got wood drying everywhere. Maybe someone should clean this up?

Had a big, thick, top-cap come off the log that was borderline for all but some bowl blanks. So I decided to get them cut down to 7x7 and varying thickness(a natural edge, without the bark). These will sit in the shed until tomorrow morning, and then get moved into the garage/shop..






And some more of the 4" wide by 1-1/8" thickness cleaned off, sitting on the mill....yup, that's a 8-3/4"sq x 8'length beam, or maybe some more bowl blanks later on? Don't know yet?? And beside that piece, there is a chunk of timber that is 2-1/2" thick. It's going to be chopped up into 2-1/2 cubes(thinking Christmas ornament blanks)?




Anyway...thanks for looking. And the answer to the unasked question.....yup I made some more pen blanks today!



Scott (wearing the floppy hat and sweating Gatorade) B
 
SDB777

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Here is the first of the two video's I shot yesterday. For whatever reason, I have terrible times uploading to YouTube(not sure if it's me or the interweb connection or them), took about 5.75hrs to upload and process this video yesterday. By that time I'd had called it a day.


Woodmizer does Hickory part#1 - YouTube



I'll load the other part after I finish cutting turkey pot call blanks this afternoon! Maybe.....





Scott (about 30mins of video) B
 
SDB777

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Much shorter, and it only took about 1.5hrs to load and get processed into YouTube!?!? Anyone else have these problems loading stuff, or is it just me?


Anyway...

Woodmizer does Hickory part2 - YouTube




Don't forget, this is for amusement only. Don't try this at home, I'm a trained red-neck!







Scott (you can tell redneck by the floppy hat) B
 
SDB777

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I'm a great lover of the crotch.....timber you pervs!! I does matter how it's cut though, if you 'butcher' crotch chunk in the wrong direction....well, you end up with mediocre blanks. And mediocre blanks equal mediocre pens!



I spent the early morning cutting Eastern Red Cedar logs for a customer. Just simple plain sawn wood, but I think milling in the heat and humidity made it more difficult then it should have been?

Ended up with just under 320 boardfeet of flitches! I know it doesn't sound like much....but remember, I run a completely manual mill set-up!





Scott (took a shower and now the dog will play with me) B
 
SDB777

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Decided to get right to it, so I only took 15 photo's! They all can be seen in my flickr account(SDB777), so feel free to go look, because I am not going to put them all here(although there are some nice photo's of some really nice timber)!

This is the resulting pile of a 131Bft(Doyle scaled) of White Oak{Quercus alba}. The fella wanted to be able to make some tables(book matched), so he requested some 8/4 along with the standard 4/4 that I generally cut for him.

(The dark spots are the result of a green-ish White Oak log sitting on my steel bunk, it turns it black in a split second. And yes, it'll sand out....it's not very deep.)

Got the next log rolled up and ready to go! The yield is supposed to be about 105Bft(Doyle scaled) from this one, but there was a lot of rot around the outside....not thinking it came to the great stack it should have.



The bookmatched piece from the above log.


The next log was a simple Eastern Red Cedar{Juniperus virginiana}, and the Doyle scale said it was only going to come to about 14Bft(Doyle scaled-think the scale lied).....but a pretty 14 it made!


Finally a 'group shot' of all the mess and the smoking burn barrel!


Too much excitement for me for one day. Time to get the grille going and put those ribeye's I've had marinading all morning in my stomach!



Scott (still, just a hobby) B
 
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SDB777

SDB777

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Hendu3270 said:
This so cool Scott. Wish I had the resources to do something like this.
Click to expand...


I started with nothing more then a chainsaw, and an idea. Upgraded the chainsaw stable a few times, bought a chainsaw mill and ripping chains....then made some deals happen. And BINGO! I could afford to purchase the mill with no 'out of pocket' monies involved.

The logs are pretty much all around you, C-List is a good place to start. You can search local places by using the words logs, trees, or firewood....in the section labeled 'FREE'. A lot of people don't want to pay to have trees removed, so you'll have to be picky about what you cut(and how close you are to their stuff), remember you probably won't be insured(meaning, if you break stuff you might have to pay for it). If you can find storm damaged stuff, everyone wants that cleaned up! Be ever mindful for things like powerlines, cable, and telephone stuff...try not to drive over waterlines or septic line either(yuck).
Just be up front with them, 'clean up' to you probably means something completely different to them. I tell them I will do such-n-such, and they will need to pile the limbs for burning or removal by whomever. If the 'talk' isn't going well, be prepared to walk away.....or start talking money for services.


There is another way.....you can always come up for a 'visit' and we can go make sawdust out back. I usually have something to cut up?!?!?! That is pretty much standard for anyone that would like to come 'play' with the sawmill...you are even encouraged to bring your own log(s)-but they need to be 'clean'(no metal in them, bands aren't that cheap).....







Scott (my sawmill was my 4-wheeler) B
 
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