Wood Milling

[MilesTeg]

It's getting about time to log off the family land again. We luck out and my brother is a log buyer so it takes a lot of the guess work out of the experience. But this also throws a wrench in me and my fathers desire to be more independent and do stuff ourselves. So he wont help us in our desire to mill out a few boards ourselves. He say just to buy the boards and be done with it.

We don't have the money or the desire to purchase a full size mill. I don't think we would get the use out of it to justify the purchase. We just want a few boards to mess around with. Realistically talking would be 4-8 logs a year, all hard wood for specialty projects nothing for building. So we are leaning on getting an Alaskan mill.

If anyone has any experience on the topic it would be greatly appreciated. I also don't know much about drying it. I read/watched some online about putting it your basement for a winter and that usually was enough to dry it out. I think that might work for my situation considering my water heater is a dehumidifier and wouldn't cost me anymore money to run.

 

[Robin]

I have never used an Alaskan Mill, but I have had raw logs milled for me. Your basement would work if its dry but even so A dehumidifier is almost a must, they give off a tremendous amount of moisture, especially the first year. As soon as they are milled paint the ends to seal the grain or they will split and cup vary badly, make sure when you stack the planks that you sticker them, like the drawing, so air can move all around and through your stack. I put a dehumidifier next to the stack with the fan blowing through it.
Generally you can figure at least one year for every 1-0" thickness of the plank, my planks are 2-3/4" to 3-0" thick so I waited three years before using the thinner planks and they had shrunk to 2-1/2", so plan ahead. Good luck!!!!
Robin

 

[MilesTeg]

I have never used an Alaskan Mill, but I have had raw logs milled for me. Your basement would work if its dry but even so A dehumidifier is almost a must, they give off a tremendous amount of moisture, especially the first year. As soon as they are milled paint the ends to seal the grain or they will split and cup vary badly, make sure when you stack the planks that you sticker them, like the drawing, View attachment 37803 so air can move all around and through your stack. I put a dehumidifier next to the stack with the fan blowing through it.
Generally you can figure at least one year for every 1-0" thickness of the plank, my planks are 2-3/4" to 3-0" thick so I waited three years before using the thinner planks and they had shrunk to 2-1/2", so plan ahead. Good luck!!!!
Robin

This was my understanding also. I'm lucky that this is a newly poured and sealed basement so there's zero extra moisture other than what is weeping through the walls. I can tell you that hot water heater draws a crap ton of moisture out of the air. I was down there working this fall when it was still hot out and in an hour the sump pump had kicked on 3 times.

I've heard of the boards shrinking but I had no clue that much. Was it hard wood?

 

[Robin]

Hard rock (sugar) Maple, Black Cherry, Black Walnut.
Robin

 

[MilesTeg]

I'm thinking about doing maple, cherry and possibly some ash just because we won't have any for the rest of my lifetime.

 

[masterswimmer]

... possibly some ash just because we won't have any for the rest of my lifetime.

Very sorry for you. There's nothing like a good piece of ash

 

[camper4lyfe]

I believe @NirvanaFan recently used an Alaskan mill to slab up a tree. I've seen it done quite a bit on Youtube as well. It looks pretty straight forward. The biggest catch is that you need to buy a ripping chain, as the standard cross cut chain just won't cut it long term.

 

[1911guy]

I've done it (years ago). It's ok for short time for one or two boards/planks. But it is very time consuming and labor intensive. Be sure to get a ripping chain.

 

[pjzwtl]

I have an Alaskan Mill I use now and then. The biggest thing is to make sure you get a chisel chain the low kick chains are iffy in that application.
Also need to keep in mind your using the saw in a manor that isn’t really how it’s ment to be used so be carful and make sure everything is tight in between each pass.
I have done hickory, red and white oak, sugar maple and tulip. It’s a bit of work but worth the effort

 

[MilesTeg]

How do you dry the wood? Is 4 logs a year too much for a setup like that?

 

[Criticalt]

I use an Alaskan mill I built 15 years ago.
It is a time consuming endeavour but very rewarding.
Ive built a chicken coup, a small shed and a blacksmith shop all with boards I cut.
Plus many random boards.
I have been cutting wood for 20+ years so I dont need to speed dry our wood.
We have logs piled in our "wood shed" which have been naturally drying for years.
We just rotate the logs when we use them.
It is the Amish way, which is who I learned from.
But these other guys gave great advice on drying and chains.

 

[MilesTeg]

We aren't scared of some chainsaw work. We usually end up doing 60+ chord a year, between his outdoor boiler and the syrup operation. We do plan on purchasing the appropriate chain to go with the mill.

It sounds like the general consensus is just to do it and see what works for you. Anyone have any brand recommendations.

Oh and Criticalt a chicken coop is on the short list of projects this year. I have a set of running gear that I want to make a mobile one until I decide on a final location on the new land.

 

[Robin]

 

[pjzwtl]

How do you dry the wood? Is 4 logs a year too much for a setup like that?

4 logs a year wood be fine, I just stack mine and let the air dry them out or stack some in the basement during heating season and let the wood stove speed it up. Just remember to cut the slabs thicker then you want in the end product.

FYI you will also save on sharpening time if you debark the logs first.

Also to help keep the boards from cracking as they dry you can coat the ends with paint or silver roof sealant. That keeps the moistures departure even

 

[camper4lyfe]

4 logs a year wood be fine, I just stack mine and let the air dry them out or stack some in the basement during heating season and let the wood stove speed it up. Just remember to cut the slabs thicker then you want in the end product.

FYI you will also save on sharpening time if you debark the logs first.

Also to help keep the boards from cracking as they dry you can coat the ends with paint or silver roof sealant. That keeps the moistures departure even

With the paint, either use leftover stuff you have laying around, or go to Home Depot/Lowes and buy the "oops" paints. No one cares what they look like, it just needs to seal the end grain.

 

[Criticalt]

We aren't scared of some chainsaw work. We usually end up doing 60+ chord a year, between his outdoor boiler and the syrup operation. We do plan on purchasing the appropriate chain to go with the mill.

It sounds like the general consensus is just to do it and see what works for you. Anyone have any brand recommendations.

Oh and Criticalt a chicken coop is on the short list of projects this year. I have a set of running gear that I want to make a mobile one until I decide on a final location on the new land.

Mine is stationary but I do use chicken tractors sometimes.......but usually just let them run free untill I coup them at night.

 

[MilesTeg]

I plan on doing the same thing. We do have a quiet the fox and coyote population so I might have to use tractors instead of free ranging. I do want to do some meat birds but I don't think I will have the time next year for that.

 

[phatfarmerbob]

I plan on doing the same thing. We do have a quiet the fox and coyote population so I might have to use tractors instead of free ranging. I do want to do some meat birds but I don't think I will have the time next year for that.

Meat birds are great I did 6 the first year. Then I decide “that was easy” so the next year I did 40 bad idea. I got busy and wasn’t able to process them on time. Ended up doing two night sessions in the middle of busy season. And getting birds that dressed between 8-10 pounds. If you do it be sure to kill them at 4-6 pounds . The big ones are only good for soup

 

[MilesTeg]

My cousin did 2 batches of 24. I helped with the first batch. It really wasn't bad but there was 2 of us. We also broke down the whole birds. I think when I do that I will only 2-4 whole birds and breast and part out the rest. I think not having to gut the bulk of them will help some. The biggest eye opener I had was the resting process. I dont have the ability to do that with a decent flock. I hope to buy some more gear this year and do the meat birds the following year.

 

[Bulldog51]

Have you looked into hiring someone with a portable bandsaw mill?

I have to assume you have a saw and bar big enough for Alaskan mill work?

 

[MilesTeg]

I know of a few farmers that would probably loan me theirs, but I don't want to impose. I don't think we plan on milling enough to make it worthwhile to hire someone to come out.

For the saw end, we have a big enough saw but we will have to buy a longer bar and ripping chain.

 

[phatfarmerbob]

What if you load up your logs and take it to one of the farmers... that would be a lot less of a pita for them.

 

[phatfarmerbob]

Also check with morrisvill the NRCS guys might have one and come do it for you for a class.

 

[MilesTeg]

That is a possibility, we will have to take another look after syrup season.

 

[MilesTeg]

Also check with morrisvill the NRCS guys might have one and come do it for you for a class.

I thought they only fell the trees.

 

[phatfarmerbob]

I’m not sure but it’s worth a try, it would be free...

 

[MilesTeg]

Good point. There's a debate right now on the scope of this years logging. We might pillage one section in order to make the undergrowth thick again to bring back the deer. If we do end up doing this then we wont have time to mess with the milling.

 

[fresch]

Chainsaws
Read here, good site.

 

[CaliberPlus]

Not sure how it would compare price wise, we bought a used small mill a couple of years ago. Originally from Harbor freight. They sell for about 2 grand there now. There is a site that sells mills, used and new, and you can find them there sometimes. This particular one has parts made by Hud-Son. We added more track to it. I cannot remember all the specs but dh loves it. I think it has an 8 hp Briggs and Stratton engine. He can saw up to about a 16" log, up to 12' long. He enjoys the challenge of getting as much lumber out of every log he can. He stickers it out in the back shed like described above. We have used the ash, cherry, maple, black locust, elm and pine in a bunch of projects. The locust made great raised beds for son.
I know ths is an older thread but it just caught my eye and in case you are ready to move on...dh also looked at the Alaskan mills but this was a better deal for us. Once you have one and it is set up you might find a need you never knew you had for lumber!

 

[MilesTeg]

We have kind of put it on the back burner for this year. We instead are going to log off a few sections this year. In the Hope's that we can generate a rough money to have his tractor rebuilt. We hope this will last him for the rest of his life. Plus we also decided to do a major overhaul to our maple syrup tubing in the hopes of getting a 1/2 gallon of syrup a tap.