Minimum sawn timber sizes?

[Ron Dunn]

I read the SkillMill posts with interest, as this product brings the possibility of combining my own timber needs with a small hobby business to pay for the mill over time.

The question which arises in my mind is how small can timber be cut? I'm not interested in cutting large slabs of timber, but rather, I'd like to be able to cut and dry (over time) dimensions like 100x25, or even 100x15.

Are there problems (ie, excessive warping / cupping / checking / whatever) if I cut timber in this size? If there are problems, what size of timber could be considered a realistic minimum for a saw like this?

[DJ’s Timber]

I would say with confidence that you can cut stuff that small and even smaller, the main criteria with any timber that is milled is sticking it, racking it and also allowing for shrinkage as well depending on which way it has been sawn

[BobL]

I would say with confidence that you can cut stuff that small and even smaller, the main criteria with any timber that is milled is sticking it, racking it and also allowing for shrinkage as well depending on which way it has been sawn

I Agree. The thinner you mill it the more effort you need to put into the post milling factors, more stickers, more accurately placed stickers, more weight or clamping of stacks, more careful drying, etc.

[BUNTA]

will depend on the type of timber cut some are more stable than others !!
but if you selling timber is an excuse to buy a mill ...spose you can talk your self into it :D

[Ianab]

Most of the time it's best to rough saw between 25 and 50mm.
Thinner and it's more likely to warp while drying. Thicker and drying takes too long and can be more prone the checking.
I've cut and dried plenty of 100x25, dries fine, then it can just be planed, edge jointed and made in T&G panelling at 85(cover)x19. No fuss :2tsup:
Often end up with down to 50x25 if I'm cutting around defects or just have a piece left over, it all dries fine. 25 x 25 is a sticker for the drying stack, and you will need a heap of them too.

If you want 15mm rough sawn I would suggest cutting it at ~35 or 55mm and resawing on a workshop bandsaw once it's dry.

The Skillmill will cut thin boards fine, but drying them can be problematic. Also if you saw really thin much more of your wood ends up as sawdust. If you sawed 15mm boards with a 5mm kerf then 25% of your log is turned into sawdust.
Cutting at 50mm and then resawing later with a thinner kerf bandsaw will get you more useable wood.

Cheers

Ian

[Ron Dunn]

Ian, you're right on the reason for my question.

There are a lot of woodworkers out there, self included, who don't have resaw capability but would like to work with timber other than radiata pine and tas.oak. My thought was that I might be able to cut to a dimension that, after drying, could be planed/thicknessed to standard sizes like ?x19, ?x12, etc.

It was the risk of warping that concerned me. Wasting that timber AFTER cutting would be a crime :)

I'll keep thinking about it.

[Ianab]

Cutting dimensioned boards is what swingmills do :D

Rough sawn 25mm will yeild 19mm after drying and planing, so that part is fine. Most of my woodworking wood is sawn at 25x 100 - 150 - 200 depending on what the log is like and what I am wanting to build. As long you have reasonable logs and you build your drying stack well it will dry straight.

But big knots or tension wood can cause warping no matter what you do :~. Even if that happens though, woodworking often uses parts only 30-90cm, so you can still trim a banana board into usefull pieces or remove a big knot with some clever cutting.

Cheers

Ian

[Sigidi]

Ever noticed when you go to guy a peice of dried, planed timber it has really weird dimensions? Like 92x19mm?

Well it's because the timber industry overcame the issues of cut size a long time ago....

they just cut 4"x1"'s or 5"x1"'s etc and then seasoned and machined them down from the rough sawn blanks, so as an example your 92x19mm starts off as a 4"x1"

So either way it doesn't really matter which way you want to do it; you could cut it fat so as to allow for shrinkage and machining or cut it on the mark and have a product which is common to everyone. This works out well if you need to buy a peice of timber to finish off a project you have started with your own milled timber. If you mill it fat then try and match a peice of bought timber to it, you will find it very hard

(yep it's an old post, only just read it...)