Thread: Horizontal Bandsaw for milling

yes, there is a commercial one, sold by ayao in brisbane. it was origanally made by them. will cut 350 by350 by1100. it was displayed at the maleny show this weekend now wearing a woodfast brand. if you google ayaoyou should find it.
cheers
jim

Website says 1.25 m long, pity because that's still too short in my book

I don't think that's the one I saw, but yeah that sort of thing.
I have a few logs I want to cut long ways.
I do have a rather large vertical bandsaw but I find that hard and I must admit a tad scary to operate by just me!
I probably should make some sort of fencing for the logs to move along, I don't know!!!!!

for small stuff I`ve welded a t-bar sash clamp to a metal plate to hold the log( I put a thick scrap of wood under the log) and then chainsaw it to a manageable size at least it gives you one flat edge.

I can understand the value in a horizontal BS if you want to make veneers but your chances of successfully cutting and saving a 350 mm wide board board from a 350 mm wide log and especially a branch are not that good. Even the boards from the top and bottom half of a log that are going to be flat sawn and likely to cup and the ones in the centre will have heart wood.

In general it's better and much cheaper if you already have a CS to split a small log up with something like a small chainsaw mill. You are much more likely to get a usable board if you split a larger log into quarters and then take board off the sides of the quarter logs with an upright BS as they will be close to quarter sawn.

There are many types of mills around around but basically there are mills that hold the saw/bar at one end (eg Micro or Mini mills), or those that hold the bar at both ends (Alaskan Mill) You can also tackle really ugly shapes with a chainsaw mill.

I made this little mill in 2007 out of bits of scrap steel and it accommodates chainsaw bars up to 25" long for about a 20" wide cut - the first cut is made on a wooden board and in the picture below its actually a plastic deck board as the mill slides on it really easily. The chain on this saw is Lopro chain which has a narrower kerf than a regular chain saw and while a BS blade is much narrower i don't usually use the chainsaw to mill entire short small logs but just to break it up
strange.jpg

I wasn't trying very hard to get a good finish but it still worked out OK
grain2.jpg

If you are worried about noise and are close to mains power electric chainsaw can be used. If you already have a chainsaw and an upright bandsawyou get into this highly addictive activity for the cost of a minimill eg Granberg Mini-Mill #G555b | Granberg Alaskan Sawmills | Granberg Alaskan Sawmills | www.baileysonline.com

Got one of these mini mills for my bandsaw, just what I needed

Hi Brainstrust,
that's an interesting mini-mill log holder for the bandsaw.
Can you post more pictures of it please?
Did you buy it commercially?
Thanhs
Paul