BobL throws the Chain Saw Mill in for a bandsaw mill!

[BobL]

Progress with installing this has been slow but today we finally go around to laying a 6 x 2 m x 120 mm thick of a concrete slab for the BS mill.
I'm a bit still and sore from using muscles I haven't used for a while.
Also you can see it's mostly under shade from two big gums so it should be a nice place to work.

[Dengue]

Nice shady area Bob, but be careful of overhead eucalyptus trees. In the strong breezes and the cyclones up this way, they are the most brittle of all the trees, dropping large branches ( "widow makers") at any time during, and for many for years afterwards. Suggest trimming it adjacent to your work area.

We have a couple of beauties as huge street trees in our street that I am always nervous about, as they virtually extend over the width of the whole street. There is no avoiding them, either when driving or when walking the dog

[BobL]

Nice shady area Bob, but be careful of overhead eucalyptus trees. In the strong breezes and the cyclones up this way, they are the most brittle of all the trees, dropping large branches ( "widow makers") at any time during, and for many for years afterwards. Suggest trimming it adjacent to your work area.

Yeah good point Dengue. The tree lopper (Jeff) is a qualified and experienced arborist and advises local councils on trees in playgrounds and has done an assessment and several branches have already been trimmed from the trees.

[artme]

How come I missed this before?!

Should be good for all sorts of reasons Bob.

[BobL]

Well I finally got some time off from treasure hunting to do a bit more on the BSM.

The rails are now on the concrete pad and the mill is on the rails.


There is some rust on the rails, frame and the covered sections that we have decided to treat.
Before we could get at the rust all the stuck on layers of sawdust and grease etc had to be blown/cleaned off.
I dragged the small compressor out of the shed and via an extension cord it reaches the mill easily enough.
Not much dust came off with the compressor as most of the sawdust was glued on with resin and grease so it took a while to get it to all off.



Then a coat of tannate rust converter and here it is after the anti rust treatment.
All the orange/red rusty bits are now brown/black

Maybe another coat of rust converter before a topcoat

Some of you may be interested in the piles of logs behind the mill so here are some pics of those.
This is only about half the logs in the yard - all up there are over 100 logs - not all for milling - some will be for nature playgrounds.





One thing that was holding us up was that Jeff (tree lopper) lost the ignition key.
After looking for it for a week he finally gave up and decided to get another key on-line.
Apparently the key is due to arrive on Monday but today Jeff's son pointed to a rusty old cultivator under a pile of green waste over to the side and said there's a key in that and sure enough it fits!

[redmower]

Thanks for the photos Bob looks like a pile of work ready for you there.

I have a similar bandsaw but am lacking the mechanical skill to get it fully operational. Have it home here in town at present, busy doing other things for a while. Can slice 1200 wide with over a meter of height range. 7mtr bed with the extension. I use timber blocks under the log, replace them roughly every two years.

I notice the arborist vehicle in the background: nails in urban timber is a curse with the bands. I avoid town timber below the 8 ft height above ground (I consider this to be the nail zone).

I'll get you some pictures of my dormant machine and the rail setup.

And I'm envious of your stockpile too (quantity and I dare say quality with the WA hardwoods).

[BobL]

Thanks for the photos Bob looks like a pile of work ready for you there.

I have a similar bandsaw but am lacking the mechanical skill to get it fully operational. Have it home here in town at present, busy doing other things for a while. Can slice 1200 wide with over a meter of height range. 7mtr bed with the extension. I use timber blocks under the log, replace them roughly every two years.

This one is smaller, 5 m bed and 900 mm cut.

I notice the arborist vehicle in the background: nails in urban timber is a curse with the bands. I avoid town timber below the 8 ft height above ground (I consider this to be the nail zone).

Jeff (the tree lopper) does a fair bit of town tree removal but he gets most of his millable logs from firebreak clearances and work for large organisations and companies. I have milled over 100 of his logs with a chainsaw mills and struck a nail in only one but I have hit concrete and glass. The glass was inside a branch union that would have been at least 10ft above the ground - I reckon someone there it up there and wood grew around it. I have also milled town trees privately and have hit a bolts twice, luckily they were soft iron and the chainsaw chain just cut right through them. Not so with the blue metal and stainless steel wire.

[BobL]

Most oif the BS Mill got a lick of paint last week and here are some pics I took today.
Don't look too close, it's really just a coat to keep a lid on the external rust and nothing like a full refurb which is what I would have done if it was mine.

Anyway it should do the job.

Front


Back (the unpainted black bits are going to be greased up anyway so it was not worth painting them)

I charged the battery and fired it up to see how it ran - no cutting though, blade was off.

I also assembled the new Dinasaw BS blade sharpener and setter

Fully Auto (start it and walk away - apparently) Sharpener.
Takes about 3 seconds to sharpen a tooth and toggles on to the next one and when its done the full set it turns itself off.


Dinasaw setter. works on a manual crank, about one tooth per second.


Neither units are adjusted yet so I can comment on how good a job they do.

[dai sensei]

Nice looking bandsaw sharpener & setter set-up. Will it do your other std bandsaw blades too?

[Dengue]

Must be getting close to cutting something soon? The suspense is killing us

[BobL]

Nice looking bandsaw sharpener & setter set-up. Will it do your other std bandsaw blades too?

Yep it will sharpen blades between 16 and 75 mm wide, and 8 and 32 mm between teeth.
I'll post some more detailed pics once I get it running

Must be getting close to cutting something soon? The suspense is killing us

I could throw one of the half dozen or so blades on it that are already sharpened but am making sure I sort of know what I'm doing.

[Dengue]

Garn, avago !!

[JDarvall]

Look forward to seeing your results on the blade sharpener.

I was thinking of getting one too, but then the price put me off. So was thinking of making one up myself using a chainsaw sharpener and just doing it one blade at a time with a simple stop.

But then I'm told with the Lennox bimetal brands its actually cheaper just to throw away and buy new all the time and not bother with sharpening. But that advice tends to come from people who sell them I noticed.

I imagine with progressive sharpenings the blades will loose their set. At what significance I haven't a clue. I guess a point will be reached where the sets so lost that the blade will start to bind too much.

Thats when they say ' take it to a professional ' eh. But maybe, when that points reached the blade won't have enough meat left anyway to get professionally sharpened.

Theres this guy, who sets himself. Pretty ruff. But the concepts quite simple I think, so I don't see why a good setting jig could be made as well, if it was necessary. But maybe just sharpening without setting will be good enough for most band sawmill cuts. .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiYkkTZ6r98

ultimately interesting to know how many re-sharpenings you can get in yourself before you go for a new blade or get professionally resharpened.

[Willy Nelson]

I too, am enjoying this thread, looking forward to the day we see logs on it, but I guess with our Perth Summer on us, we may have to wait. Oh well, have to go cray diving instead.

I doubt Derek would recognise his mill now.
Good Thread Bob, keep em coming

Willy

[BobL]

Look forward to seeing your results on the blade sharpener.

Me too. Post coming soon, but the proof will be in the cutting.

I was thinking of getting one too, but then the price put me off.

I agree the price is steep but then again, I didn't pay for it.

So was thinking of making one up myself using a chainsaw sharpener and just doing it one blade at a time with a simple stop.

If only it was that simple. The DinaSaw with the MSA is considerably more sophisticated that this with a Left - right - centre sequence that sounds like its really worth having.

But then I'm told with the Lennox bimetal brands its actually cheaper just to throw away and buy new all the time and not bother with sharpening. But that advice tends to come from people who sell them I noticed..

The price of a setter and sharpener plays for a lot of professional sharpening but then I have no immediate and fine control over the various sharpening settings to suit what I'm doing - which remains to be seen how useful that will be. Given my experience with chainsaw chains I like to have a high level of control over what is going on.

I imagine with progressive sharpenings the blades will loose their set. At what significance I haven't a clue. I guess a point will be reached where the sets so lost that the blade will start to bind too much..

We have the setter as well so that is not a problem