Thread: 1.5 meter wide walnut tree

Hey Spongebrain - let me get this straight, you are felling the tree's, removing the mess, and travelling over 300k to then also pay $200 for the pleasure??? WOW

First I'd say it would be worth contractng a lucas with slabber, you get wide slabs then and even if you only use one or two for yourself, then you can sell off others. $1,200 in paying someon else for a bit of time will get a lot of slabs cut and that wide (up to 1.5m would be very rare, so the price for them would go right up)

But like someone on hear says - when all you have is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail. I suppose I'm a bit that way 'cause DanG I love my lucas!!

The more I think about it the crazier it sounds.

Originally Posted by Sigidi

Hey Spongebrain - let me get this straight, you are felling the tree's, removing the mess, and travelling over 300k to then also pay $200 for the pleasure??? WOW
:

The exhaust fumes from my chainsaw must be getting to my head.

Why pay 200 but then again sometimes you write it down read it and it doesnt appear as good an idea as first thought.

When I first read your post I though the name spongebrain fitted. How would you cut the trees down? Do you have the gear and expertice? Or are they just straight drops? Do you have insurance to do this? Or is there nothing or no one to hit? What are you going to do with the rest of the tree? Do you have a chipper?
The logs do sound very good though. When I only had a chainsaw mill I used to mill one side untill it got too wide then roll the log 90 deg with kant hook then mill again. Or do top and bottom roll side ways then mill slabs with straight sides.

This is my way of thinking, If you want the logs bad, get them by means of a truck in one trip if they can get to them. I use a tilt hiab for multiple logs or big big single logs, he charges me $70 per hour. I have also used a friend that owns a building site bin truck for the big boys as well.$200 bucks for the wood forget it, look at the effort your putting into someone elses problem. And a tree lopping business to boot to clean up the branches unless you get on to the local wood turning club and they take them. It being walnut should be worth it. Plan B sell the logs. Ive known guys here in the west to pay up to $1000 per cube for big walnut or english oak logs. If youve got say 6 cube in log, thats not a bad weekends work

Originally Posted by nifty

I have also used a friend that owns a building site bin truck for the big boys as well.

Tell me more Nifty, I have been looking at those bin trucks and wondering if they could sling a large diameter trunk up onto their bed the same way they sling bins? They could certainly sling the weight (9 cubes of sand and rubble is way heavier than any trunk that would fit on the truck) I was just wondering whether they could logistically do it?

A number of good points made by others, so far I havent had the problem of how to handle a 1.5 m dia log yet for me personally I'd be thinking am I gonna get another log/s this big of something like u describe If u have to the time I'd be thinking of going for it rather than passing as long as all bases r covered re the points made above,

Are u thinking bark to bark slabs, boards.... or, I remember seeing something on this forum on Will Mallof where he cut 300x300 sections on the diagonal using a single rail system and a not so big saw, might be a little easier to handle than a 1.5m wide slab 3m long, still, its all gonna be heavy either way!!!!
Peter
http://www.willmalloff.com/page2.html I just worked out how to do this link thing Will I remember next time tho

Burnsy I have a friend with a bin truck with the pivoting arm to lift bins on. It works well for logs only trouble is its a bit short at times, the last log he carried for me was 6m so he put a 6x4' trailer on the back so the over hang didn't look so bad.

note his location at the top of the post.

Cheers

Originally Posted by Calm

note his location at the top of the post.

The same thread is running in US forum. Here is a quote from Georgian, Dave, "paying for trees sight onseen. plus you have to fell them and clean up.cheaper to find allready milled and cured walnut."
But likewise there are 2 two guys saying it depends on whether it is "claro" or "nigra" and if it's claro it probably worth it.

First of all after milling over 50 tons of wood I believe that if you want it then do it. However, chainsaw slabbers waste huge amounts of valuable wood. Since you are in California I'd find a sawyer who has a breaking down saw and that way you will recover a large number of boards that will be perfectly cut parallel. You need to fell the tree or have it felled, then have the millable wood left as long as possible; hire a crane mounted truck to pick up and deliver the logs.
If you decide to get a wide slabbing frame you also need a saw like an 090; I had 2x 090's and even then on logs that used all of the 48" wide logs I used to mill, it was slow, costly, extremely difficult to handle as they are VERY weighty (the boards will be handled many times before they are finally worked on). Additionally, you need to have some experience to know at which position on the log to begin taking slices.
Perhaps it will take a few years to lose 85% moisture content and become lighter. All I hope is that if you decide to self-mill the wood you and your friends have good backs and are very strong.
What an opportunity. All the best.
Ivan Earl.

Originally Posted by ivanearl

If you decide to get a wide slabbing frame you also need a saw like an 090; I had 2x 090's and even then on logs that used all of the 48" wide logs I used to mill, it was slow, costly, extremely difficult to handle as they are VERY weighty (the boards will be handled many times before they are finally worked on). Additionally, you need to have some experience to know at which position on the log to begin taking slices.

It would be helpful if posters were to read the questions asked and to look at the persons location and what they are cutting before offering advice. I disagree that 090's are needed to slab walnut, even big walnut. Green walnut has a Janka hardness of about 4 kN which makes it about as soft as pine compared to Aussie timber which means even a quality 90cc saw can readily pull a 60" bar through it. A 1.5 m bar can also cut up a 1.3 x 1.4 or 1.8 m diameter log although the slabs from such a tree can never be more than 1.3 wide. On a 1.5 m log the log can be cut up in thirds which makes it even easier. The density of Walnut is also 2/3 that of aussie timbers so even a 1.3 m x 50 mm x 2.4 m slab weighs a lot less than an equivalent piece of Aussie hardwood.

I do agree that a CS mills is more costly and time consuming than other mills but if you are not doing it for a living and you want to access small amounts of even big trees it is quite surprising what you can do with a CS mill. Even after all this whether it's worth spongebrain's effort and the $200+ other costs is still probably debatable.

Originally Posted by glenn k

When I first read your post I though the name spongebrain fitted. How would you cut the trees down? Do you have the gear and expertice? Or are they just straight drops? Do you have insurance to do this? Or is there nothing or no one to hit? What are you going to do with the rest of the tree? Do you have a chipper?
The logs do sound very good though. When I only had a chainsaw mill I used to mill one side untill it got too wide then roll the log 90 deg with kant hook then mill again. Or do top and bottom roll side ways then mill slabs with straight sides.

I would climb the tree, cut the small branches with a hand saw, then use a small chainsaw for the larger branches,, and work my way down cutting sections from 6 to 8 feet, until I get the lower 8 foot sections, where I would fall it, pretty strait forward.
Then I would hall the branches and leaves off to a city compost pile where it would be chipped.
I figure falling it and cleaning the mess is a days job per tree, maybe two though when I consider the time spent driving back and forth with loads of branches.

I would hate to cut off too much of the outer rings because those are usually some of the nicest parts, but that is probably the most reasonable way to do it.