Thread: Lucas vs Woodmizer

The 28mm material is Cedar and cut for a specific order. I would be an idiot to quarter cut it. As far as warping is concerned there has been no problem, we sticker to suit. Width of cut 1.540m. maximum.
I agree that most timber should be quartered for stability but figured cedar is an exception. There are others that also should be rift sawn to prevent splitting, crows ash for boat decking would be one example.
Again, a lot of sawdust for a little timber with a Lucas.

I cut a lot of 325x50 on my bandsaw for the staircase market. The big advantage of a bandsaw is being able to cut the majority of the log into this size with very little left over as fall down sizes.

Cheers
Steve

Can you explain that please steve? Cant get my head around it...

Originally Posted by Sigidi

Can you explain that please steve? Cant get my head around it...

Al

I would imagine that Steve constantly rotates the log just taking a single slice from each face.

But I have just done my usual trick of butting in so back to Steve for this one.

On the subject of circular swing saws and bandsaws, there are very definite pluses and minuses for both types of machine.

I think the big advantage of the Lucas mill is it is both affordable and forgiving. It allows you to get on with the business of milling timber. It has some advantages that are not met by any other type of saw and that is the combination of portability and capability.

You could, if you were fit (a lot fitter than me) carry the saw into a virtually inaccessible area and mill a huge log. Of course, quite how you retrieve the sawn timber is another issue.

The saw is easy and cheap to sharpen on site with minimal loss of production. This comment is of course true for most of the swing saw mills.

The band saw has it's strengths too, but is a fickle creature requiring expensive sharpening machines (profiler) and a lot of knowhow both in sharpening and milling. For example, a particular blade may cut one species of timber successfully but not another.

My impression is that generally they are more expensive than the circular saws and at times, as others have already said, they can struggle with the denser hardwoods.

I started with a bandsaw and subsequently realised that it was not the best machine for my purpose and bought a swingsaw as well. It was most suited to the production of building timber.

Today I only have the bandsaw, not by choice, as it just happened that the circular saw found a buyer first.

Regards
Paul