Thread: How and why did you get into small timber milling??

I started out in 2006 making woodworking tools and rigs and jigs. The sizes and amounts of wood I needed were very small and for about a year I survived on pieces of red gum and odd bits of jarrah from my firewood pile and the slabs and timber under the house I had milled up for me ( from the same red gum as the fire wood) by a lucas miller in 1997.

In 2007 I made my first small CS mill using a 1972 Mac10-10. It had a 16" bar and it lasted for about dozen small logs before it dropped the top end. Given I had used that saw for 30 years for everything including grubbing out stumps I was not surprised. I still have that saw and all the parts+ to fix it up.

By then I got the bug and I could see that this was a way of accessing timber that would otherwise be unavailable. My next saw was a Stihl 076AV with a 42" bar. It is a great saw and paired with my all aluminium BIL mill milled about 80 logs before I had the opportunity to pick up a never used 880 with a 60" bar for half RRP. This was too good a deal to pass up and have milled about 40 logs with that combo. It is an absolute pleasure to use and can tear into big logs without any fear. I have also made 2 other mills, one of which is a small rail/minimill running an 441 that I picked up at the same time as the 880.

Although only about a quarter of what I have milled is mine to use I have used stuff all of it to do anything as I just enjoy milling for its own sake. I have sold none of it and traded a few bits for favours but otherwise I still have most of it ready for my retirement in 8 months time.

I have limited interest in getting into the timber selling game but will have to do something with it as I will probably just pick the eyes out of the stash and move the rest on one way or another. I am now down to milling for $/hr, or only if a log holds some real potential for me. I get the odd offer to mill pine and scrubby looking stuff but I usually turn these offers down.

I worked in large timber mills since 2006 stacking,grading,docking,benching,running malty saw ect (for peanuts) .Never realy had a love for it till recently.
Saw the lucas saw and just had to run one.

The property I used to live on suffered a freak storm which came from nowhere knocked over a swag of trees in a 100m wide band for a couple of hundred metres and then pi**ed off again.

These trees were all spotted gum, which is a relatively shallow rooted tree, and some were quite large. I tried to interest a local sawmill in them, but to no avail. I saw it as a natural resource going to waste: The proverbial windfall.

After about a year of failing to interest anybody in these logs I bought a my Laidlaw bandsaw mill and subsequently bought a swingsaw to go with it.

Nowadays I just have the bandsaw left and only use it very infrequently for my own purposes/ amusement.

Regards
Paul

i like to make furniture,if you go to matthews timber in nunawading victoria they charge $5000 per cube for blackwood.i'm next to the dandenong ranges where blackwood is nearly a weed.i know a few tree loppers so it was a pretty easy desicion to make

I started out collecting huon pine driftwood from a 10' tinnie on a craft permit while living on the west coast of Tasmania, wading in the freezing lakes digging old bits of trees and stumps out. This soon progressed to making my own adjustable chainsaw mill and running an old 090 with a 3', 4' or 5' bar, depending on the log size. I was sourcing my logs from the Forestry Tasmania yard and listened and learned from a few old huon piners in thier eighties who were happy to share their wealth of knowledge with a young keen fella.

By this time sawdust was starting to flow in the veins, but still a weekend hobby. Then one day I heard a successful small business owner on TV say "To succeed you must invest in what you believe in. Everyone has a dream, but very few lay their money on the line to acheive it." At that exact moment I decided to spend the entire house deposit I had saved from working in the mines on timber. I purchased truck loads of myrtle, sassy and blackwood logs that were destined to be buried under a waste dump at the Savage River Mine or at the pulp mill. We milled the whole lot on an old breast bench, breaking down the logs with a chainsaw and running the flitches through. By now I was completely obsessed with salvaging quality timber and milling, and ended up back in Victoria with a few semi loads of sawn timber which I racked out. The response to someone having nice Tasmanian timbers in an old farm shed in country Victoria was great, and I started selling the odd bit as it dried.

Then logs just started to come my way and I bought an old model 8 Lucas and a forklift, and things have just rolled on from there. I have slowly invested any money earned from the timber back into improving the hobby, such as the crane truck and bobcat and a new M10 Lucas. Over the past 6 years I have primarily focussed on large windblown logs on farms or logs that have come from tree loppers and developers. It was only last year that I engaged the help of Krunchie and Tony, as the logs and projects were getting bigger and bigger. Until then I had milled and racked everything myself.

I now have about 3-400 cubic metres of high quality furniture timber racked and stacked away for a rainy day. And still to this day, seeing magnificent timbers come off the saw is my passion and salvaging them from unwanted logs is even better.

Now timber is a part of daily life and my 3 year old daughter oversees the whole operation, quickly informing me if I miss a bit of gum vein with timber sealer or a rackstick is crooked. To my partners surprise, during a recent rainforest nature walk, my daughter was not commenting on the birds and the flowers. She was kicking the bottom of each tree and saying "What a thumper dad!" and "Check the barrel out on that tree dad!" How they make you laugh!

Cheers
James

Ye my 3 year old boy Joe,wants to (cut them all down)

Streakers Lament - It seemed like a good idea at the time. That was about 20 years ago and have never regretted it. Starting to feel the years catching up now though. Its a young man's game. But, provided you have stockpiled properly, you get to reap the rewards of your labour with some excellent timber for choice in your later years. The stuff doesnt get any cheaper as time goes on.

Back a bit before 2000 I needed some rustic timber for a project - and started ripping by eye - close but not a great deal of consistant accuracy. A mate showed me his version of a Grandberg copy, and I thought - I can make one of them. Started out using a Stihl 034 with a 16' bar - able to make a 12" cut - but hey, this was great for converting a tree into useable lumber. Have progressed to an 044 with a 25" bar - giving a 20" cut. I remove ever second pair of teeth, bring the angle to 10degrees and Oi! - I cut with twice the speed, half the fuel and half the sharpening. About five years back I bought an 088 and made a mill to suit a 36" bar - works amazingly but I should have built it years back when I had youth and strength on my side. Now its just on the heavy side, and I find myself preferring the 044.

I have cut a range of timber from ironbark to black pine and camphor laurel - yellow box looks fantastic when dressed and oiled as furniture. Both my sons have used this type of salvage wood for their major HSC woodwork projects with very creditable results. When a conversation starts with "Dad, would you have some wood down the shed about this size....' then away we go - invariably with success and something is fashioned to suit the need.

Over the years I have not kept track of the trees I've slabbed or the wood I've racked out - the 15" thicknesser I bought years ago certainly has had a workout - but hey, what a fantastic hobby.

[QUOTE=Brosh;1499292] Both my sons have used this type of salvage wood for their major HSC woodwork projects with very creditable results. When a conversation starts with "Dad, would you have some wood down the shed about this size....' then away we go - invariably with success and something is fashioned to suit the need.

QUOTE]

Always good to hear of interaction between the generations. I have a mate who says "Money is not everything, but it does keep you in touch with your children."

Your way is another.

Regards
Paul

My facination starts with my dad being an old scottish farmer. He ran a circular saw of the back of a fergie grey to mill fence posts etc. He's also a carpenter, so wood seems to just draw me to work with it. I'm a sparkie by trade though. Dad and i worked side by side building houses and i took care of both carpentry and sparkie work.

Now i live on an acreage with acces to some nice stuff, and have built a mud brick home for my family. next project a timber shed out of a couple of good sized wooli butts, blue gum and black butt and a kitchen bench top out of spotted gum all from my own property. Oh, and i bought my own fergie grey for slashing only though.

I guess at the end of the day looking back at your work with timber to me is much more satisfying than making a light globe glow. Electrical supports my hobby of milling, so i'm not complaining in my choice of vocation.