Thread: European Oak

Hi Arron.

Sounds like a very romantic idea. Go for it.
European Oak should be very good timber.

A few considerations:

Trees that grow isolated tend to have more defects than if growing in a group or a forest.
Trees that grow next to houses, tend to have all sorts of stuff stuck into them, from bullets to nails, wire and spikes, Not very healthy to mill them. Still one can take chances I suppose.

In South West Sydney when an area is developed, the bulldozer usuay makes mince meat from the trees. I cut a life long supply of fire wood from trees from a development in Cecil hills that dumped the trees in the local tip. (would hate to pay their tip bill)

If you are interested in "recicling" trees, talk to the tree loopers, they cut trees down every day and have to pay to get rid of them at the tip.

How do you want to mill the trees? Do you think this would be usefull? http://www.vianet.net.au/~jemal/home.htm
This web page says the mill costs 5,800. It is either a mistake or extremely cheap, considering that I had a Lucas mill quote 5 years ago for $12,000

I dont know if this is helpful, but I saw this ad in the QLD Courier Mail in the Weekend Shopper (secondhand classifieds)

SAW MILL
Peterson Log Locust, 6''
cut plus 3 saw blades and sharp
ener. $5200 ono. Ph 3200 6858 or
0403 987 561 Waterford West

Brisbane: October 18, 2003


btw: You can search the National News Classifieds DB at http://classifieds.news.com.au/

Wayne, have a look at this

http://www.linnlumber.com

Why buy second hand when you can buy a NEW horizontal band saw mill with 20HP motor to cut almost any tree you fancy in 2mm thin shavings if needed for less than $6,000 ? it is very hard to beleive!
I am almost tempted to buy the thing and have it in my back yard just to look at it ! What do you buy with $6,000? Some old rusty bomb . . . .well I am getting exited here . . .ha ha

Marc,

Yep - incredible what you can get in the USA (how much would the freight be on one of those? )

I know next to nothing about log milling machines but saw that Ad and thought I would post it in case someone thought it sounded interesting.

Hi guys,
I had a bandsaw mill for a coupla years and if I was looking for a commercial output these days I would go for the peterson mill. It will produce far more timber in a day than a bandsaw mill and with a lot less frustation as the bandsaw mills are notorius for wavy cuts.

Before I bought my mill, I inspected around 25 ton of slabs, cut by it....perfect. The reason for wavy cuts can be many, but basically it is through operator inexperience.

The blade needs to be sharpened properly and also set correctly if using non-tipped teeth.
The blade needs to be tensioned correctly.
The blade should have the correct sharpening angle, varies depending on whether cutting hardwood or softwoods.
The saw should not be overdriven through the timber(pushed too fast).

Yes, there are bandsaws out there being used by inexperienced people, giving band sawn timber a bad name.

Both bandsaw mills and conventional circular saw mills have their own advantages.

A mill which slabs and wastes 10mm of timber each cut is fine as long as the log being cut is of limited value. If you wish to slab high value timber (eg Huon or King Billy Pine) then if you can cut extra slabs out of the log/stump, by reducing sawdust waste, you have maximised your return from each log.

regards

Kev

I agree.
100% of all timber that is milled in Suth America, and that is a lot of very fine timber, from the pine plantations in Chile to the tropical Cedar (cedrella tubiflora) from Paraguay and Brazil is milled with vertical bandsaw mills.

In Chile some plantation have machines that have multiple blades cutting one log with multiple cuts in one pass. In fact the distance between baldes can be adjusted by a computer one milimeter at the time, and the product is bark to bark slabs with a near dressed finish.

In the Amazons there are some old fashion band saw that have the wheel mounted on a giant tree trunk and run by an old truck motor, using a monster 6" wide saw. I have never seen one place that uses circular saws of any kind.

Kev, what brand and size is your mill?

Marc,
My saw is an Australian made Dinasaw by Portamill in Queensland, now no longer produced.

It can cut logs up to 5 metres long and 600mm wide slabs. It has a 16hp V-twin Briggs & Stratton motor and runs a three inch stellite tipped blade. When we bought the saw it came with 12 blades, replacement cost of blades is around $390 each. We have also bought a professional sharpener (3 phase, oil filled gearbox- but fairly old) having seen the inconsistent results of some of the "newer portable units".

regards

Kev

I agree the key to bandsaw mills is keeping the bands set and razor sharp, but that isnt quite as easy as it sounds. As soon as the microedge of the band dulls a little band wander is likey to occur. Tungsten tip bands are the way to go.

However the Peterson mill which was the starting point of this thread (and other swingsaw mills) will still cut a helluva lot more timber in a day than the mobile bandsaw mills. From memory the Peterson and the Lucas and the Ecosaw (lewismill) swing saws all have a 5mm kerf not 10mm as seems to be suggested. So despite a little bit more sawdust the increased output means much higher income for each days work.

Ok we get 10mm kerfs with chainsaw mills but this thread is not about them.

When you go to field days and see bandsawmill manufacturers struggling to cut a straight line while demonstrating you really start to appreciate the swing saws.

Its also interesting that Lucasmill swingsaw is sold in various South American countries.

Bob,
Apologies for the misunderstanding, I was not suggesting that swing saws had a kerf of 10mm, I was referring to the bolt on, add on chain saw bar which is necessary for slabbing.

It is horses for courses, for slabbing I would recommend a bandsaw, but for sawn edge timber the Lucas or Peterson are both faster and will produce more sawn timber in a day. I bought my mill to maximise return from high cost timbers and I am extremely happy with it.

regards

Kev

KEVM,
Absolutely no apologies necessary.
My old mill was also a Portamill (horrible orange color) but obviously a totally different model with a 5hp motor and cut 16 inches wide and used bands 1 to 1.5 inches wide. The rails deflected about half inch with the saw midway.

So obviously I am suspect of elcheapo bandsaw mills.
But a few questions about your mill if you don't mind please
What diameter are your wheels?
What is the band thickness?
Is the band autotensioned?

I used a Dinasaw about 13 years ago it was very hard to set up to cut straight but when it did it was reasonable I got some blades mabe in Williamstown I think they were ~$30
Swingsaws were the things used before chainsaws a cirular saw on the end of a shaft with a large petrol engine driving it. I have never heard of porable mills being called swingsaws before.

The modern swing saw mills are a totally different machine to the old aussie swing saws.
The new mills previously mentioned make a vertical cut going in one direction. The operator then swings the blade 90 degrees and makes a horizontal cut when coming back to the home position. An ingenious method to cut face and edge consecutively thus eliminating the non productive time spent bringing the saw back to its starting position.