Making my own lumber. Sawing the First Logs on the New Sawmill.
The first thing everyone asks is, What are you going to build with the lumber you create?
Well, a shed to put my sawmill in of course. I guess it's the first thing most people build. But, this one will be three parts. It will have a room for drying my lumber, a room for firewood and a third part with just a roof to put the sawmill under.
some of the waste from the old cherry tree
I don't even know what the first log I sawed was. I new it wasn't an oak or anything I needed so I picked it to play with. I think it was a sour wood tree, but I've never seen those before moving here so I can't be certain. It had a pretty greenish-yellow color and is relatively light wood.
The second tree was an old very gnarly cherry tree that had been down for at least 2 years. It had rot, holes, and ants. I knew I wouldn't miss it if I made a mess of it.
Some beautiful wood from this cherry even though it had a lot of bad spots
I'm excited to say I got some great and usable lumber from both trees. I was able to get a 12 ft 4x4 and several 1 inch boards from the "sour wood"
I also got several 1x4 inch and 1x6 inch boards around 10 foot long from the cherry along with some slabs that may be useful and may be firewood. There are other 10 inch wide cherry boards about 10 ft long that I can probably use half of each board since several of these have cracks and rot.
Even though it had some bad spots, it's beautiful cherry wood
There is a lot of waste from cutting the bark off (cants) and squaring up the boards. Not to mention when it's full of rot and ants. But, it's not really waste because it will be firewood that doesn't need to be split, bonus!
The waste from the old cherry tree
Sour wood boards
cherry boards
Hope you enjoyed seeing how this works!
You'll get the feel of it in no time at this rate. Nice haul of dimensional lumber and scrap for two trees!
Thanks. I'm starting to get comfortable with it already. I can tell it will work out just fine to get the lumber I need. Thanks for the support.
I have absolutely no use for a personal mill, but now I want one...
Ha. No tree shall be wasted here! I will have park benches all over this place.
wood as much as this is usually 3 days process in my place. maybe if you wear new sawmil you just a day. hahaa lol
Ha, that would take me days to process with the mill. How many people work there to don't all by hand ?
all here still use machines like me. it's in my area. do not know if it is outside my city. I rarely get anywhere
Mill looks great and ready to work. A small cheap metal detector will find any unwanted nails or metal in some of the logs you may cut. Logs from town or close to your homestead may be hiding nails or metal from the past, can save on blades. Just something I learned the hard way.
Enjoy.
Thank you, that's a good idea. I hear about people getting into metal all the time, but didn't think of a detector. I'll see how it goes for a while since we're pretty remote I'm hoping the odds are low I'll get into anything.
Congrats! Looks like some sweet wood. We had a sawyer come last year and were really impressed at how a mill turns trees into usable wood. What a great tool!
For us it was a huge blessing, we had been chainsaw milling 15' cedar live edge boards. The sawyer made quick work of it.
Excited to see how this mill changes your life.
oh man, yes I'm fully stoked about this. I have so many logs to mill and so many things to build. I'm taking my time and enjoying the process though. Thanks so much for your words and support.
Looks like you are having fun with that new toy.LOL. You are getting some good practice in with the old trees and some useful boards to boot. Good work.
For sure. I couldn't stand to see the wood wasted from all the trees here. Thanks.
Very much enjoying your posts about the farm!
I'm very much enjoying you enjoying my posts about the farm :)
Hey @qberry :) Did you know about the @preppersonline group on Discord? A lot of good people on there, and I think they would be interested in seeing your homestead, off-grid, woods etc prepper stuff. Whenever i'd start thinking about prepper needs, i would always end up at homesteading for the long term answer, so to me the groups are pretty similar. It would also be a good way to help target your posts that are prepper geared, 2 new curation posts are starting there, one on sundays, the other on mondays. Let me know if you would like me to send you an invite link.
I did not, that's a great find. Would love an invite. Thank you!
My pleasure, you would be a great addition to the group .. the invite link: https://discord.gg/255Td3q .. if you go to the #prepper-newsletter channel there, you can put your post links for the every Sunday group newsletter highlighting the group member prepper posts .. in the #steemit channel is for the Monday curation preparedness post link submissions and discussions - you'll see in there who is doing that curation, you know her from the homesteaders group .. look forward to seeing you over there @qberry :)
Awesome. I appreciate it. See you there.
That is amazing! I have cut alot of wood, but never had the chance to mill my own lumber. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you very much. I had cut two years worth of firewood and couldn't stand to see the rest go to waste so I had been dreaming of one for a while. We had a lot of timber left after building our home.
Awww I can see a coffee table top with that cherry wood - I wish I had it!! I bet you're having a blast playing with your new toy!
You got that right. Benches, tables, shelves and a shed! I have enough to keep my busy for a very long time now. Thank You!