Making cookies and small lumber

[BackyardlumberATX]

all hello, first of all i am completely green at this so please be patient, back story is that after having worked for corporate America for a decade and been in an almost head on car accident i now have a new outlook in life, i will be starting two new businesses one that hopefully will give me income to support my family and the other just because it has always intrigued me. I'm a single father of four boys one working on a masters, one Grunt in the Middle East killing bad people and two young ones, i was always very outside type of guy until Corporate America got ahold of me and now I'm trying for dear life to set myself free of those chains.

So here if where i need advice, i have. Echo CS 306 that i purchased refurbished with a 16 bar that i have used only twice in the last two years to cut firewood, upon reading I've found out that the bar is not even for that saw, it does run good but not great, i was given 2 yrs ago one big slab of live oak that was rough cut that is aprox 30 inches wide and about a foot thick and 5 feet long i have that one in my garage, plus three stumps that are about 20 in diameter and a foot thick, two split before i read a had to seal the ends with wax and one is pretty much intact. I was also given about 15 pieces of logs that range from four feet long and 8 inches in diameter to 3 feet long and 12 inches in diameter.

So i will be buying a Stihl 180 that will serve several functions, one as a saw to stop and cut lumber from construction sites and then change of bar and chain so i can use it in a small mill which brings me to what kind of small backyard mill is advised for a smaller backyard. Again this will be an urban operation

Is there a jig or mill to make cookies/slabs out of the logs? Maybe about 2 inches thick and 6 to 12 in in diameter i want to do a hand finish on them and sell them on ebay etc so what kind of bar and chain will work best on my Echo CS 306, i do want both a 12 inch bar with a very good chain for my smaller logs and a 14 in bar to swap out and use on my thicker logs.

Here in Austin Texas there is a lot of road construction and new communities being built so raw material won't be an issue to collect, a lot of pecan, live oak, cedar oak, and definitely a lot of cedar. I'm wanting to corner the smaller sized lumber market with decorative finished stumps, small rustic stump tables, and cookies/slabs made of sliced trunks and smaller sized lumber lengths ,4/4s to 8/4s and the occasional 12/4 in lengths upto 8ft to market to the doit-yourselfers.

Once again any and all advice is greatly appreciated and sorry for the long post.

Happy to be part of this......

Gracias Hermanos
Emilio DeLuna

 

[BackyardlumberATX]

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[BobL]

Sorry if it sounds rude but a Sthil 180 is classified as a "homeowner saw". It is designed for light pruning and "occasional" fire wood cutting and not designed for any sort of extend use. Using it in the way you describe way will result in its early demise.

The minimum sized/style saw I'd be looking at for your sort of work is something like a 291. Better still for your work would be a ~70cc saw. It's inevitable that you will come across larger pieces and with a small saw you won't even have a chance on these.

Before getting into the cookie cutting business you need to do your homework otherwise the vast majority of your cookies will end up as pizza slices.

 

[SeMoTony]

[/ATTACH]

View attachment 594852 all hello, first of all i am completely green at this so please be patient, back story is that after having worked for corporate America for a decade and been in an almost head on car accident i now have a new outlook in life, i will be starting two new businesses one that hopefully will give me income to support my family and the other just because it has always intrigued me. I'm a single father of four boys one working on a masters, one Grunt in the Middle East killing bad people and two young ones, i was always very outside type of guy until Corporate America got ahold of me and now I'm trying for dear life to set myself free of those chains.

So here if where i need advice, i have. Echo CS 306 that i purchased refurbished with a 16 bar that i have used only twice in the last two years to cut firewood, upon reading I've found out that the bar is not even for that saw, it does run good but not great, i was given 2 yrs ago one big slab of live oak that was rough cut that is aprox 30 inches wide and about a foot thick and 5 feet long i have that one in my garage, plus three stumps that are about 20 in diameter and a foot thick, two split before i read a had to seal the ends with wax and one is pretty much intact. I was also given about 15 pieces of logs that range from four feet long and 8 inches in diameter to 3 feet long and 12 inches in diameter.

So i will be buying a Stihl 180 that will serve several functions, one as a saw to stop and cut lumber from construction sites and then change of bar and chain so i can use it in a small mill which brings me to what kind of small backyard mill is advised for a smaller backyard. Again this will be an urban operation

Is there a jig or mill to make cookies/slabs out of the logs? Maybe about 2 inches thick and 6 to 12 in in diameter i want to do a hand finish on them and sell them on ebay etc so what kind of bar and chain will work best on my Echo CS 306, i do want both a 12 inch bar with a very good chain for my smaller logs and a 14 in bar to swap out and use on my thicker logs.

Here in Austin Texas there is a lot of road construction and new communities being built so raw material won't be an issue to collect, a lot of pecan, live oak, cedar oak, and definitely a lot of cedar. I'm wanting to corner the smaller sized lumber market with decorative finished stumps, small rustic stump tables, and cookies/slabs made of sliced trunks and smaller sized lumber lengths ,4/4s to 8/4s and the occasional 12/4 in lengths upto 8ft to market to the doit-yourselfers.

Once again any and all advice is greatly appreciated and sorry for the long post.

Happy to be part of this......

Gracias Hermanos
Emilio DeLuna

I lack a pic of my HF version of beam maker cutting guide. That is what started me into milling years ago w/ms-170. Next came ms-460 with an alaskan for larger work & the selection of bars has grown from 25" to 36" adding 50, 60 & now 72" along w/powerheads in the 90cc class. Starting small isn't bad unless a new purchase is involved. On a new purchase of a saw the recomendation in CS milling 101 (recomended reading) is get as big as can be afforded to meet as much of your needs from the get go.
My avatar shows the result of the 1st use of the 60"" bar mounted in alaskan mill. I ordered it "just in case" more than eighteen months before. Under the alaskan another table top about 65" x 95" could have been slice off if the 72" bar was in inventory at that time.Point being , that we don't know how large a log or stump may present itself to our use. To use a 70cc powerhead on a 60" bar I had to get skip chain for reduction of drag / power needed to pull. Please look threw CS milling 101 to see what others have done in this endeavor and learn how chain needs to be sharpened for milling. Wish I'd known of this site when I started. make use of the knowledge gained from the members experience to shorten the learning curve.

 

[ChoppyChoppy]

I've made cookies on the firewood processor. Seems every year we get a few people coming by wanting them for a wedding or something. Not sure why they figure I'm doing arts and crafts?

It's a PITA, they are real fussy about them. I made the mistake of cutting g them and showing each one. Wasted 2 whole logs and nearly 2 hours!

Last time I just found a decent firewood log and cut a pile, probably double what they needed and said, there, that pile, $50.

It's doable on the Woodmizer too, but it's hard to clamp and takes longer.

 

[Boogedy_Man]

A MS180 will be an excellent saw for cutting lumber. I have a 170 that I use for that...never touches anything but clean, bark free wood. Stays sharp forever. Handy as can be.

I wouldn't personally do any milling with one. It's just not the right saw for that.

As far as cookies, you can probably get pretty good at free handing them up to a certain size. I have people ask for them frequently.

Big ones I chainsaw mill at $100/hr, medium I generally free hand for a few bucks each. Folks have been wanting small ones for coasters lately and they can me made nice and accurate on the bandmill at $75/hr.

I offer advise, too: They will crack and you won't get your money back.

 

[BackyardlumberATX]

Thanks for all the advice guys!