Well, it wasn't as good as you might think with the teaser photo there. Here's the story:
I spotted a huge maple tree that had been taken down in a local park. I found out later that a large branch had fallen off of it and so the City had taken it completely down. After some patience and a few discrete inquiries, what was left of the trunk showed up at the City log dump / milling site. About 9’ long and 3 ½’ wide, the City crew set it up for me with a loader.
Possibly the widest log I had ever tackled.
My friend and I set to work on it with my newly acquired and recently tuned up 3120 with a 60’ bar. I had sharpened the Granberg chain carefully , set the rakers to 6.5 degrees, and replaced the clog-prone auxilliary oiler with a drilled bolt that simply drips oil onto the bar, a la BobL. We had the log set up on an angle to make the milling easier, but with the log being so big, the end wound up over our heads! (photo taken before I trimmed off the knobs under the guide board)
We set up some stumps for us to stand on, and got to milling. The mill cut through this log like butter, and with great excitement we flipped the waney first cut onto the ground. The spalting was amazing, there were internal burls, and unbelievable quilting in the unspalted sapwood.
After the excitement wore off though, we realized that most the log was too punky to use, and that the quilting was confined to a narrow and irregularly shaped band at the outside. So after much consideration, and with great disappointment, we abandoned it. I also realized that the reason the saw had cut so well was that the log was so punky I could push my fingers into it! We did cut a two foot piece off the better end for a lady who had lived for 30+ years across from the park where the tree grew.
So, we turned our attention to a small cherry remnant. It was from a flowering cherry street tree, and included the union where the flowering cherry stems (likely prunus 'kwanzan', by far the most popular flowering cherry in town) were grafted to the trunk. It was over 3’ wide, but only about 2’ long. We took nine 2 ½” slabs out of it, the union adding some character to the wood. I counted the growth rings and was surprised that the tree was less than 40 years old with such a large size. The growth rings were huge.
The saw cut the cherry with no problem as well, but did tend to grab a bit, so I will not set the rakers any further and keep sharpening until it gets down to 6 degrees and see how it cuts in hardwoods.
You are right Pete, the photo is a bit Vader-like! The saw did cut very well, so I guess the saw was with me that day.
Pot of soup? I don't see that!
