dimensions for future re-saw - walnut slabs

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stihl_lyfe

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Hey guys, so am stepping up the sawmilling game, took delivery of a new bandsaw mill today.

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This is after chainsaw milling 75+ slabs and wanting to make the job a bit easier, and also that the slabs sell pretty easy so won't take too long to pay the bandsaw mill back. Especially when a forester mate made me aware of a heap of thinned walnuts that could be had for extraction costs only. Here's one I chainsaw milled

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And here are 50 more trimmed to length (~3m) stacked and ready to be picked up by self loading truck next week

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Going to slab the lot to air dry and subsequently kiln dry in the solar kiln, so question - any suggestions on slabbing dimensions to allow max future versatility for making and selling dimensioned timber? Thinking commonly sought after dimensions for furniture making or other uses that will make selling easy, maybe ~65mm slabs for tabletops that could also be resawn to 25mm finished dimension floorboards but what do people think? This is not a pure commercial enterprise, primary motivation is to make some amazing timber for our own use/woodworking but obviously hobby has got a little out of control and at this volume some opportunity to sell a fair bit and make some $ also.
 
With a bandsaw I think there’s little reason to spend too much time planning a re-saw scheme. You’re not wasting a ton of wood (or time) in each kerf like you do with a CSM, so I think you should just shoot for cutting the dimensional bits you might want right from the beginning while the wood is green.

Go to your local hardwood distributors and see what dimensions of walnut they carry. Then either cut those same sizes with the thought that customers already demand them, or cut some larger ones hoping there is demand for some beefier bits than the big mills tend to produce.
 
We are metric in Canada but deal in imperial..(go figure).looking at your log pics, by the time you cut around the pith your not left with really wide "'slabs"" but aiming at thickness I would stay in of 30mm, 60mm... ..Usually when I start dressing my wood I loose at least 3mm.. Just compensate when cutting for the wood loss when drying/dressing..
All my cabinetry work is 1/2" (drawers), 3/4" (carcass/some tops) 1.5" (coffee/entry table), 2"( Dining up to 6'), 2"+ (larger tables)
 
These showed up on the truck, super happy to have these landed!

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The odd thing here in New Zealand is 'hardwood suppliers' don't really exist, there are woodworkers out there and hardwood stuff goes into high end fitouts of new build houses etc but in general most timber to be found is pressure treated pine due to strict building regs - basically dont see a lot of alternative species other than in fringe applications which is why its not obvious how to process this stuff. At this moment am thinking I will slab the ones with good heart content @ ~60mm, and then just do dimensional boards on the logs that I have to due to big sapwood (or degraded sapwood - thinnings have been on ground for 3 years). For the single commercial outfit I can find in NZ that even sells walnut, available material is 25/40/50mm thick and random widths/lengths...

Pic of first test of new bandsaw mill for good measure, tazzy blackwood crotch

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Beautiful logs there mate. I have a similar mill (gt26 aussie hardwood mill) i think that 65mm-75mm is a good thickness for re-sawing slabs.. i stick to that thickness anyway and it seems to sell well.. nice one mate
 
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