Daninvan
ArboristSite Operative
Normally the city opens up the log dump at the beach to chainsawing and milling shortly after Labour Day. This year because the weather was so darn nice the beach was still full of people through September so they did not open up the chainsaw area until Oct 1.
I had spent a lot of time (a LOT of time) in the past week sharpening my four loops of milling chain (my bars are 36", so the chains have 60 cutters on them). I used my micrometer to ensure that each tooth was sharpened to the same length, then I used Bob's DAF method to set each raker to 6.5 degrees (one chain I did 6 degrees). The rakers on one of the chains had become quite flat-topped, probably from my previous use of a FOP-like device, so I reshaped them all to a more correct curved-toothy kind of shape. It is also strange how when I hand file in "the field" I wind up over time with the cutters on one side consistently shorter than on the other side. Anyways, the chains are all good now. I also filed all my bars and cleaned up all my power heads. But it sure took a LOT of time.
So off I went to the beach this morning, wanted to test everything out, make sure all the saws were running well, and also test out the new 48" Granberg mill I bought. Previously I had been using a couple of simple homemade mills, but I had a lot of trouble last year with one of them starting to dive into the log and getting jammed. I am pretty sure it was racking. I tried several times to fix it up and in the end decided it was not worth it. I had also injured my back quite badly in March so I wanted to test out how it would react to the milling work.
As some of you might recall, I have a pretty sweet location on the beach to mill at. Last night there had been a bit of a wind storm and there were still some waves coming in. First time I had ever seen that. But it was a lovely day, cool to start, but warming up in the sun with a few clouds.
Today's log was a Deodar cedar, it was quite short but I have a ton of Deodar already and I really don't love it that much any more, so I figured it would be a good one for testing stuff out.
The new Granberg worked grand, er great. The log was pretty smooth so I couldn't really assess how it dealt with lumps and bumps. But it seemed to slide down the cut with way less pushing required than my other mills. Which is definitely nice for my back!
I cut six or seven fairly thin slabs out of it, I left several at the beach which were scooped up by passersby before I was even gone. They had way too many knots in them for me.
One problem I did have was with my 3120. I have always found getting the chain properly lined up on the drive sprocket-doodad to be a real nuisance. And of course it was misaligned again this time and I think I may have damaged it. Otherwise things went well. I am looking forward to a great milling season!
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I had spent a lot of time (a LOT of time) in the past week sharpening my four loops of milling chain (my bars are 36", so the chains have 60 cutters on them). I used my micrometer to ensure that each tooth was sharpened to the same length, then I used Bob's DAF method to set each raker to 6.5 degrees (one chain I did 6 degrees). The rakers on one of the chains had become quite flat-topped, probably from my previous use of a FOP-like device, so I reshaped them all to a more correct curved-toothy kind of shape. It is also strange how when I hand file in "the field" I wind up over time with the cutters on one side consistently shorter than on the other side. Anyways, the chains are all good now. I also filed all my bars and cleaned up all my power heads. But it sure took a LOT of time.
So off I went to the beach this morning, wanted to test everything out, make sure all the saws were running well, and also test out the new 48" Granberg mill I bought. Previously I had been using a couple of simple homemade mills, but I had a lot of trouble last year with one of them starting to dive into the log and getting jammed. I am pretty sure it was racking. I tried several times to fix it up and in the end decided it was not worth it. I had also injured my back quite badly in March so I wanted to test out how it would react to the milling work.
As some of you might recall, I have a pretty sweet location on the beach to mill at. Last night there had been a bit of a wind storm and there were still some waves coming in. First time I had ever seen that. But it was a lovely day, cool to start, but warming up in the sun with a few clouds.
Today's log was a Deodar cedar, it was quite short but I have a ton of Deodar already and I really don't love it that much any more, so I figured it would be a good one for testing stuff out.
The new Granberg worked grand, er great. The log was pretty smooth so I couldn't really assess how it dealt with lumps and bumps. But it seemed to slide down the cut with way less pushing required than my other mills. Which is definitely nice for my back!
I cut six or seven fairly thin slabs out of it, I left several at the beach which were scooped up by passersby before I was even gone. They had way too many knots in them for me.
One problem I did have was with my 3120. I have always found getting the chain properly lined up on the drive sprocket-doodad to be a real nuisance. And of course it was misaligned again this time and I think I may have damaged it. Otherwise things went well. I am looking forward to a great milling season!
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