Red neck milling

[PheasantHunter]

In the past I have had a person with a Woodmizer mill a few thousand board feet of walnut, ash and maple from my family's farm in Minnesota. The only milling I have done myself is with a chainsaw for bowl blanks or small log sections on a shop bandsaw. However, recently a friend gave me a birch log. My shop bandsaw is on wheels so I decided to see if I could use it to mill. All I need was a way to hold the log off the ground so I could push the saw through the log (see photos). It worked ok to split the log in two which should prevent most checking and will allow me to mill lots of turning stock at a later date from it. Wish I had a chainsaw mill (mostly I lurk on this forum)!!!

Anyway, thought you might get some laughs from my feeble attempt at milling. I am mostly a woodturner and furniture making hobbiest.

 

[qweesdraw]

Heck that's not Redneck milling,i think it's about the only way to do small stuff.
I use a piece of plywood with a piece of (u) metal mounted to it to ride my fence for smaller stuff.
(a few drywall screws to hold it in place)
For larger as you have i use a chalk line(for center) and push it through by hand.
It's kind of frustrating when you own a sawmill and can't do smaller stuff for some applications.
I have a piece of plywood for the mill and use timberlock screws to hold it for smaller stuff.
Faster to just use the bandsaw i think.
Mark
P.S Possibly someone else has a better solution!

 

[Rookie1]

Nice job.

 

[BIG JAKE]

Interesting solution you came u with and looks like it worked pretty well! If you use a lot of lumber you should consider a chainsaw mill. They are somewhat labor intensive but if done in your spare time can be quite enjoyable. There are many older large cc saws that would work and can be had cheaply. Stonykill has taken this route and makes some beautiful stuff with his milled lumber.

Edit: Might be something productive you could do during your long winters!

 

[billstuewe]

How do you think most of us got started? I have a 4' piece of 3/4" plywood with a piece of wood screwed to the bottom to slide in the miter groove. The ply was cut a bit wide on the left so that when I pushed it through the saw the first time I cut off the left side. Now the left side of the ply is where the cut line is. Screw a short 10" or so piece of ply at a 90 degree upright to the large piece on the leading edge. I had drilled a number of 1/8" holes in this piece. Place the "log" on the sled with the amount you want to cut off hanging over the cut line and with the end butted up against the upright and screw through a couple of the holes into the end of the log to secure it from moving/rolling. Now guide it through the saw. You can slightly move the back of the log to adjust for any tracking variance in the blade. I then joint the cut edge and put it down on the sled and repeat. My own mini-mill.

 

[BobL]

Possibly someone else has a better solution!

I also do small stuff with a bandsaw and also have a sliding rig for my table saw which I use to cut up short pieces of small logs like Mulga which has a Janka hardness of over 4000 lb so carbide tipped blades are about the only way of doing this.

On the band saw, to split a log down the middle I sometimes screw the log onto a piece of chipboard or MDF so that it slides easier on the band saw table.
I mark a line on the MDF and then place the log along the line and tek screw the board onto the log about 2" either side of the line.
This also stops the log from rolling side to side which can damage the blade.

 

[PheasantHunter]

Thanks

I also do small stuff with a bandsaw and also have a sliding rig for my table saw which I use to cut up short pieces of small logs like Mulga which has a Janka hardness of over 4000 lb so carbide tipped blades are about the only way of doing this.

On the band saw, to split a log down the middle I sometimes screw the log onto a piece of chipboard or MDF so that it slides easier on the band saw table.
I mark a line on the MDF and then place the log along the line and tek screw the board onto the log about 2" either side of the line.
This also stops the log from rolling side to side which can damage the blade.

That is a great set up. Wow, 4000 and we America's think our maple is "rock hard"!

 

[PheasantHunter]

How do you think most of us got started? I have a 4' piece of 3/4" plywood with a piece of wood screwed to the bottom to slide in the miter groove. The ply was cut a bit wide on the left so that when I pushed it through the saw the first time I cut off the left side. Now the left side of the ply is where the cut line is. Screw a short 10" or so piece of ply at a 90 degree upright to the large piece on the leading edge. I had drilled a number of 1/8" holes in this piece. Place the "log" on the sled with the amount you want to cut off hanging over the cut line and with the end butted up against the upright and screw through a couple of the holes into the end of the log to secure it from moving/rolling. Now guide it through the saw. You can slightly move the back of the log to adjust for any tracking variance in the blade. I then joint the cut edge and put it down on the sled and repeat. My own mini-mill.

Thanks. I may cut some of these 1/2 logs to 3' in length and try this. I wish I had a way to set up an infeed and outfeed table for my bandsaw, this would make it a lot easier to handle a 100 log and push it through the saw.