Standing tree to 90 bd ft 5/4 cherry in 3 hrs

[woodshop]

Got a call from a friend of a friend that there was a property being sold that was going to be cleared and rebuilt, and thus I could have any of the trees in her woods back behind her outbuildings. Lots of 10-12 inch maple/cherry/oak... too small do mess with for me at this point anyway. Walked past the 30 inch white oak that was sickly looking and should have been cut few years back. Walked past a 36 inch strait as an arrow HUGE Poplar tree that caught my eye, and found a nice strait 20 inch cherry tree about 150 ft back. Mature woods, no way to get a vehicle back there, even a tractor wouldn't fit without cutting down some smaller stuff. This is exactly the situation I designed my csm/Ripsaw milling system for. I pulled into her driveway at 1PM, unloaded my saws and equipment and carried it back on my little Harbor Freight cheapo wagon. Cleared away a little brush and dropped the tree. Bucked an 8ft butt log from it. Slapped my aluminum 2x6 guide bars on it and squared up a 12x12 (just three sides) cant with the csm. Jacked that up onto my little horses with my floor jack and proceeded to slice the cant into nine 5/4 boards of the prettiest knot free top grade cherry with the Ripsaw. Used the wagon to carry the boards and equipment back through the woods to my van and load up. Left the rest of it for another day. So exactly 3 hours after I pulled into her driveway I was driving home with 90 bd ft of premium 12 inch wide cherry worth well over $500 in these parts. Lots of hard work yes, did almost as much carrying as cutting. But cherry is worth it so I figure burning the calories was icing on the cake. Not knocking other kinds of mills, just saying for this situation with a standing tree back in the woods like that, my system works pretty well from the back of my van. It doesn't need heavy machinery and does the job relatively quickly start to finish. In the devils advocates defense, it's true that today, these three hours were almost textbook. No problems, no gremlins, everything went smoothly. Anybody that ever dropped a tree and milled it on the spot knows that doesn't always happen. Of course it IS Mothers Day today. I lost mine in a car accident years ago. She was always looking out for me though and she loved stuff made out of cherry wood, so I figure maybe she was looking down today makin' sure everything milled up OK for me

 

[dustytools]

Excellent post Woodshop! I posted some cherry pics a couple of weeks ago (not nearly as pretty as yours) Which I intend to craft a corner shelf out of for my wife. I love the looks of cherry in finished products. Its good to hear of your good milling day. Im sure that your mother was with you today! God bless!

 

[lmbeachy]

Interesting post Woodshop. Those are some nice looking boards. You certainly have your methods down to a science.

 

[BobL]

Nice post woodshop. I love hearing about these dream run milling events - maybe I can have one some day?

 

[flht01]

Excellent post ! Looking forward to seeing pict's of future trips to that woodlot.

 

[aggiewoodbutchr]

Great work!

 

[oldsaw]

I did less than half as good as you. I got half the wood, and it isn't as nice. I got some knots, but some nicer stuff too. First milling since last fall. Been a long time.

Looks good though, and sounds like a perfect day.

Mark

 

[OZDOG]

well done very nice timber, got any planes for them yet?

 

[Woodsurfer]

Nice story, beautiful stack of wood. You can't beat a productive day in the woods.

 

[woodshop]

well done very nice timber, got any planes for them yet?

Just about all the wood I mill feeds my woodshop. I started a (very) small business selling wooden product at craft shows. Mostly small things, largest being a Shaker side table. Right now I limit myself to only 5-6 shows a year, so my profit basically pays for equipment upgrades. Slowly ramping up for when I retire (7 years?) at which point I will do that on a larger scale. I mill several thousand bd ft of mostly hardwood a year, and at this point use maybe 4-500 ft a year in the shop. That's all, so most goes into storage for future when I might not be able to do what I still can today. Premium stuff like this cherry definitely gets stashed away for special high end project.