Grade Sawing A Sugar Maple

[Drilling Man]

  I was given this sugar maple by a friend who lives in town.  I wanted it for my own use, so i milled it all to 5/4, as that's what i prefer... 
 
  First, i rotated the log to pick where i would start, loaded it on the mill, and got ready to "grade saw" this log.  I had a well used band on the mill, but it was still sawing dead flat, so i left it on and took the first slab off, and then a flitch...
 

 
  Then with a turn of the log, i took the second slab off and another flitch, and turned the log once again to remove the third slab!
 

 

 
  and "finally" with the last turn, off came the last slab,
 

 
  exposeing the "cant", so i could see what the "grade" was going to be...  None of the choises were "perfect", but in this case, i just picked the best and went with it, untill the grade fell off...
 

 
  Actually, the grade wasn't all that bad either!
 

 
  and the cant gave me some nice 12" lumber!!  With that, i noticed the saw head pushing a bit harder than it should, so i took the band off, sharpened it and got back to sawing...
 

 
  until i got to the last couple of boards,
 

 
  And here's the "tally", that ended up at just over 130 bd. ft. of lumber...
 

 
  As you can see in the pile, i didn't trim the boards as much as i would have, if they weren't mine.  I don't mind a bit of "wane" on my lumber...  Also when i edged the first flitches, they ended up 10" wide instead of 12"...
 
  Well, that's it for this time...

  DM

[Graybeard]

What is a flitch? 

[bobg]

    I wondered the same thing Bill.  .  Looked it up in the dictionary. A flitch is a side of pork smoked and cured as bacon. .
                 bobg

[Zulu]

Drilling Man,
Where do you live?  I want some of that!  If its maple you don't live near me.   You posted 9 pictures without reposting.  How many pics can fit in one post.  I thought it was only 6 for some reason and always back out and then come back in for more. 
I always wanted a saw like that but you need more stuff after you get it.  Tractor, trailer, someplace to store the wood, a tree would be nice.  How do you dry it?  I've always heard 1 year per 1" of thickness if air drying.
I know someone who lost a 36" walnut tree in a storm.  He didn't have any way to handle it so he cut it into firewood.  I got a few pieces to mess with on my lathe.  When I told him what it was worth you should have seen the look on his face.
Zulu

[Drilling Man]

  Hi guys,

  Glad you enjoyed the picts...

  A "flitch" is what comes off the mill with the bark on both edges.  You then "edge" the "flitch" to make a board.

  You really don't need a tractor around the mill, or even to get logs to the mill, but it does make those jobs and many more a lot easier...

  I sticker my lumber to air dry it, in stacks,



 and then move it into my shop for a few weeks to finish drying, before using it for things like furniture.  For construction lumber, you can pretty much use it right off the mill or sticker it for 30 days or so...  And "no" it doesn't take one year per inch, most times it's much faster than that, depending on your climate, the specie and several other factors...

  DM

[Graybeard]

There is no fixed number of images per post so long as you are posting them in the body of the message. If posting them as an "additional option" below the post the limit has more to do with total size of images than number of images.

The more images the longer a post or thread takes to load but if you have them stored on a fast server and if the person viewing them has a high speed connection it doesn't make that much difference. Now to folks with dial up connections it sure does.

[Zulu]

Thanks Graybeard,
I've put maybe 18 pictures in my message but thought I had to do it in three post, one after another.
I'll try it.  Everyone likes looking at pictures.
Zulu