Logging near public places.

[Gary_C]

I am just finishing a small job in a rural area near Faribault, MN. I am clearing all the aspen off this small woodlot that is enrolled in the Tree Farm Program. I am mainly working along a private driveway but it is parallel to and about 100 yards from a well traveled county road. This aspen is all being sold for pulp as it is low quality and most is starting to fall down and needs removing.

Late today I was picking up the last of the cut logs with the forwarder and was about 50 feet from the driveway. An older man in a small pickup stopped on the driveway and watched for a minute and then got out of his pickup and started walking thru the brush to where I was loading logs. He got about ten feet from the pile I was picking up, but since I had the last logs in the grapple I did not stop. As I put the last logs in the bunk, he went around the far side of the forwarder and stood there. So I idled the engine down and turned to the door and he approached. I started thinking he was going to say something about this being an amazing machine when he said "that's sure an amazing machine!" So I was polite and just said yes, it sure is. Then he asked if this was going to be a housing development and I said not as far as I know. He said is this just for a new house and again I told him no. So then he said "those are sure some beautiful logs you are getting out of here!"  Actually I was near a lowland spot and the aspen was mostly hollow and pretty rotten. 

So then I guess he asked the 64 dollar question. He asked "is there was going to be any firewood available from this job?"      Again I was polite, and did not laugh, and pointed him to the owners house but pointed out to him that there were stacks of firewood along the driveway. 

He left and did not even head towards the owners house. I suppose I could have said that I doubt he would cut up this lousy aspen for firewood, but he had already wasted enough time and I figgured I would have to explain why. 

[deeker]

Gary, here in central utah the rotten aspen is used for picture frames.  I am getting .50 per foot.  Beats cutting it all for firewood.  The grain and color in these bug eaten logs varies from black to white and red.  It is amazing what it looks like when finished.  I will have to take a few pictures and post them. 

When I was logging in southern utah, I had a few people demand to see my permits to allow me to destroy "their" forest.  I get all "giddy" when I see John Q. citizen  walking towards me with a chip on his shoulder.  Even had the local sheriff called on me (by John Q.) for "stealing his logs" as he had been told by a non existent USFS employee to take whatever logs he wanted from my piles.  He did own the property next to the forest land, but was not allowed to touch any logs as we had purchased them.  The look on his face was "priceless" as officer friendly told him about the bear.

A lot of local mills turn aspen logs (higher quality) into paneling.  Looks great.  You should post some pics of your aspen project.


Kevin Davis
Ruff Cutts

[Gary_C]

Sorry about the pictures. I had already posted them in another thread. This is one area and you can see one tree that was broken and the large one on the left of the picture was the largest tree that was cut.
 

This shows the driveway near the place I was working when the guy drove up.
 

This shows a load ready to go to the pulp mill. I probably could have sorted a load of logs and sent them to a sawmill, but the sawmills do not pay much than pulp prices right now.
 

[Cedarman]

Before we clearcut the cedar off of 40 acres at Chickasaw National Recreation area in southern Oklahoma, which is along a state highway, the park people published several articles in the local papers as to what was going to take place and why. When we started cutting there were quite a few calls to the park.  99% of the people said it was about time they got rid of those nasty cedars.  One person said she loved seeing the green in the winter.  Now with the head high grasses it looks like a prairie the way it was 100 years ago.

It is all in the head.

[deeker]

Cedarman, I too enjoy working with cedar (juniper) white and red.  Learning how to make tables now, instead of just sawing it for everyone else.  A very interesting tree.  What is your end use for what you cut?   We are going to be salvaging a lot of it from the fires last summer in central utah(milford flat area) .  Most for tables and mantles.  Some for beds, lamps and what ever the wood looks good for.
GaryC, the pics look great!  Wish I had a few trailer loads of the trees, after they have been "bug eaten".  As I said they make beautiful frames. 

Kevin Davis
Ruff Cutts

[Cedarman]

There is a long list of what cedar can be used for.  We make lots of lumber, squared posts, live edge siding, beveled siding, T&G, round fence posts, peeled poles for furniture, peeled logs for theme parks (Wolf Lake Lodges), split wood for ceilings (Disneyworld), split rails for fences, saplings for viking fences, privacy fencing, sawn slabs for bars and tables, sawdust for additive to kitty litty, cull logs sold for shaving market,  weird logs for crafts (beds, porch posts etc), lots of mulch, flute blanks, and probably a few more I have forgotten.

People want the strangest stuff.

[Woodcarver]

Red cedar is also used in the carving world.  I've seem some truly awsome carvings done in red cedar.  I haven't done any pieces using it yet, but red cedar is on my list of woods to try someday.

[CLL]

Have a chain saw carver in our area that gets pieces from me, makes some nice looking Indians, eagles, ect.

[stonebroke]

I thought this thread was supposed to be about logging? Another Hijacked thread , Thats the great thing about FF.

Stonebroke

[SwampDonkey]

Yeah, the best I seen for aspen veneer was $140/cord. The pulp price was as high as $48/tonne (metric) before the bing collapse. So it was $50 more for the veneer. A lot of hardwood plywood has aspen as the core layers. I can smell it when it's passing through the table saw.

Gary your aspen is pretty typical of our area. Second growth from suckers doesn't seem to be as good as that from fires or grown up fields and edges. I suppose the roots carry on disease.

[Cedarman]

Stonebroke, these threads are kind of like watching a butterfly in a breeze.  A little this way, then a little that way and the butterfly always ends up somewhere. How's this for a right turn?

[WH_Conley]

Whatever turn they take, eventually they always make it to food.

[grassfed]

Gary that aspen looks a lot like what I cut.

 What do you figure for tons per cord on that wood. The lumber calculator says 3900 per cord but some truckers around here say 2.6 tones per cord.

Last I checked I can get 32 a ton(us) 28 miles away for pulp and 100 a cord 100 miles away at the mill. For veneer I can get $300 mbf 140 miles away and $240 mbf 28 miles away. 

The best deal seems to depend on what trucking I can get but I always seem to strike a bad deal with the truckers. I am starting to think that I ain't got the brains for this line of work.

[SwampDonkey]

Yeah 5000 lbs or 2.5 short tons (2.27 metric tonne) is what the mills and Marketing Boards use here. 3900 lbs is too light for green aspen, way off.

Can't be much profit in $80/cord aspen. 


private land stumpage $15/cord
logging treelength $30/cord
trucking $40/cord

Just what it costs locally for conventional logging. We had to at least get $110 to make it worth while. The guys that own their own trucks are no further ahead, it costs money to maintain trucks and pay a trucker.

[grassfed]

Thanks a tonne

Swamp you have made my day I just found out that I am 28% more productive than I thought

[Gary_C]

grassfed

There are standard conversions here in Minnesota but I do not know how they were determined originally.

For Aspen, it is 4500 lbs. or 2.25 tons per cord.
Maple it's 4800 lbs. or 2.4 tons per cord regardless of hard or soft Maple.
For Basswood, it's 3850 lbs. or 1.925 tons per cord.

These are all green conversions so the seller comes up short if it is not fresh cut.

[SwampDonkey]

The numbers I know here came from weighing samples, many samples.I'm sure it was done out there to. Some mills even give seasonal adjustments on weight because it does vary. I guess that is why we average 5000 lbs.

4500lbs may not be out of whack, but it seems they are using the figures for the dry season only. I suppose it gives the illusion of helping the logger when the price is so low.

[grassfed]

seller comes up short if it is not fresh cut.

Would I loose much weight during say 4 weeks on the landing mid January-Feb with the logs bucked 16-24'? or will it hold water during the winter freeze?

 

[SwampDonkey]

They won't dry frozen. Most loggers this time of year haul like there is no tomorrow because road closures are coming up and won't be lifted til first of June. Some get stuck with wood on the ground during closure and don't seem to suffer much. It's not hot here until mid June, but hardwood logs will spoil from mid April (maybe a bit later, depends on year) onward here. Bugs will be into it by mid May.

[Gary_C]

I do not know how much weight the logs lose in the winter on the landings, but I see the ends will check even in the coldest weather.

One year I had 3 loads of Basswood pulp that could not be sold before spring breakup and with a hot dry spring the logs really dried out. The biggest load I hauled was full up to the top of the stakes, about 15.5 cords and it weighed just 45,000 lbs. That's about 2900 lbs per cord. 

[SwampDonkey]

There might be some wicking on the ends of the logs near the surface, but when it's freezing water is bound to the wood and won't migrate out to the drier areas of the log ends. I've not seen checked winter cut logs. I have seen it on wood that was cut in the fall and not hauled 'til later.

[beenthere]

Freeze drying happens....that was a once-upon-a-time method proposed for slow drying walnut gunstock blanks.. problem was they dried too fast. 

 

[SwampDonkey]

Heat of wetting is where energy is given up when wood takes on moister. I think the Freeze drying process is a bit different than a stick of wood in a pile under the snow at -10 F under normal atmospheric pressure (26-30 in Hg or there abouts) and RH of 40-50 %, which is normal for my area in dry winter days. If your going to liberate water from deep inside a stick in cold temperature I think there is some pressure involved in the process to reduce the energy needed to liberate the water.

Maybe I'm just confused. 

edit: had my units mixed up.

[Gary_C]

Freeze drying occurs as a result of the process of sublimation which is a phase change from liquid directly to a vapor at temperatures below the Triple Point and it is driven in this case by the energy in sunlight. This sublimation occurs all the time during the winter, and you can see the results when the snow starts to get that porous or coarse grained look. And it happens even when the air temperature never gets above freezing.

From Wikipedia  Triple Point of Water:

The single combination of pressure and temperature at which pure water, pure ice, and pure water vapour can coexist in a stable equilibrium occurs at exactly 273.16 K (0.01 °C) and a pressure of 611.73 pascals (ca. 6.1173 millibars, 0.0060373057 atm). At that point, it is possible to change all of the substance to ice, water, or vapor by making arbitrarily small changes in pressure and temperature.

What this all means is the frozen water in the logs will make a phase change directly to water vapor even while sitting on the landing in below freezing weather. I have no idea how much moisture they can lose, but I have seen all species of logs that were cut in the coldest temperatures end up with cracks in the ends of the logs, and that includes ones that have been end sealed.

[SwampDonkey]

Yeah, but your hovering very close to the melting point. Even -0.0001 C is freezing. A slight change in pressure in the right direction and your in business. Now as the days become longer in February and onward, the sun is real warm on an exposed wood pile in the southern aspect, snow even melts even though the shaded air temperature can be 24 F. Dirt on the wood yard even melts the yard each day. The water ain't going to move when she's -10 F out.

And yes the energy comes from the sun, or the wood pile wouldn't season.


When splitting firewood, it's a lot easier when wood is frozen and green. You'll know if it's dry, it ain't so easy.



My understanding of sublimation involves a vacuum chamber to control pressure and cold air flow is used to wick moisture from the wood. It's done at around 30 F and -16 mm Hg. Done for hardwoods. Lower vaccum does not produce faster results and costs more.

For softwoods a dehydration unit at colder temperatures is used at  -2 to -100 F typically and takes more energy for cooling than the ealier method. By adjusting the atmospheric pressure within the dehydration unit moisture can be removed from the cells with minimum structural damage to the cells. The wood is dried in a chamber. The cold, dry air is circulated through the chamber, where it picks up moisture from the wood. The wet air is then removed from the chamber, heated, dried and cooled for recirculation into the chamber. The cool dry air is blown in under positive pressure to wick away the moisture.

Taken from: Patent Storm Website