Bottom turner for Ron W.

[Jeff]

I thought I would post this here rather then just email it to Ron. Somebody Might find it interesting or useful.

The picture shows how using a small cylinder, and a lever, how you can "lock out" your top dogs from coming down, thus forcing the bottom dog up. This action will flip your log from underneath, causing the opening face to be down on the log bunk. This eliminates 3/4s of a turn.

The top and bottom dogs are fastened to opposite ends of a hydrolic cylinder on a slide. So when you prevent one dog from going up or down the other moves. This also allows the dogs to"pinch" your log, not just hold it down from the top.




Top and bottom dogs

[Ron Wenrich]

Here's what my downturns look like.  I have one on each of my middle headblocks.  They work well on straight logs, or square edges.  But, a crooked log or a log with severe taper, and they will miss the log and not turn.

[Don P]

Can one of you guys back up enough to get a full carriage shot?

[Jeff]

You bet Don. I have to prove mine is better then old woodticks anyhow.

[Ron Wenrich]

It ain't what you got, it's how you use it.  

Here's one view of my carriage.




Here's another view.  It's a little dark.  Taken real early in the morning.



Here's a view of my office.




And, yes, that is a left handed mill.

[Jeff]

Hey, that thing's bassackwards.

[Don P]

Cool stuff, I can throw my carriage back on with a big grunt when it jumps track. You're running 4 headblocks,Ron?
I've taken to downturning whenever I can as its all cant hook and 1/4 turn sure beats 3/4.What keeps the log from rolling right off the mill when you hit the lifting cylinder?I've got flip up wedges on my log deck that slide it back, you're bound to have something more positive.

[Ron Wenrich]

I'm running 4 headblocks.  I saw 8' to 24' material.  8 & 10' on the center blocks, 12 on the back 3, 14 on the front 3, and 16 and longer on 1ll 4.  Everything is hydraulic.

I'm turning when my carriage is on the return, when I can.  I pull the headblocks back, and hit the downturn button.  When I get the blocks back far enough, I release the dogs, which flips the log down.  

Then you pull your headblocks forward, hit the dogs, and you're ready to go.  If I had a computer, it would put it right where you need to be for the next cut.

Those downturns will work on any length of log.  I rely on them for the long logs.  Crooked logs don't turn too well.  I like to be at the ramps to turn, just in case anything goes wrong.

You have to be careful not to turn into your saw or edger.  I've sent a few big logs off the carriage when they hit the edger.

I've sawn on hand mills, and I've used a system that had rollers that where on a hinge.  You pulled them up after the log was on the carriage.  When you wanted to turn, you did the 1/4 turn thing onto the rollers.  Log slid right back onto the carriage.  

Using that method is much faster than any log turner.  I like your flip up wedge idea.  Put a couple of rollers on there and it would really be fast.

[Don P]

That's what I like about bouncing ideas off you guys, The Wheel, gonna try me one of those.

The flip up wedges were a trick an old timer with a meadows mill showed me, in his 70's and had rhythm, the kind of guys that don't really look like their working till you look at the pile of wood they've knocked out.

[Ron Wenrich]

If you're going to try the wheel, I better explain a little more.  These weren't big wheels.  They were only about 2-3" rollers, and they were solid.  They were only about an inch wide.

I mounted mine on my skid poles, which were hickory poles.  There were 2 rollers on each set.  Looked something like this.

   |O
   |   \
   |______O


Like I said, they were on a hinge.  But you might be able to mount them on a bar that would swivel up and down.  Would save a lot of time compared to flipping them up by hand.

You could also use a bearing, but they may break due to the pounding of the log.