The Forestry Forum

A friend of mine asked me to saw some 36'' wide knarly maple into slabs...Im using my band mill that I built a few years back..It has taken me 2 blades to saw the entire log which is 36'' diameter and 12' long...I'm pouring the water to the blade and manually feeding the carriage to the log.. Im more familiar with my bellsaw so I don't know if this is crazy that the blades are making such wavey pieces so quickly or if you guys have the same results

Rock maple can be tough

Large diameter logs require wide cuts early in their sawing.  Wide cuts require sharper blades than narrower cuts, for lumber to be flat. Bark has dirt and that doesn't go well with keeping a blade razor sharp.  It is a challenge.

I always would use at least 2 blades, and more,  to cut a 36" diameter log, usually at least 1 blade to "skin it out" meaning to cut off most of the bark faces, sawing 8 sided helps.  Then put on a fresh blade to get it down to cant size.  If the customer wants a stack of 24" wide boards then I might actually have 3 or more partly used blades by the time I'm done,  several of them changed out just because they are starting to give wave on very wide boards.  Some of those blades would be fine for cutting 1' or less wide wood for hours more, but not for really wide wood.

I've been cutting some big poplars lately. They've been laying for a few months. First thing I do is cut the dry ends off with a chainsaw. Even after that they dull a blade pretty quick. I'll saw two big logs, (24-36 inch") then finish the blade off with several smaller logs.