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What makes you mill?

Started by Nate Surveyor, November 20, 2007, 07:15:06 PM

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Nate Surveyor



I think it is the excitement of seeing what is inside the log.  :) :)
Seeing something that would have been firewood, turned into a fantastic piece of art.

Nate
I know less than I used to.

Daren

Quote from: Nate Surveyor on November 20, 2007, 07:15:06 PM

I think it is the excitement of seeing what is inside the log.  :) :)
Seeing something that would have been firewood, turned into a fantastic piece of art.


I reckon those would be my top two reasons also...sure ain't because that it is easy work and the money is good  :(.
Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.

LeeB

For the exercise and all the fiber it adds to my diet. Yea right! Same reasons as you and Daren. I started out wanted to get wood for my woodwork hobby and now I just like making sawdust.
'98 LT40HDD/Lombardini, Case 580L, Cat D4C, JD 3032 tractor, JD 5410 tractor, Husky 346, 372 and 562XP's. Stihl MS180 and MS361, 1998 and 2006 3/4 Ton 5.9 Cummins 4x4's, 1989 Dodge D100 w/ 318, and a 1966 Chevy C60 w/ dump bed.

oldsaw

Too cheap to buy hardwood, but opening up a log is pretty cool.  Christmas any time of the year.

Mark
So many trees, so little money, even less time.

Stihl 066, Husky 262, Husky 350 (warmed over), Homelite Super XL, Homelite 150A

rbarshaw

The sheer joy 8) of opening up a log to see what's in there. I have cut it having no ldea what I might do with it, knowing it's probably going to be junk and find something wonderful in there ;D
Been doing so much with so little for so long I can now do anything with nothing, except help from y'all!
By the way rbarshaw is short for Robert Barshaw.
My Second Mill Is Shopbuilt 64HP,37" wheels, still a work in progress.

kderby

I like saying "Opening a log is like opening a new book",  :P with lots of pretty pictures.

Do I hear an Amen! 8) 8) 8)


hansbaba

I guess I am different than most. I'm milling because I am surrounded by D-fir and Redwood and I want to build a house with all the framing, siding, flooring and trim provided by myself. I am hoping to save a bundle and am going to completley ignore all the time, and labor that goes into making your own lumber. I also like the fact that I am probably saving thousands of barrels of oil by not having my lumber cut in canada, trucked to a mill, shipped to a train station, loaded on a train, shipped to california, loaded on a truck, shipped to a lumber yard, loaded on another truck, and finally driven to my building site. Did I miss any steps???  I figure its probably an order of magnitude or two less energy that goes into cutting my own 2x6 as opposed to buying one from the store. It amazes me that after all the traveling that 2x6 has done and yet it sells for as little as .40cents a bdft. Go figure???

Bring onthe logs!!!!

ljmathias

I mill (so far) exclusively for my own use so there's a selfish satisfaction in finding the best lumber and beams in a given log.  Sure, the art and beauty factor are important but there's a pragmatic aspect that I really find enjoyable: I'm getting better products than I could easily find anywhere else- not that you all couldn't saw better (of that I am certain) but you all don't live close enough to saw for me at the same price I can... 

Let me give you an example of how I'm finally making progress: been catching up some on the Katrina logs I've had setting.  Gotten into some of the big old red oaks, 24-30" in diameter, 14-20' long on my new-to-me LT40 hydraulic.  Loaded one up a few days ago and sliced off the soft and rotten outer layers to expose some still-red-and-beautiful heartwood.  Well, I looked at that cant for a while and finally decided to slice some 1" boards off the sides to remove the last of the punky stuff and use the rest for 4X6 beams for my workshop under construction.  Couldn't believe I actually did this one right, getting the pith exactly centered in the middle of six beautiful beams that fell out of this old log.  I just stood there for a while, admiring how straight and smooth and perfect red-oak-ish they were, then proceeded to the back-breaking job of loading onto the front end loader, moving them to my stack of posts and beams wannabes and getting them stickered and weighted.  What a great feeling to finally do a whole log pretty much the best way I could imagine it (course doesn't take much imagination when you're still learning...).

So I guess there's more than one reason we all fall in love with making sawdust and occasional near-perfect pieces of lumber, but they're all good ones.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

LJ
LT40, Long tractor with FEL and backhoe, lots of TF tools, beautiful wife of 50 years plus 4 kids, 5 grandsons AND TWO GRANDDAUGHTERS all healthy plus too many ideas and plans and not enough time and energy

Bibbyman

I like..

Waking up in the morning stiffer and sorer than when I went to bed the night before.

Being dirty and sawdust covered 80% of the time.

When I think I'm almost getting something done and then the unexpected happens.

Ending the year with enough money to pay the taxes. 

Having at least one new fingernail growing back at all times.

Having a knock on the door or the phone ring every time I set down to eat or enjoy something on TV.

Most of all ... I like being able to provide for my family without going to that gowd-awful office job and be bossed around by idiots.
   
Wood-Mizer LT40HDE25 Super 25hp 3ph with Command Control and Accuset.
Sawing since '94

bandmiller2

It's just in your makeup, like farming or commercial fishing.In our world today its rare to be able produce a finished product from the raw material.
A man armed with common sense is packing a big piece

Cedarman

I am in the pink when sawing cedar.

mburrow

Quote from: Bibbyman on November 21, 2007, 02:11:52 AM
Most of all ... I like being able to provide for my family without going to that gowd-awful office job and be bossed around by idiots.
   


I think Bibbyman hit the nail on the head, for most of the millers in this area.
I tool my first load out yesterday, it made enough to pay my expences. for a start up with a used mill that needed a few repairs I feel I did OK
Mike

musikwerke

For the do-it-yourselfer a mill is just one of those tools you knew you'd find a way to have someday.
John

ely

just a little bit of what everybody before me said. ;D

Tom

I'm not sawing since last October, or so. Not that I don't want to, but some folks get the good genes and some of us get seconds. :D

Sawing to me was many fold.  I love to see a log opened.  There are the different species that produce different colors, there are the growth patterns that differ from log to log, there is the challenge to collect what the log is trying to provide and there is the challenge to provide what the customer wants.

There is a sense of power associated with bucking and ripping a tree.  They are huge and heav things.  Most people are intimidated by them and will hire an entire army to get one out of their backyard.  Some of us, those that stay in the business, slow down and see the rigging possibilities of moving and turning a log safely with less strain than others.  There is a great feeling of accomplishment when you balance a log on a stick and it spins when you touch it with your finger.

The other part of sawing that I think I enjoyed as much, maybe even the best, is meeting the world's fine people.  This business has given me the opportunity to rub shoulders with  great and famous people. Maybe not of the famosity of a F.D. Roosevelt, or  a George Washington, but famous in their own right just the same.   Every little town, county and State has their heroes.

I've met men who were millionaires several times over.  Who wold lose it and gain back.   I've spent weeks with WWII heroes like my friend "Groundhog" who lives on a little island next to the inter-coastal and built his daughter a house when he was in his late seventies.   I've spent time with my old-timers who keep bees, wind motors, turn bowls, repair appliances, still practice their machining trade, build horse drawn wagons and carriages, own and run cattle ranches, care for family timber, build and rebuild tractors, grind cane, make syrup, some make libations as well. 

Then I have the younger heroes who work hard in their businesses, raise families to standards that the rest of the world is losing and will spend time with any one's kids to answer a question rather than sending them down the road making them think they are in the way.  I've seen a slower life-style that allows the dollar to be earned tomorrow if something family oriented comes up today.  I've watched children be given tasks from the time they could walk so that they could be a part of the action.

I've eaten some of the best biscuits ever made and filled myself on fresh vegetables from the garden, cooked with fatback from barn and potroasts from the field prepared by the nicest ladies in the area.  These aren't spic and span, neat freaks who allow you in only one room of the house.  They aren't hurrying family from a meal so that they can go shopping.  They are true homemakers.  Their care is for their family and their visitors.  You will be questioned later about their biscuits and whether they are as good as Mrs. So'n So down the road.   It's important.   

An occupation like sawing trees will open a whole new dimension if you allow it.   It's the kind of life that would allow you to lie down in your grave knowing satisfaction. 

What I miss the most is the people.  Being able to ride down a dirt road in the backwoods of a county in a neighboring state and have someone honk their horn and wave and holler your name as they go by.  To go into a resturant and have the mayor shake your hand only to go to the parking lot and have the local laborers run over and shake your hand too.  There really are good people in this world and sawing has given me the chance to find them.

lmbeachy


Tom: Coulnn't have said it beterr myself, for that matter I couldn't have said it near as good. Tom is right.
hotfoot

Coon

Tom has the truth nailed right on the head.  Sawing and milling is the heart and backbone of our livelyhoods.  It seems to bring a local economy together in ways often unnoticed, keeping the barter trade and such alive in these parts.
Norwood Lumbermate 2000 w/Kohler,
Husqvarna, Stihl and, Jonsereds Saws

thecfarm

Kinda hard to top Tom when it comes to writing.
I saw for own use most of the time and I tell people that.I will saw enough for a dog house.
I just saw so I can build what I need around my house.I have my own trees so the savings is alot.I all ready have all the equipment needed to handle the logs.Time I have but money I do not have.It's a good feeling to look at a buiding that I built from my own land and know how.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

tcsmpsi

I gotta tell you, Tom....hearing you talk about milling in the past tense, even more especially with your eloquent approach to the whole endeavor, is something similar to (what I would imagine, having only given them and not taken them) swallowing a pill for the scours. 


" What makes you mill?"

A, if not the, significant factor of it is, that nothing makes me mill.  I don't have to mill.  It is likely my most free will endeavor of substance.

I have a lot of diverse things I have to do to make a living.  And, though I loosely  weave milling into that fabric, it is intentionally not enough for a dependent source.

Much in the way of cfarm, I have trees to mill.  Initially, I thought I might have to temper my tree cutting to feed the mill, I now find I underestimated the standing stock that I have.  In time, I will have to thin and remove trees beyond my own need of lumber.  I have sold a little here and there, but in the not too distant future I will have larger loads available. 

The vast majority of what I have is SYP.  I do a bit of trading from time to time, milling for oak, cedar, etc.   And, I like doing smaller milling projects for others who are and/or have been intimidated by some of the antics of other mills (millers).

All of that is good.  But, as cfarm noted, taking the wood from the land (with explanation, of course), and shaping into structure on the land from whence it came is a proper gesture which brings honorable satisfaction.

I have a lot of long-term building projects ahead for my own use, and am working the mill to help bring forth the fruition of others' building projects, make a little money and a lot of sawdust, expending a little blood and lot of sweat along the path.   ;D

What more could a feller ask for?   


\\\"In the end, it is a moral question as to whether man applies what he has learned or not.\\\" - C. Jung

Frickman

Good reply Tom.

I'm an at least fifth generation sawmiller, and upteenth generation farmer. It's just what I do. It sure beats having a real job.
If you're not broke down once in a while, you're not working hard enough

I'm not a hillbilly. I'm an "Appalachian American"

Retired  Conventional hand-felling logging operation with cable skidder and forwarder, Frick 01 handset sawmill

Pretend farmer when I have the time

Dave Shepard

I am a lot like Frickman. I grew up here on the farm, which has been in my family five generations. Sawing often goes hand in hand with farming, many farms around here had mills to run in the winter. My grandfather was involved in the forest products industry his entire career. He started with Morbark early on, and also worked for HMC, and then cofounded the Forestall corporation, manufacturing mills. I heard a lot of sawmill stories growing up. ;D My father wanted me to buy a Wood Mizer when I got out of high school, but I had no interest at the time. ::) About six years ago, I got the sawmill bug, and have been trying to get a mill ever since. Last winter I got the chance to run the mill that I run now. A friend of mine, Bud, a very long time WM owner, used to run the mill. Bud and I have had many long sawmill talks over the years, and probably has had much to do with my mill addiction. I can't wait to open up a log and see what is inside. I always try to see how much I can get out of each log, and to make the best use of really crummy logs. I also like to see all of the good lumber that can be made out of logs that other people were just going to push in a burn pile. It doesn't seem to ever get boring.


Dave
Wood-Mizer LT40HDD51-WR Wireless, Kubota L48, Honda Rincon 650, TJ208 G-S, and a 60"LogRite!

WH_Conley

Pretty much what Bibbyman said, especially the "idiot" part.
Bill

Handy Andy

  Tom and Bibby both have a gift for putting into words what the rest of us feel.  My reason to get a mill and saw is kind of hard to explain, but I have a farm, and there is a crick through the farm, and trees grow down there.  Have always enjoyed working with wood, and want to build things for my kids and grandkids. Went into a career of building, and enjoyed the work but not most of the people I worked for, and not some of those I worked with. So when finances were right I retired and just farm. And saw and build things.  Right now I'm excited about getting started on my saw shack, been cleaning up the site, and planning how to do the building.  Jim
My name's Jim, I like wood.

treebucker

QuoteWhat makes me mill?
A gun in my face, or money.  Both work equally well. :D

Opening a log is like opening a book...only the pictures are better.
Last night I lay in bed looking up at the stars in the sky and
I thought to myself, "Where the heck is the ceiling?!" - Anon

Rancher

I mill first off for me. Every log is the same yet every one is different. What I really love to see is the look on the face of someone seeing a log opened for the first time. Like a kid at Christmas. Most guys say"I want one".
If you're honest you don't have to trust your memory.

Tom Sawyer

What everyone else said, plus there is something about hearing the Cat diesel purring that makes the testosterone flow. ;D ;D

medic1289

Tom Sawyer: So what explains my lady's love for milling ??? She has the bug almost as bad as I do!

LeeB

I do believe Tom has missed his true calling. Maybe now that he's not sawing anymore he should pursue a writting carrer. Reading some of the things he has posted over the years always bings me to mind of Samual Clemens.
'98 LT40HDD/Lombardini, Case 580L, Cat D4C, JD 3032 tractor, JD 5410 tractor, Husky 346, 372 and 562XP's. Stihl MS180 and MS361, 1998 and 2006 3/4 Ton 5.9 Cummins 4x4's, 1989 Dodge D100 w/ 318, and a 1966 Chevy C60 w/ dump bed.

woodmills1

I saw my first Woodmizer in action at the forestry show in Springfield mass in 1993 and just new I had to have one.  It was an HD 40 G24 and in 1995 I found one used and bought it

I really can't think of a better way to pay the bills and have a little left for enjoyment.  I used to be the guy who would pick up a pallet to take home and dismantle to see what I could get from it.  Now I move 100 hundreds of thousands of board feet of logs and lumber.  I cut some of the robert frost tree, my wood was used by the winner of the high school woodworkers competition in mass last year, and my lumber has been on tv due to my barrel maker customer.

and there is nothing like opening my wallet at the bank and having a whack of sawdust fall out. :D
James Mills,Lovely wife,collect old tools,vacuuming fool,36 bdft/hr,oak paper cutter,ebonic yooper rapper nauga seller, Blue Ox? its not fast, 2 cat family, LT70,edger, 375 bd ft/hr, we like Bob,free heat,no oil 12 years,big splitter, baked stuffed lobster, still cuttin the logs dere IAM

Tom Sawyer

Quote from: medic1289 on November 22, 2007, 04:55:00 PM
Tom Sawyer: So what explains my lady's love for milling ??? She has the bug almost as bad as I do!

Umm...  Mabye she likes having all those piles of sawdust to clean ??? ??? ???

Nate Surveyor

Quoteand there is nothing like opening my wallet at the bank and having a whack of sawdust fall out. :D


Boy is that true!!

:)

N


PS, um how do I do the inserted quote? OOPS! got it!
I know less than I used to.

pineywoods

Quote from: LeeB on November 22, 2007, 05:27:17 PM
I do believe Tom has missed his true calling. Maybe now that he's not sawing anymore he should pursue a writting carrer. Reading some of the things he has posted over the years always bings me to mind of Samual Clemens.

If you ain't seen Tom's web site, you have missed a lot. I keep going back and re-reading all his stories. Specially the possum sandwich story and the bit about the peas and the wooden spoon..  ;D  priceless
1995 Wood Mizer LT 40, Liquid cooled kawasaki,homebuilt hydraulics. Homebuilt solar dry kiln.  Woodmaster 718 planner, Kubota M4700 with homemade forks and winch, stihl  028, 029, Ms390
100k bd ft club.Charter member of The Grumpy old Men

blueduck

I run my mil for various reasons, but the biggest one is that it continues to teach me patients, yes most of the world is in a race to get-r-did and go recreate somewhere, everyone is in a hurry and they have no idea why, with the sawmill it only saws at a steady pace, completes its cycle in about the same time frame each pass, and at the end of the day I can see an accomplishment of what has taken place that day.

I started out with a mill because the big mills we were hauling in to decided that it was better to take the logs and not pay honest scale, I was hauling on a '58 F-800 and was scaling out about 1500 average [got as high as 2400] but then one spring the scale on the same logs they were happy to see got me 800, 900 and 1100 feet one week when we started back on frosty roads and that was it, I knew i could saw more than that out of those logs and dad and I  went looking for something to use..... visited a cousin-in-law who had a old model G Mighty Mite and a Precision scragg beaver mill [small cedar fencing he cut with it] even hauled over a few cedar logs to watch them go through, well we couldnt afford the 100 grand for the scragg set up so when he told of a Model 127 Mobile dimension that a fella needed to get rid of we went and made our deal..... No one can get a book learnin like that which is offered running a mill, reading a log, decipherin what it has in it, how to cut it for the best yeild, and the desire to make it better than is offered at any lumberyard.....

Tom is right the people Ive met over the years are from all walks of life, of course i met the one president 7 years afore i got the sawmill, and the one that was related to us never did come visit while he was in office [I spect it was Nancy what did not approve of the black sheep in the family her daughter married into, but then i coulda been wrong, and o'course we woulda treated them like any other visitors, they woulda got the clean plates to eat victuals offn] Ive been around those folks who have made millions too, and those who are still working on their first, retired Generals and those who barely made it past basic training all in need of lumber, Ive only met a few folks i never cared to meet again, and they eventualy got convicted somewhere of something [not that i aint ever been on both sides of the written law afore, but not when milling logs at least]

And what other profession cana fella do for 6-9 months out of the year, pay all the bills and go hunting anytime he wants, or fishin when the notion strikes? those folks who dont make a living at milling logs either have not tried it full time or are not in the right market... and i admit that a couple years it was slim and i went and worked other jobs to occupy the timeslot..... and pay the bills, but the mill is payed for and I can work it when i want, and love to see the look on folks faces when they ask where i work and I tell them I am "self-UN-employed" with my portable mill..... I can set isde with my feet in the oven and starve if i want as opposed to having to go out and pay for equipment [yes i am thinking of getting a new mill, but 2 mills will double the payback time as long as I can find a competent person to run one of them and I will have the $70 grand payed off in a years time frame, maybe less]

I understand the markets I have to a large degree, and the custom market is played out for a few years for the most part, the cycle is down and going on the upswing but slow, the large picture is what i like seeing, and if i have to park the mill it beckons me back with promises of not having to talk to anyone while its running, with the smells of different woods and resins, and with the lure of a few more dollars to once again return to the hunting grounds and fishin holes ive found over the years..... besides giving the wife a new pair of boots to shovel sawdust in...... <-----[ok if she reads that i am in trouble]

The reasons to quit just dont outnumber all the reasons to keep going on sawing.

William
Central Idaho
Upon the plains of hesitation bleach the bones of countless millions, who when on the dawn of victory paused to rest, and there resting died.
- John Dretschmer

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