Walnut: to cut or not to cut

[Carpenter]

     I have the opportunity to cut some black walnut.  These logs have been cut for several years and may be fairly hard.   Should I cut them?  And the reason I ask is that the sawyer that they normally take wood to won't cut them.  From the sounds of it he normally cuts cedar, and thinks the walnut will be too hard on his blade.  All I know is that the other sawyer also runs a circle mill, like me.   
     I have not seen the logs, but as long as there is no metal in them, I was thinking I could run one through slow and see what happened.  I suppose on my set up the worst that could happen is that I dull a few teeth and break a shear pin.  I just don't want to do any damage to the blade.  We just had it hammered with all new bits and shanks but I really don't want to go through that again after 500bf. 
     Just wondered if any of you had any thoughts on this?
     Thanks.

[paul case]

my bandmill seems to cut right thru old walnut. the blade may dull a little faster but not much. the worst thing for me was it was a custom job and all the sapwood had rotted off the logs . i probably threw away 200 bdft of sapwood on just a few logs. it would have been good if they woulda brought them when thay were green.pc

[Ron Wenrich]

My guess is that the other sawyer is shy because of metal.  He may see something that you don't. 

I've cut 2 year old hickory on a circle mill.  I also saw old locust.  At this time of the year, the logs dry out faster, and even the white oak that's a month old seems like its really dry. 

That walnut may be dry and dusty, but you shouldn't have too much of a problem with it.  If you want to keep the dust down, wet down your logs before you saw them.  You'll saw a lot nicer.  My saw always works better on a day that has some rain. 

[Bibbyman]

Here are three nice fence posts and one sign post. Got to where I scanned ever nice log that came in as well as any I suspected of metal.

Unless you can trace back to where they came from and be assured they are metal free,  scan them for metal.  Walnut attracts metal for some reason.

We've sawn a lot of dry walnut logs.  A lot depends on if the bark is still on them – even if it falls off in handling.  The ends will be dry and hard.  If they were cut while live two years ago, the insides will still have a lot of moisture.  They may be hard on the side that was up, soft on the underside.  If they were racked in a pile, that would help.









Here is one I missed because the nail was gone.  >:(

[ladylake]

 Is that a insulator, if so I bet that blade looked real nice with no teeth.   Steve

[ely]

taking the bark off if its loose will get rid of alot of dulling sand thats in the bark. hickory and walnut seem to gather more sand than most other wood.

[Autocar]

If the bark is still on them there cut basically like a fresh cut log, and if the bark is off and there is stress cracks from drying out in the sun they still should saw fine except the outer boards won't amount to much because of the cracks.

[Carpenter]

Thanks guys.  I guess I'll look them over real good, and maybe get a metal detector.  I probably should have one anyway.  What would be a good reasonably priced one to go with?   

[campy]

I would not hesitate to cut old walnut.

Something I like to do is to cut walnut that has been rotting for several years.

The sap wood is totally gone and the brown heart wood remains.

The color of those logs is superior to new logs.

There are deeper brown and red tones, hard to explain.

They are hard to come by but well worth the trouble.

[carykong]

I sawed (LT 25 WM) some walnut a few years. The client said the logs had been on the ground for 36 months. Logs were still wet and most of the bark was still on the log. No real problems but did break one bandsaw on a very hard knot. I was rushing a bit. Slower feed and I probably could have saved the blade. Good luck.

[terrifictimbersllc]

I've cut old walnut logs and don't think of them as particularly hard, but most were lying on the ground so they stayed wet.  A few years usually and the wood was very good. Seems the cracks don't go in far from the end or sides.   However it would probably be a different story if the logs were stored up off the ground.