These will dull a blade and you want even know it.

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

These pics are of Pine boards and I saw a lot of Pine.
I see this from time to time and what looks like to be nails......well, its not.

When you run your blade through these in a cant, you want even know it......but it will sure dull a blade.
It looks like nails and when you look at them close.....they even shine like the head of a nail.......but your metal detector will never pick them up.

These particular objects are small pieces of Quartz Rock. These were yard trees. I sawed 2 butt logs from this yard, hit 7 nails and saw a lot of rock embedded into the lumber.

My guess is the rocks came from a lawn mower throwing pieces of rock when these trees were small.
I went to see these trees before they were sawn down and saw the yard they came from.
I was expecting EXACTLY what I got when I started to mill these 2 butt logs.......nails and rocks.  :D
A lot of you know exactly what I'm talking about.
Just wanted to show these pics to some of you that may not have ever experienced this.



  

 

[rmack]

I guess those would really reign havoc with a planer.

good thing they are easy to see on the surface, I worry about rocks that get stuck to the lumber during handling causing trouble for the guy with the planer/moulder.

[Tim Lea]

Man they do look like a nail in the pics. I have found a rock imbedded in a log but it was a lot bigger. About the size of a marble.

[Dave Shepard]

I found a rock in my slab pile with my chainsaw the other night, does that count? :D

I've never sawed through a rock on the mill. Just metal, and some ceramic insulators.

[Delawhere Jack]

How far up the butt log... Let me re-phrase that. How high off the ground were these rocks when the tree was standing? I find it a little hard to believe that pieces that small would penetrate the bark enough to get embedded, seems it would require them being fired from a shotgun more that hit by a lawnmower.

Any chance that they somehow became imbedded in bug holes?

[scully]

Looks like .22cal bullits I sawed a log that had a bunch . Yeh I'm the one who put em there ....

[Left Coast Chris]

Great pics and reminder.  Maybe cutting the butt log a little higher off the ground would have avoided them?  That way you won't get stoned.  :

[Delawhere Jack]

Sawed 22's before, but they didn't leave any staining in the wood like in the pictures.

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

How far up the butt log... Let me re-phrase that. How high off the ground were these rocks when the tree was standing? I find it a little hard to believe that pieces that small would penetrate the bark enough to get embedded, seems it would require them being fired from a shotgun more that hit by a lawnmower.

Any chance that they somehow became imbedded in bug holes?

Jack.....if you remember, I said "my guess'. The rock were about 3-4- foot up the log. Its not uncommon for rock to get into the bark and the tree continue to keep growing around it until one day......well.....the pics show it.
Member "TEE" saw some of these tiny rocks in pine boards last week when he came by to help me. I saw the yard where these logs came from and how short the homeowner cut his grass/dirt.  :D

[Tee]

      I saw something similar in a piece I was sawing right after I got back from your place. Let me tell you something that crossed my mind not knowing what it is; a small pocket of pure resign that may have formed around some small wound, almost in a "crystallized" form.
      If I run into any more of them I'm going to take the time to get a sharp pointed something and get some out. If you get some out, see if it burns and if so if anything is left such a a piece of rock. I wasn't able to see anything as obvious as your pics show of rock or what ever it was.

[Chuck White]

I've never seen stones "in" the wood, only stuck in the bark!

No choice there, just saw and see what happens!

Good luck if you have a bunch of them.  :

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

      I saw something similar in a piece I was sawing right after I got back from your place. Let me tell you something that crossed my mind not knowing what it is; a small pocket of pure resign that may have formed around some small wound, almost in a "crystallized" form.
      If I run into any more of them I'm going to take the time to get a sharp pointed something and get some out. If you get some out, see if it burns and if so if anything is left such a a piece of rock.

You could be right Tee. I took a piece out today and hit it with the hammer on my anvil......looked that Quartz Rock. But I'm no scientist.
I will try your idea tomorrow and if I keep it on my mind, I have been known to go to the mill in the middle of the night just to cure my curiosity.  :D
What's really curious is the way the tree darkened around it like it is a foreign object like metal.

[WmFritz]

David, them pine boards might be worth more then ya thinks. Sometimes quartz contains gold.

You may wanna sift your sawdust pile for gold-dust.   ;D

[drobertson]

Looks like steel shot, or maybe an asteroid hit?  there is carbon present for sure,   david

[Deese]

Oh my gosh I should have been taking pics of what I've been cutting, as I have some similar stuff that gave me fits...

[Peter Drouin]

Rock salt from a shotgun  :D

[loggah]

Peter ,that would be my guess also! ;D

[JJ]

If it is rock salt, then it should desolve in hot water.

I cut down big dead hemlock in my yard, and find ton of bullets, all different cal.  Some 22, some jacketed high power slugs, and some 44 mag, and steel bb's.

Was done by prev landowner, before houses build up around, who must have used the tree as target from front porch.  Wonder if the copper jackets is what killed the tree?

    JJ

[Brucer]

... I've never sawed through a rock on the mill. ...

Well you can't, so don't bother trying :D.

[stumpjumper83]

From the pic the "rocks" look to be all the same or very similar in size, and uniform in shape.

What is the chance that your dealing with tungsten carbide bird shot?

[Left Coast Chris]

Bird shot would make more sense.  The chances of multiple pieces of rock of about the same size in a single board are almost nill.

[SPIKER]

From the pic the "rocks" look to be all the same or very similar in size, and uniform in shape.

What is the chance that your dealing with tungsten carbide bird shot?

Dont think the saw blade would make it thru any carbide material that is just a few steps below diamond in hardness...

Mark

[Ianab]

Carbide will shatter and break up. But it wont do your saw blade any favours while it's doing it  :D More like mutual destruction  >:(

Ian

[MikeInTexas]

The first sawing job i did on my new Norwood HD36 was on some matt timbers, heavy equipment matts.
They have been down in the dirt, mud, driven on, and were they hard on blades. Good thing i got a sharpener with my saw, going to need it.

Mike

[Magicman]

I will not saw crane/heavy equipment mats.  No way.

Poston's "problem" that started this topic was only pitch/resin pockets.  I have also done a double take after sawing through them but the problem is in looks only.  They are not hard.

[RAYAR]

The OP said it was not detectable with a metal detector. If it's small enough, some detectors will not pick it up and others will.

[Magicman]

Was not metal, it was hardened resin pockets.  Not unusual to find in SYP.

[Woodpecker52]

I use to put old soda bottles found in the woods in the forks of young trees,  found one the other day just the neck sticking out of a tree trunk, someone some day can write about sawing glass on a post in the future.

[Ed_K]

 Wish I had a picture of the rock we put into the crotch of a yellow birch while blasting ledge in the green mountain national forest. It was 2'x2'x3' about 15' up in that tree. We had to take cover in a 60" culvert,broken windshield on two trucks. Boss says I think I put to many sticks in :D.

[Bruno of NH]

We hit some rock hard pitch in a big white pine on Monday. 
It was so hard we had to change the band 8° cobalt
It started diving in the cut.
If I remember right the log had a 8ft scare in the bark that was healed over.

[Magicman]

Here is what a crotch rock will do. 


 
And then you change the blade.  :-\

[Beauty Hardwood]

Many years ago in a mill that I worked at I was cutting some big walnut logs of about 4 feet diameter on a bandsaw with 6 foot band wheels and 12 inch wide band and I hit a jar of nuts and bolts that had been placed in the fork of a branch and had been completely covered over by growth, it tore about a dozen teeth completely off. Another time I hit  bridge spike that had been hammered into a tree as they used to do to tie the horses to. Have also cut through 22 bullets, they show up as shiny spots and don't do damage as they are soft.

[Nomad]

I use to put old soda bottles found in the woods in the forks of young trees,  found one the other day just the neck sticking out of a tree trunk, someone some day can write about sawing glass on a post in the future.

Already did that.  Hit a Pepsi bottle in a Live Oak tree with my Lucas.  Freshly sharpened blade, too.  Did that saw no favors at all.

[tmbrcruiser]

I hit a g white glass insulator that was nailed to the tree. Never made it thru the insulator, blade went dead on contact.

[123maxbars]

thanks for the tip @POSTON WIDEHEAD 
Never thought about that before,