So I have the big oak log, now what?!

[Patrick Smith]

Well, after lots of hem-hawing and no out of town sawmill paying my uncle for his oak tree, he's given me the OK to come get it. It is 26' long x over 4' diameter and straight as an arrow. Not many branches were cut off either. He doesn't want it cut into boards on site. I have access to a big flatbed rollback trailer for hauling cars. Any idea how much a 26'x4' diameter oak log weighs? It was cut down last week.

I've already called Woodmizer to get some references for local mills. I REALLY want this thing quarter sawn. I don't mind paying for blades if they hit metal. Am I better off going with a portable Woodmizer-type sawyer or since I can (probably) move this thing around should I take it to a real sawmill? This is my first crack at this. I'm excited about all the wood in that tree though. If anyone has a good sawyer or mill reference in the Akron/Wadsworth area I'm all ears!!

Patrick

[Bruce Walton]

According to http://www.woodweb.com/cgi-bin/calculators/calc.pl the weight is about 21,437 pounds. That was figured as white oak, 48" diameter on each end and 26' long. I get a hernia just thinking about moving it.

[Bruce Walton]

That log should get close to 3,000 board feet of lumber. At least that is according to the woodweb.com site's calculator.

[Malcolm Timbers]

I picked up a 42" diameter red oak with my 3/4" truck after ripping it up with a 98cc Husky chain saw into cants. If you are going to quarter saw it you will probably have to cut it through the middle into quarters. Wedging it up on the saw to get true quarter sawn boards off it will take a lot of time, so be prepared to pay a lot of bucks for saw time.

The best wood come from large trees, but they are such a pain to handle a lot of sawyers ship them off to the firewood lot.

[Patrick Smith]

I think my brother in law has the same Husqy saw. How long did it take to rip a log on quarters? I can only imagine how it felt. Your arms must be huge. I don't think I could do that...

I'm committed to this log - I really need the wood and it's from a relative who forego selling it to a mill himself... If you don't mind sharing how much did it cost to get your cants qtr sawn?

One last thing, there's an antique sawmill close at Hale Farm and Village that I might be able to take this thing to. It's an old circular mill though and I don't know if they can qtr saw. Although I did just talk to my uncle and he is willing to let the logs be sawn up in his driveway, he just wants the logs pulled off his grass onto the drive. Nice guy!

Advice? Have a sawyer come out vs. trucking the logs to a mill...?

Patrick

[Malcolm Timbers]

I didn't have the log quarter sawn. I had a different log quarter sawn and made the mistake of trying to split it into quarters. As it turned out the log had a lot of twist in it, so I lost a lot of otherwise good wood because the resulting split out quarters were twisted. However, the lumber sawn from the log did not twist upon drying.

I did not saw the big red into quarters. I sawed it into cants, which are squared off beams of sorts. I drew a line down each side and used a 42" bar to cut down from top to bottom through the sides of each end. Then I got atop the log and cut between the two end cuts. Then I flipped the log onto its side and cut the other barky sides off. Then I cut it through the middle to arrive at two cants that were 27" wide by ten feet long.

I had cut shorter sections that I hauled in a U-Haul and cut into slabs but that turned out to be a mistake there were too many cracks in the centre of the log.

I made an "A" frame out of deck lumber to hold a chain hoist so I could pick up the logs. It was wide enough to back a U-Haul trailer under it and set the log onto the trailer.

I also have another larger "A" frame here where I drive the truck under to pick up logs off a trailer or out of the truck. The "A" frame has a set of small wheels on one end, so I can pick up the other end and push-pull it around the yard. I have another "A" frame with track and a trolley that is 24' long that I use to pick up logs and pile them and then load them on a portable sawmill. I don't own a sawmill, but when the guy comes here, he drives under the bridge crane and we never use his loading forks except to stack heavy plank on it rather than carry them off the mill. Some of those planks weigh 150 lbs. Then I use the crane to pick up the whole pile and put it either on a pile or on a lumber cart.