The guy that came out and cut me some lumber had a WOODMIZER mill.It worked great its got a big band saw blade on it.I would like to have one but i think there expensive. good luck

There's a guy listed in our Million Dollar Rolodex that has a woodmizer for hire. If I remember correctly his name is Simon...

http://www.loghomebuilders.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=10

Steve

I think your best bet would be a very good hand router. You will have to have custom bits made probably. But anyway once you get the proper bits to make the cuts on either side of the board, you would have to constantly check the fit and level of cut on both sides. (this will take a long time :cry:

Good luck friend :)

I have looked at many portable saw mills. The big band saws are cool but can be expensive to buy. 15-25K for one that will cut long beams and you need to replace bands daily or more if your logs are dirty. Not cheap. The Logosol looked good but it is made from aluminum which can be hard to fix if you bend it. Take a look on the net at procut portable saw mills. I just built one of these. With a new 3120 Husky saw I am milling timber for under $2500 plus a little welding time. It's worth a look anyway. Bart

To make T&G, I'd use a table saw and dado blade- you can insert spacers in the blade pattern to make the toungue side, and replace the spacers with blade for the groove. IMHO, a router might wobble on the edge of a 2x6 and be a bit more setup and effort..

Hey, guys....

Quick question. How much board feet of t and g are you talking about?

I stained every stick of t and g for our ceiling pretty much single-handedly, and most of it for the second and third floors as well (we stained the first floor in place). For this house, that was THOUSANDS of 14 foot boards, as I recall. And it was time intensive work.

Seems like making your own t and g would only be labor/time feasible if you were using something very mechanized (like maybe a Logosol or one of those automatic deals) or you weren't going to be using a lot of t and g.

Sara :D

PS-- 2/11/05.... I thought that we'd done 2500 t and g boards, but Jeff informed me that it was a bit less than 1500, and that that's considered "hundreds" not "thousands". My mistake. :lol:

It'd be easy enough to do a test to see how fast you can process a board, (both edges) add a handling time and multiply that by the square/linear footage necessary.

If you have lots of "free" time ( or a son or daughter) it might be worthwhile, otherwise you might be better off finding someone with semi automated equipment. Maybe you can give them wood you've cut to work on?

I don't know (seeing as I've never peeked inside), but I suspect, that shapers are much heavier duty and better able to handle 1000's of linear feet of work than even a biggest, badest, router can with less wear and tear.

Get a used one, sell it afterwards. -)

I'm building a Procut mill. I will substitute a vertical shaft
lawn tractor engine and save my nice Stihl for other work.
I have used a Wood Mizer and they are wonderful. Also used
the circular saw mill out of New Zealand. They are fast for
through & through milling, but very slow when cutting for
grade. I wasn't impressed but have talked with another
member who was impressed. You mileage may vary. I'm
thinking the Procut out of Canada might be the best way to
go but I'll know more when the mill is finished in a few months.

A router and table will work but the router needs to be big
and you might need several. The bearing don't last a long
time in that type of hard application. You will need a power
feed (I like Hol-zer) witha router table or shaper so the
cutters will follow the deviation of the lumber.

I used to have a five head mill. This is the ideal tool. It will
cut the cope & profile on the edges and surface the top and
bottom in one pass. The lumber doesn't even need to be real
accurate for tolerance. A high power mill will take an over-
size board and cut to size very quickly. I bought the mill for
$500. Wish I had it back...each cutterhead (then) was about
$1,250!! The mill had to be moved and I was happy to sell it
for what I paid.

-Rick Buchanan

Great Minds Think Alike!!

Eagle sent me the brochure but no price lists. I could not determine the proper method to fasten them either since it looks like they run them from left to right along the roof. Is there a combo of glue and screws ? Is the roof design using purlins running left to right or using skips method of 4x10 rafters going down.

The other question I had is there a loss of structural integrity since you no longer have the matrix of 2xt&G holding the roof on. ?

I'm gonna give making T+G a try. I want to get a Hud-son Oscar 28 bandmill, and try a table saw attachment,

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/product.do?BV_UseBVCookie=Yes&vertical=TOOL&pid=00903214000

with T+G bits,

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/product.do?BV_UseBVCookie=Yes&vertical=TOOL&pid=00923302000

So, anyhow, I figured out that my plans call for just over 5100 s.f. between the floors and roof. Now, I'm starting to think that I'm gonna look for bargain T+G if at all possible. That's A LOT of grooving, even if I choose to make 10 inch wide boards.[/u]

Yea, the thing looks a little scarey, don't it? They sort of "bolt through" both by passing through and "jamming" the bit into the adapter. Yes, it is made for use on a table saw, and the one advantage over a T+G router bit is, this cutter is able to make a wider cut. (I think up to a full inch or more vs. the typical router's 3/4" max) I'm thinking about an offset tongue to deal with the thicker boards, of course, this will require an additional cut to complete the board.

The blades are not carbide though. (sure would be nice, huh?) I'm not sure what to expect for life of the cutters, but if I had to go through a couple sets to get all my wood cut, I could live with that. Sharpening is definitely limited due to the nature of the cut. Sear's old style only used two cutters, so I imagine the change was made to extend the life of the cutters. Also, you only need to set the depth of the cutters so only the "fingers" of the cutting edge will cut wood if your boards are already cut to width. That should save time and wear.

Wow, 4 miles. Yea, I may consider bumping up to 2x8 or even 2x10 to reduce the workload. Personally, I think a wider board looks good up on the cathedral ceilings. (where 3300 s.f of the lumber will be needed) Probably stick to 2x6 on the floors to maximize nailing effectiveness.

I know what you mean by a LOT of sawdust. I build raised panel doors, and there is no end to the piles created. Shame I can't find a use for it like the industries have. Never thought I'd see homes being built out of woodchips. :wink:

We accidentally stumbled upon a mill near us and the guy that runs it is willing to tongue and groove our 2x6 boards for a reasonable price. We cut down our own logs so we plan on using everything we have for lumber and flooring to save money.
So our plan at this point is to hire someone with a portable mill to cut our lumber and 2x6 boards, then we will take the boards to the mill for the tongue and groove.
I priced it all out at one point and it was way cheaper then buying the 2x6 t&g outright.
I will let you all know how the process goes. We should be ready to get our lumber cut within a few weeks.

The logs that we are getting the 2x6 boards from came from the hayman burn area here. We had alot of fires here a couple of years ago and one of them burned over 150k acres.
The trees are totally dry because of this. The bark literally comes off of them and they have a carmelized color effect to them. They are quite beautiful.

WOW, sweet deal. 150,000 acres of kiln dried lumber with "fall off the bone" bark. I'm envious to say the least. Are you aquiring the logs for free? (obviously transporting is a cost)

I've been chewing on this tongue and groove idea for a while now and I have an idea.

Using a spline to connect the boards. There is a rounter bit that cuts a 1/8"-1/4" groove into the side of a board for "T" molding. Its not a typical router bit. It's more like a saw blade mounted sideways with four carbide tips. It cuts faster than the typical bit and doesn't put so much strain on the router. I just received a quote from a local steel supplier for 1/4" by 3/4" wide flat bar: $7.15 for 20 ft. Using a hardwood spline would to but that's a lot of milling. I picked 1/4" flat bar, because that is what came to mind first. 1/8" steel could work just as well. I wouldn't go 1/8" with wood though.

I use splines all the time in my work. If the wrong wood is used the spline will fracture defeating the purpose. Steel or metal will be consistant, strong enough and cheaper than using a wood spline (time and money combined).

The only thing I can think of that might be an isssue is the moisture in the wood causing the steel to rust, than you might get some staining from it bleeding into the wood. A cheap primer coat would fix that though.

Andy