Maple in Middletown

On Saturday, I made a call on Justin and Tisha in Middletown.  They had a large maple tree taken down in their front yard recently, and didn't want to see all that good wood end up as firewood.

The arborists left them with two large irregularly shaped trunk sections in their front yard, and three smaller pieces along-side their driveway in back. 

The trunk sections were only about 6' long, but they were 36" or more in at least one cross-section.

Since they were not even close to being round, they could not be rolled even with my biggest cant hook, so I used the clamp to pull them onto the loading arms. But getting them loaded was only the first of the challenges.  Getting a big log down to a manageable size requires a lot of turning while whittling away at the outside.  Somewhat counter intuitively, short logs can be harder to turn than longer ones, and the lumpiness of the logs certainly didn't help matters.  The chainsaws were put to use several times, trimming away sections of the logs to allow the saw head to complete a cut.

Though it was a lot of work, we did prevail in the end, and made a nice stack of 1" and 2" boards.  Unfortunately, milling the two trunk sections took until rather late in the day, so a return trip will be needed to take care of the smaller logs.

Pine in Shelton

The customer I had lined up for this past weekend canceled late in the week.  I contacted several people on my wait-list, but all had other plans.  This was somewhat disappointing, but there's no shortage of chores to do around the homestead.  So, on Saturday afternoon I found myself up the driveway with my tractor burying a couple of boulders that had been poking up and threatening the undercarriages of all passing vehicles.  When I got back to the house, there was a message from Win in Shelton.

Win had had some large pine trees taken down and wanted to know about the possibility of turning the logs into lumber.  I called him back, and we discussed the broad outlines of the proposition.  I told him that due to the cancellation, I could come to Shelton the next day.  I explained that otherwise I wouldn't be able to get to him until sometime in November.  Win said that he would get back to me soon, and sure enough called back a short time later to say that he and his wife would like me to come visit them the next day.

Although I had my doubts once or twice, my GPS led me unerringly to Win's driveway only a few minutes after 9:00 AM.

Win had a nice stack of pine logs piled up.  Unfortunately, space was a little tight, and I wasn't able to get the mill positioned directly in front of the pile.  So instead we set the mill up at 90 degrees, and Win was able to spin the logs and push them onto the mill's loading arms with his small tractor.  Most of the logs were big enough that they would have been difficult to reposition by hand.

A short time after arriving on site, we started turning logs into lumber.  Win and Patty mostly wanted 2 1/2" thick boards that would eventually be used in one capacity or another in their soon-to-be summer kitchen.  They were both above average off-bearers, who quickly learned how to take slabs and boards away without slowing me down.

We finished up at around 5:00 PM, with 7 billable hours of milling time, having worked our way through 10 logs that scaled out at 1,775 board feet. That works out to just over 250 board feet per hour, which is pretty good productivity, especially considering that we hit metal a couple of times.

Sawmill Demo at the Farmers Market

On Sunday I gave a sawmill demonstration at the Coventry Regional Farmers Market, which runs from 11:00 am until 2:00 pm every Sunday, spring, summer, and fall, and is reputed to be the most popular farmers market in the state. It's very well run.  It started out as a small scale event, but has been growing steadily over the years, and now draws pretty big crowds.  The atmosphere is like a small agricultural fair, without the cotton candy.  A few years ago they arranged to move the market to the grounds of the Nathan Hale Homestead here in town, which gives them room to handle the crowds, and to hold special events, like a sawmill demonstration.

We set up in the 'Holy Grove', a parcel near South Street that's away from the farmer's booths.  My brother-in-law, Kevin helped as off-bearer, while my wife, Kim, and Ed, a friend visiting for the holiday weekend, helped by handing out pamphlets and answering questions. 

I brought four 8' red oak logs to demonstrate with during the 3 hours that the market is open.  These produced a nice stack of lumber by the end of the day.

Lots of people stopped to watch, many asked questions, and more than a few said they would be getting in touch to schedule the mill for a visit to their logs.

We had put down tarps to collect most of the sawdust.  To clean up, we scooped it into 30 gallon paper 'lawn and leaf' bags.  It took me three trips to get everything back home in my pickup truck.

All in all, time well spent from my perspective, and the market organizers have already asked me to come back next year