Woodworking - "mill" my own boards?

[czechsonofagun]

I did quite a lotof alaskan milling with a small chainsaw - 50cc - and it was hard work and took a long time. If you want to use the wood, find a mill to do it for you.

In the worse case you could split it in two halves - lengthwise - and take it to the mill like that.

I even heard of people splitting the log with black powder to get managable pieces.

 

[forgeblast]

I even heard of people splitting the log with black powder to get managable pieces...
wow you may need to with the black locust....

 

[czechsonofagun]

Somebody posted it on milling email conference while ago. Chainsaw plunged in the log in a line, making pockets radial to the center of the log,filling it with bp and the result was a log split in half.

Don't try it at home, I am sure that guy had some experience with it.

 

[dooleysm]

Take it to a mill if you want it done. The ones around here are hurting for business and are priced appropriately. I just paid $.30/bdf to get some pine, cherry, ash, and maple milled. It came stacked, stickered, bound, and loaded on my flatbed for that price. I've got it sitting in a barn drying right now.

 

[20 20]

There's a reason black locust is not a favourable wood for woodworking. When it is green it is "hard as the hinges" to work with. When it dries it is "harder than the hinges" to work with! Although it has great colour it is a very difficult wood to work with. Also you want it to dry and unless you have a kiln air drying(stickered wood) takes a year per inch(thickness) to dry properly.

Hope this helps...

Black locust is a great wood for outdoor use{if not the best} so is cedar. They call black locust the 75yr wood compared to treated at 20-30yr. Some ole timers will say put a rock on the post{black locust} when it starts to crumble then it's time to change the post.
I do agree about it being hard, I have seen sparks fly off the chain{on chainsaw} while cutting into very dry locust. Much better if it can be cut while green then let to dry.

 

[20 20]

Bill,

My good buddy has been harvesting locust for "projects" and I keep telling him about the challenge to work it. He is adamant to use the stuff. Most of the logs have been sitting for 10+ months. We will A: see if the mill can saw them, B: see if he can wok with the stuff or C: (which I like) firewood for the next 2-4 years. 1st photo shows a bunch of jack pine, second photo show pile of locust to the right in image.

I wish I had those locust logs, I have worked with them for building pole barns. They are harder but WELL worth the effort IMO in the long run. My problem was that I got a hold of some trees that at one time had fencing nailed to them. To make a long story short nails and metal are way tougher on a mill/chainsaw then any black locust I've cut into