Milling!

buzz buzz!

 Well as the old saying goes 'Its an ill wind that blows no one any good'. A big Sycamore blew down near my Father-in-laws and the farmer who owns the land lets him clear up fallen wood for firewood. Thankfully he thought of me before sawing it all up in short lengths for the fire. I helped him get the wood and and got my 'share' in the form of several 14-18" wide 4 foot long sections and a few smaller pieces to play with too.
 Then came the problem of how to process such large and heavy lumps of wood efficiently to dry. Chainsaw mills are ridiculously expensive for what is after all a few bits of straight metal, so I thought a home made one was the way forward. Now I am no metal worker but luckily for me my best mate Andrew 'Burger' Burton is a dab hand with the stuff! I drew up the plan and worked out the sizes, Burger brought some old box section he had and between us we knocked up a mill frame yesterday afternoon. The 'fun' was in trying to get everything perfectly square, this was even more important as the frame only clamps at one end of the bar and so has to be perfect to get square. even thickness slabs.
 The picture shows the first log being cut using the mill, my 20" bar Ryobi (cheap and nasty) chainsaw is clamped in and I'm pleased to say  it all works perfectly
 I know I'm not wearing the proper safety gear in the pic (a bit naughty but it was just a quick test run on one of the thinner logs) and would advise anyone using a chainsaw to use proper equipment at all times.