Another wood job

Here is a log ready to cut and the tool we use to move it (peavy or cant hook). I think this log was 14.5′ long.

Cutting the log into lumber is part art, part math and geometry and part luck. You never know what a log will do or even what is inside a log. We have found fence parts, shotgun slugs and nails. Sometimes a log is rotten. This picture shows Gary measuring the cant, or the squared off log, to determine the next cut. We are making 2×8’s out of this one if I remember right. Once the log is squared off, you are ready to make the lumber.

Here is Gary cutting the cant into lumber. Even if you are making 2×8’s, your log has to be larger than 8×8 to make 4 boards. Each cut you make on the log also takes up a part of the wood just from the width of the blade. This is called the kerf. Typically the blade will take 1/4″ with each cut, so you would really have to have a cant of 9×8.25 to make 4 2×8’s.

I keep track of all the board feet we cut, and help remove the lumber from the mill, stack it, throw the slab wood (or what you remove to make the cant or squared off log). Slab wood is shown in the back of the truck in pic #2.

Yesterday we had about 2 more cuts to be done when we had a torrential downpour. So I could not take more pix of the stack we did. We cleaned up in the rain, after having cut in 85 degree temps. There’s nothing more miserable than being covered in sawdust and dirt and then being rained on. Wet sawdust is very sticky.