Lumber Yield

[Kent A Bathurst]

[QUOTE=bill tindall;2325064] 12' will be easier to stack, keep straight, and minimize end trimming waste With 8' lumber one winds up with piles of short lengths left over from making stuff like tables, chests of drawers and the like that involve cuttings of 2-4'. Personally I think that 12' lumber is a good compromise between minimizing cutting waste and ease of handling and storage.

[QUOTE]

Agreed. I don't get involved in milling logs, but I do buy QS flitches from trees. 14' is the standard I get.

Cutting short for planned part length would cause me a problem: I don't just hack the boards into pieces - I lay out my parts as the grain dictates, which often isn't "straight" down the board, and almost never starts right at the end of a board.

[Mark Bolton]

The answer to this entire thread is what is the total invested cost. If the land owner is giving the tree away trying to mill the tree in the best way possible encapsulates reasonably getting the tree on the ground and some reasonable milling. The OP never intimated that this tree was gold or that he had any intended use for the yeild.

Sawing long for the hobbiest is a bonehead decision unless he specifically has the ability to move, handle, and store, long lengths. If shorts leave some waste or leaves some material for future endeavors so be it. The tree was free.

I say unless the owner wants to jack around with the possibility of getting a few bucks out of the tree, knock it to the ground the cheapest way possible. Buck it up into whatever makes sense standing at the logs with a tape, and go on.

[Chris Padilla]

Why does he want the tree gone? I realize what we see in the photo is limited but that is a gorgeous little scene of tree and fall foliage colors!

[Mark Bolton]

Why does he want the tree gone? I realize what we see in the photo is limited but that is a gorgeous little scene of tree and fall foliage colors!

My assumption was the land owner knew the OP could make use of a nice tree. Whether it needs to come down or not who knows. Sure looks like an easy lay down and plenty of room for the mill.

[Clay Fails]

Thanks all for the input. Finding a good local sawmill will be the challenge. I will keep you all posted.

[Scott T Smith]

"You will increase yield if you mill the logs in the shortest lengths that you expect to use (or leave them live edge). "

While the lumber yield from the log may be a tiny amount more for this straight trunk, the yield of useful cuttings in the shop will be much poorer for 8' lumber than 12'. 12' will be easier to stack, keep straight, and minimize end trimming waste With 8' lumber one winds up with piles of short lengths left over from making stuff like tables, chests of drawers and the like that involve cuttings of 2-4'. Personally I think that 12' lumber is a good compromise between minimizing cutting waste and ease of handling and storage.

If the person running the mill is experienced the loss from edging is minimal. I would find it aggravating straightening 500 bdft of live edge lumber when it came time to use it. However, if into trendy table tops the live edge may be desirable.

However......my advice to the log owner would be to sell the log to a mill. I can't tell from a picture but you may get $1, to several dollars per bd ft for the logs. If you don't know what you are doing, a fine cherry log is a poor place to learn. Risks- lumber molds, gets worm holes, dries crooked, gets fatal drying stress if kiln dried, no means of getting it dry if not kiln dried, etc. There is a lot to know and worry about.

Advice based on running a hardwood lumber business 30+ years, owning part of a saw mill for a few years and drying and working many thousand bdft of lumber. Others results may differ. If you don't have room to store 12' lumber its advantages are irrelevant.

Bill, I think that we will have to agree to disagree regarding the yield from the log. I am in agreement with the rest of your comments.

Like you, I run a hardwood lumber business and am the owner of two sawmills, a dedicated slabber and two dry kilns. My comments about yield are with respect to milling yield, as opposed to shop yield (I'll leave that to others to debate).

For logs with similar end diameters, I concur with you that log length will not have much impact upon the yield. However, most logs are tapered, and most boards are consistent width, and thus the longer the log, the more waste material is produced due to taper.

Here is a cropped version of the OP's tree photo. I cropped it even with the outside of the bottom of the trunk in order to more clearly exhibit the taper in the log. It appears to me that there is an almost 20% delta between the diameter at the large end versus the diameter below the crotch. Additionally, the log has some curve to it which will also result in reduced yield if the logs are milled longer as compared with shorter.

cherry tree cropped.jpg

I find live edge milling beneficial when working with high value logs. For one thing, it maximizes the yield and in instances of curl the inclusion of the sapwood can enhance the character of the board. Below are some photo's that exhibit this point. In this instance, a 38" large end diameter / 32" small end diameter white oak log was quartersawn, with the slabs from the outside of the log saved due to the extraordinary character. The yield increase from live edging the boards was approximately 15%, which included some rather spectacular spalted curly sapwood.

These live edge boards exhibit extraordinary curl along the outer edges of the board; yet minimal curl towards the portion of the board that was near the center of the log. Had these been milled using a conventional "square up the cant" milling process (as well as trimming out the sapwood), over half of the curly portion would have been lost.

Skirt lumber 1.jpg

Here is a tapered board that was produced from squaring up the can't near the butt flare of the log. Some extraordinarily figured lumber that would otherwise have gone to waste.

IMG_3561.jpg


Typically the log with the most to gain from being shorter is the butt log, as it usually has the greatest amount of taper.

I'm not trying to be argumentative - just elaborating on why I provided my earlier advice.

Regards,

Scott

[Dave Zellers]

I just love this stuff. My dream is to cut a tree down and mill the log and make something useful out of it but I'm starting to doubt it will ever happen.

So I live vicariously as a woodworker through threads like these.

That looks like a beautiful trunk to me. I hope you are able to make this happen. If that were available to me, I would bend over backwards to make it happen.

Of course at 62 it's getting hard for me to just bend over forwards, so I would certainly understand any and all physical and fiscal obstacles that might present themselves.

But I love this discussion and really hope to see a pic of this tree cut and stacked as it dries.

[Clay Fails]

Why does he want the tree gone? I realize what we see in the photo is limited but that is a gorgeous little scene of tree and fall foliage colors!

Fair question, because it is a gorgeous tree. Answer is a combination of:

1. He is a dear family friend and knows I am a woodworker who will make good use of the lumber.
2. I will be making a table for his family with the lumber.
3. His neighbor is a little concerned because, though healthy, the tree is close to his property and he occasionally gets downed limbs in his yard.

The question I'm still trying to figure out is just how much it's going to cost to get it down and milled. With my recent bad experience resawing a nice piece of 8/4 Qsawn WO, I'm inclined to forego kiln drying and let it dry naturally.

[Clay Fails]

I just love this stuff. My dream is to cut a tree down and mill the log and make something useful out of it but I'm starting to doubt it will ever happen.

So I live vicariously as a woodworker through threads like these.

That looks like a beautiful trunk to me. I hope you are able to make this happen. If that were available to me, I would bend over backwards to make it happen.

Of course at 62 it's getting hard for me to just bend over forwards, so I would certainly understand any and all physical and fiscal obstacles that might present themselves.

But I love this discussion and really hope to see a pic of this tree cut and stacked as it dries.

Dave, I'm pretty sure I'll find a way to make this happen, and will try to document the process and post photos. For me this is about the relationship I have with the owner of the tree and his family, and is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Looking forward to building some beautiful furniture from what we have affectionately called "Harry's Cherry"!