customchris Posted September 22, 2013 Share Posted September 22, 2013 Thought I would Post up this in case anyone was wanting to build a sawmill and needed a something to start with.. I done these myself with just a simple 3d program! I myself am going to build this here soon for my dad ..He was going to pay 6500 for one but I told him I could build one for around 2500 and be a lot stronger than those cheap high priced knock offs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigfootnampa Posted September 22, 2013 Share Posted September 22, 2013 Maybe so but who is knocking off whom here?!? Also your figures must be for parts only... is your time free? $6,500 seems very reasonable to me and you get a product with established performance! How will you flip the logs? Do you have a plan for dogging the logs? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swedefiddle Posted September 22, 2013 Share Posted September 22, 2013 Nothing against building your own sawmill, many have done it (been there done that). It sometimes is cheaper to purchase a saw that someone already has figured out, than rebuild the mistakes or updates a bunch of times. Around here there are a few portable mills, save up your logs, call in the mill. One day, job done, finished, no maintenance or storage problems. Mobile Dimension Sawmills run a 40" main blade, with one or two edger blades. Curf of the blade is more than a Bandsaw Mill, but it is more robust. Neil Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customchris Posted September 23, 2013 Author Share Posted September 23, 2013 Maybe so but who is knocking off whom here?!? Also your figures must be for parts only... is your time free? $6,500 seems very reasonable to me and you get a product with established performance! How will you flip the logs? Do you have a plan for dogging the logs? 6500 is for the cheap ones no log turning nothing but rails, saw head and non portable. When you build stuff for yourself you time is all ways free.. 2500 is portable , thick steel, all new parts and with 24ft rails the cheap ones have 10-14ft rails thin steel and you have to put them on a trailer to move them so add 1500 -2500 for a trailer.. Also the ppl making them to sell are clearing at least $3000 off the buyer thats insane .. I have done a lot of research on this I mean a lot so I am not going into this blind .. Also I build custom frames and body parts for trucks so I can work steel ... also most of the so called dealers are not established and have no history of selling these things ..they are easy to build and ppl will pay alot for them .. Kinda like you said you think that they are good ones just because they have sold a few.. Now northern tool sells some that I would buy just because they have sold that same brand mill for years Did not start this thread to make ppl mad thought it mite help someone ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaughnT Posted September 23, 2013 Share Posted September 23, 2013 My dad actually has one of these in the works. Right now we're in the collection of parts phase, but the plans he bought from this guy are incredibly detailed and it looks very robust. As you noted, reputation is important and this guy's got a very solid rep with folks that have built off of his plans. Made me feel a lot better about the project! How are you going to handle warping of the rails when you weld the cross-members in place? What's adjusting your elevation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customchris Posted September 23, 2013 Author Share Posted September 23, 2013 well the steel for the rails will be 1/4 inch thick so warping will not be a problem ... that is using a mig welder .. stick mite warp it unsure never used a stick welder.. and for the elevation going with a wench and cables to control that .. would like to use a long threaded rod on each side with a sprocket on top of each with and chain to connect them both.. then use the wench motor to turn that to raise and lower.. I have not started on it yet so not sure what would be the easy way! ... Post up the link to the plans so I can check it out Also the cross members do not have to be fully welded they will only hold up the logs. The weight spread out over 4 to 5 cross members will not be enough to brake the welds if the cross member is not fully welded also make shure that the side beams are level from end to end and supported thru out the middle to help with warping .. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Gaddis Posted September 23, 2013 Share Posted September 23, 2013 I forecast some hard learned lessons to be learned in the future...from this project.Carry on Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted September 23, 2013 Share Posted September 23, 2013 Aren't those some of the best, David? If he is stubborn enough to fit in here. by the time he gets her built, he will know what works, and what doesn't, as well as having a fine (and hopefully safe) mill. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customchris Posted September 23, 2013 Author Share Posted September 23, 2013 Thats what some ppl don't understand the joy of building it your self and not just buying ... that's what is wrong with the world there are not meany tinkers left .. everyone is a custom to buying everything and not trying to build stuff .. its a shame really Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted September 23, 2013 Share Posted September 23, 2013 I'd say there are a few thousand tinkerers on IFI. We all get in over our heads some time. You aren't the first person to build a mill, won't be the last. I'm interested in seing what you come up with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customchris Posted September 24, 2013 Author Share Posted September 24, 2013 got a new idea off a video for the raising and lowering of the saw head Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSW Posted September 24, 2013 Share Posted September 24, 2013 When you build stuff for yourself you time is all ways free.. I'm not sure I quite agree with that statement. Your time is worth something. I also know guys regularly under price materials from experience. Keep this in mind. If it takes you 100 hours to build and fabricate this, and you make $25 per hour, that's another $2500 you'd have to put towards this. That time adds up fast. If you are choosing to do this for "fun" then you are still paying yourself. I'm also betting consumables like gas, wire, grinding disks and so on probably aren't accounted for as well as they probably should be. Even if you have them on hand and use them, it will cost to replace them. Blow up your machine, cook a grinder, trash a blade for your saw that you didn't expect, and the cost escalates pretty quick. well the steel for the rails will be 1/4 inch thick so warping will not be a problem ... that is using a mig welder .. stick mite warp it unsure never used a stick welder.. cross member is not fully welded also make shure that the side beams are level from end to end and supported thru out the middle to help with warping .. Don't bet on that. Steel almost always warps. managing to control or limit warpage is part that separates those that can weld, from those that can't. I can very easily warp 1/4" steel with my "little" 200 amp mig and not even have it maxed out. If you aren't getting it hot enough where warpage might be an issue, I'd be worried that you aren't getting decent penetration into the base material. A 180 to 200 amp mig would be the minimum I'd use for this job, and given a choice, I'd go even bigger to lay down material faster and cut production time. The 180 amp class mig would be borderline at best on a job like this and you'd really have to watch your duty cycle with the power cranked up to get decent welds. Small underpowered migs like the little 110v machines are notorious for making "pretty" welds on thicker material that really won't hold things together well. Don't bet on not welding the cross members fully either. Keep in mind that while they may not support that much weight while it's just laying there, you also have to think about how you are going to load these logs. Most logs worth milling are pretty decent in size, and you don't just toss them up by hand. Drop a log off the forks of a machine, and you can have a couple of things happen. 1st is may not hit level. That means all the weight may be on only one cross member right at 1st untill the rest of the log crashes down. 2nd you have to remember the shock value of a moving object. I can easily support my 20 lb sledge on a piece of glass, but drop it from any height and it will break. Steel is tougher than glass, but shock loads will still tear things apart. Thats what some ppl don't understand the joy of building it your self and not just buying ... that's what is wrong with the world there are not meany tinkers left .. everyone is a custom to buying everything and not trying to build stuff .. its a shame really Not really. I'm not knocking you, but I'm betting the "free" work is sort of stuff mentioned at the beginning is what David and Charles are referring to. It's a fairly typical mindset for newer guys or ones who don't work with their hands for a living. I'm also betting that you may learn this the hard way like I'm betting those guys did at one point or another. I can do a lot of different things, but many times it's smarter to have someone else do the work than do it myself. I may not have the equipment to do the job, or I may not have the experience to make this either cost effective or done correctly. It makes sense for me to play to my strengths and let others play to theirs. If you are doing this because you have a newer better way to do it, then that may be a different story. If you are doing this because you want the enjoyment of working with your hands, that's also something a bit different. In that case you are paying yourself for the pleasure of doing the work. By doing so you take time away from other things, making a living, doing yard work you need to pay someone else to do, even just plunking your but in front of the TV and watching football and relaxing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
notownkid Posted September 24, 2013 Share Posted September 24, 2013 My father always said "It costs money to go to school" I'm sure you all have been "Educated" this way a time or two, so let the guy do his thing and be happy he has the ability to Build Something he can use instead of Purchasing everything like the majority of the helpless people today. Go for it CC don't worry about a few negative folks. Enjoy it when it's done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customchris Posted September 25, 2013 Author Share Posted September 25, 2013 wow your right notownkid there are a few negative folks on here ... I have worked with my hands every since i cut firewood with my dad at 14 and i am 30 now.. As i stated before I do this for a living. Making a truck frame for scratch is not child's play.. no one is the best at anything only really dumb ppl think that you can not learn anything from doing... this is turning into a Flame War on the internet .. maybe this site is not what I thought it was.. seems like ppl are quick to tell why you should not and that you are doing it wrong... thought this was a site of good ppl that beleved in helping one another .. maybe thats just a old fasion way of thinking .. I am just a good old country boy and that was the way I was raised... Not to worry I will not be posting anymore on this site.. I will just come and look at the nice stuff ppl make. I would charge my self for my time but I would never get paid HA! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
forgemaster Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 I say go for it, if it doesn't work, then you have the experience to not make the same mistake again. You don't know until you try. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSW Posted September 25, 2013 Share Posted September 25, 2013 I don't see anyone who's being negative and I certainly don't see any sort of flaming. I made several comments on what you said and denoted why you might have problems and tried to explain where we are coming from. Myself and others have given you suggestions based on hard won experience, to help you avoid having to learn the same lessons over again. Sorry if some of us older guys aren't PC. I won't tell you you are doing a good job if you aren't, just to make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. My critiques tend to be blunt and straight forward. I also won't be abusive, call you names , insult your intelligence or scream at you like a drill sergeant. Like anything else in life, you need to weigh the positives and negatives and make a choice. It won't matter to me one way or another which way you choose to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaughnT Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 (edited) DSW's on the mark with some good sound points that need to be considered. My dad's a do-it-yourself type, even when that means buying $100 worth of tools to fix a problem rather than pay a pro to come in and do it for $75. His shop is full of once-used tools that he'll never get rid of, and he can never find the tools that he does need because of all the other stuff. Pointing out flaws in the logic/plan isn't being negative. The shock load on a weld, for example, could crash the entire rig with the first log put on it. That's bad. CC, don't run off. We're very keen on seeing how this progresses. I'm hunting for a link to those plans... but I can say that the use of acme-threaded rod was one of the key features that we liked about it. Cables and pulleys would stretch and flex too much for an accurate or level cut. With a DRO attached, we will be able to theoretically adjust height .001" at a time because the two sides are on chain-driven screws. Found a link to his video. The 1st Gen sawmill used cables and pulleys for the elevation change, but his 2nd Gen mill went to the acme rods. Very robust build! Edited September 26, 2013 by VaughnT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customchris Posted September 26, 2013 Author Share Posted September 26, 2013 this video inspired the Acme rods plan that i made thinking buy this guys plans on ebay for $35 he says it 1gb of data on the build .. seems to be a good place to start.. I am a person that like your dad. I like to DIY everything and thats gives me more that just the product at the end.. it gives skills that will help me latter on in life .. I understand that there will be problems in the build that i will have to work around those and that's fine with me .. My mind set it that is half the fun building it.. Did not mean to overreact to the post just seems ppl was telling me that it was not worth my time to build it.. that I just needed to go pay someone for a new one that was not as robust... and you guys talk of the welds not holding up to the impact ..How do you explain the $6500 ones that have thin metal. how would they hold up and my 6X2X1/4 tubes would fail with the dropping of logs on it. Also all the videos and ppl that I talk to say that you roll the logs up onto the mill or set them down on there... As was said most logs wroth sawing will be large and using forks wood not be safe way of moving I would not think anyway.. All the logs I will be sawing will be rolled or placed with the back end of a backhoe with chains .. Anyway anyone wanting to build on should watch this guys video ^^^^^^^ he makes a nice strong mill ex. the engine is a little small for my taste I will be taking pics of the build as it gets built as long as I don't get ppl saying I am doing this or that wrong then I will post up the pic If you guys want.. I am not says that you can't give suggestions that are helpful. Thanks for all the comments .. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSW Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 Expanded metal works because there are more places welded and it can spread the load over more area. When I see issues on trailer ramps with expanded metal. it's almost always because the trailer company cheaped out and didn't weld the expanded metal more. You can get away with a few short 1" welds here and there if all that goes on it is a small walk behind mower. Drive a 1500 lb + zero turn on it at speed a few dozen times and the few strands of expanded mesh that are welded start to tear away while the rest gets bent all out of shape. You could support those logs with a simple canvas cover, but as soon as it tears, the whole thing will unzipper. The large surface are spreads out the load so no one area gets too much. A soon as you start getting concentrated loads, or the loads start to combine due to damage, the thing fails. I'd probably go the same way you though, with bars vs exp mesh. Irregular shapes on the truck are probably more easily accommodated with open areas vs a "solid" sheet. Expanded mesh is also a real pain to cut unless you have a shear or a carbide metal cutting circular saw.. You burn up a lot of zip wheels and even cutting it with plasma is often somewhat of a pain. I've cut quite a bit of exp metal mesh to fix trailers and build screens for work trucks and so on. It's not a material I look forward to working with given a choice. I'd also agree with the use of ACME rod. It works much better than standard threaded rod and is worth "hunting" for. MSC. Graingers, Mc Master Carr all carry it and you can get it or order it at most commercial steel yards. Trust me it's taken me a long time to try and break myself of the buy every tool and build everything myself habit, and I'm still working on it, so I understand exactly WHY you want to do this yourself. 65%+ of my house is filled with my tools both for my hobbies as well as for my business. I can usually produce just about any tool to do any job within reason, and often beyond reason... What it's taken me so long to understand is that many times it costs me MORE in the long run, even though it looks like the better way to go about it. I've learned that in some cases it makes more sense to pay someone else to do the job so it gets done faster and better and I can concentrate on other things that I'm better at. I'm not saying don't do this, just understand that it may not be as simple as it seems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 Not negative at all. I really think you have to like to do things the hard way to fit in here. I said it once ill say it again, were blacksmiths, if we wanted to do it the easy way, we'd be potters. You will have more time and materials typed up than you first thaught, that's just a given, you'll grind out and re do things, you'll scrap ideas and redesign, just the way it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted September 26, 2013 Share Posted September 26, 2013 Part of this gets down to "we all have a limited amount of time in life and so you gotta choose how you want to spend it". Some smiths want to make all their own tongs; me I've been smithing over 32 years and I prefer to buy $5 tongs and spend the time making things like historical recreation items and pattern welded blades. One is NOT better than another; just folks have made different choices. (We often want to think that *our* choices are superior to to other peoples' choices; but usually they are just "different") Now we do tend to dogpile on folks who seem to be making a choice without all the information; some of this is just due to them not posting all the information they have, some due to having made similar un-informed choices in our past; some we just worry about folks---I highly recommend *NOT* juggling running, flaming, chainsaws blindfolded---it tends to mess up the temper on the chains! HOWEVER we generally hold the right of the individual to go to "he double hockey sticks" in their own way. So extract good information; thank folks for their warm concern, think about stuff folk have posted and go your own way! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaughnT Posted September 27, 2013 Share Posted September 27, 2013 CC, get the plans off ebay. They are incredibly detailed and explain the build from a to z. I really doubt that you could come up with something better! Seriously, the guy's got to be some kind of engineer to have come up with such crisp, clear plans. Gobs and gobs of stuff to go through, and the experience to have worked the bugs out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted September 27, 2013 Share Posted September 27, 2013 CC: What the flames? Is there something wrong with people pointing out possible mistakes before you make them? I don't know about you but I much prefer to learn from other's mistakes rather than have to make and analyze my own. We're blacksmiths, we live for tinkering with things, we're always figuring out how to make things you could just hit the hardware store for. Preferring diy isn't any big deal here. Most of us toss out ideas to brainstorm with the gang HOPING someone will point out mistakes or a better way to do it. Frosty The Lucky. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
azmike Posted October 11, 2013 Share Posted October 11, 2013 CC--i don't really see any flaming----you presented a project that you were undertaking and others provided feedback----they didn't know that much about you or your particular talents---they did know that some have tried and failed doing what you plan on doing and were just trying to point out the "potholes" that are on the road......... "The hard things take awhile---the impossible, just a little longer" keep us posted and lets see that puppy makin sawdust. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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