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Milling lumberand and mopane


Elizabeth Gazmuri

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I have always enjoyed the good fortune of having Pete Boorum (smallerthanlife.com) or Steve Goode (shgoode.com) mill my lumber for me here in the U.S. I like giving them my business. BUT there comes a time when I should mill some of my own lumber, or at really least know how . My question to the forum is can experts please discuss their process. I have 2"x2"x24" turning blanks to start.

 

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I do a lot from little logs so you are already past that part. I use the re-saw fence on my band saw. I also have a real nice re-saw blade custom made from Highland Woodworking called the Wood Slicer. I have a lot of posts on my blog   http://miraclechicken.blogspot.com/  various jigs I made and pictures and descriptions.

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Like Linda I use a band saw with a re-saw fence and then a thickness sander to get it perfectly smooth and to my final desired thickness. The mopani is really hard and brittle so make sure your blades are sharp.

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Hi Elizabeth,

 

If I understand, I think you purchased 2" x 2" x 24" board for turning, but you want to cut it to dimensional lumber for a furniture project.    So if I wanted to get 1/16" thickness of lumber, I would saw the 2" board with the table saw, less sanding or planning then using a band saw.  I would give this 2" board to Dear Hubby to cut for me.  I'm not tall enough to cut lumber on his table saw.  I'm reaching across the blade when I get to the end of that 24" board.  If I had to cut the lumber on a table saw, I would buy a wider board, like 6" x 2" x 24".  I want my hands farther from the blade - but that is just me.  I have a nice portable Worksite Skil table saw, much shorter bed before the blade, that I do use on occasion, but if DH is around, he is slicing my wood.  Admittedly, left to my own devices in the shop, using the band saw and resawing, I'm infinitely more comfortable, but then I have to plane it, and our life size planer requires a backer board to get to 1/16" dimension or less, and it is all very time consuming, so I also purchase wood from Steve and Pete.  In my opinion, a table saw is much more precise - but it doesn't do me any good to have the equipment if I'm not going to use it.

 

Thanks Linda for the tip about this resaw blade, I will check this out.

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I just recently got a band saw, so I'm no expert, but the table saw converts way too much wood to saw dust with its wide kerf.  I flatten one side of the wood   with a cutter on my mill, then put that side of the blank against the fence on the band saw.  Then I follow up with the thickness sander.  I'm still learning, so l'll be watching this thread.  :-)

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With a 3/32" thick rip blade and a vacuum fence I get just as good yield with a table saw than with a band saw.  Cutting 4/4 lumber up to 5" wide half way and flipping the piece usually gets me more strips than I can with the bandsaw.  (The band saw blade leaves a 1/16" kerf but the cut is always a little wavy.)  My 14" Delta bandsaw is not ideal for this purpose and I do not have one of those premium blades that the folk who make the sting inlay use.  I also have much better dust collection on the table saw. Changing and storing bandsaw blades is a pain and a 3/4" re-saw blade is not good for general work.  With care you can get a yield of 5 strips of 1/16" from 4/4.

 

A couple of tips:

 

Planing some lumber under 1/4" thick can result in picking grain which severely reduces yield even if you are careful to feed with the grain.  This is especially true with quarter sawn cherry.

 

80 grit is the finest belt I use to reduce thickness.  Then I go to 150 to just smooth the finish and complete the job with a Festool random orbital connected to a dust collector with 180 and 240 grit disks.

 

Make sure to leave any lumber that you plan to re-saw in the shop environment.  This is especially necessary for flat sawn lumber which has have a tendency to cup.  Working in narrower pieces when you can is less problematic.

 

Some exotics like African black wood fill up belts on the thickness sander quickly.  Be very careful and take very light cuts to save the belts if you need to thickness sand exotic wood.

 

The vacuum fence eliminates kickback and the need to work over the blade if you use a push stick.  It also keeps the strip from being damages from the up cutting side of the circular blade.

 

This method has worked down to 1/64"

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My husband had to explain 4/4 lumber to me tonite, and this has been quite the comical discussion on my part.  For those of us who haven't been in lumber world for the last 30 years that 4/4 lumber is a board that is 1" thick.  I had no idea what 4/4 lumber was, still makes me laugh after a day at the office.  Referencing Pete's post about "picking grain", our Planer leaves dips at the end of the board, if I am not diligent in pulling the board through at the end, the rollers keep the wood moving through the length of the board, until the end, and as I am mesmerized by seeing the grain appear in the board, I don't always keep the board moving at the same rate, which results in a dip.  I need to alter the machine in some way, or accept that I'm susceptible to a dip, when I'm not paying attention. 

 

Deborah B (Netherlands) also mentioned dust collector in her workshop revision.  Very important, especially if working with woods that you could have allergies too.  Our dust collector is very important for the planer and table saw and lathe.  I just vacuum my band saw with the shop vac.  I don't think dust collecting setup is as important for my mini tools, but when you are using life size tools we have that set up in the woodshop. 

 

Tamra/Indiana

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  • 4 weeks later...

I would say because I use both tools listed above, that how much you are paying for wood is the biggest consideration, my table saw

has at times more waste than usable product, depending on the scale of desired lumber.

The ban saw is by far the safer of the two, and offers no wood burning, but depending on the type of lumber, antique wood requires planing, or sanding.

The table saw will make an infinite amount of identical pieces, that require little sanding and no planing.

I personally can not stress enough safety, so finger boards and a pusher is a must for that table saw, it bites back.

Good luck with your new skill

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