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Anybody on here used a chain saw mill?

J

Jason S.

Well-known Member
I was thinking about building one as I have a lot of trees that are down on my property and I don't have the thousands of dollars to invest in a bandsaw mill, so I wondered if anybody on here had used one or built one and what their experience was? Thank you.
 
I can not tell you I have ever tried one but I CAN tell you I have see a lot of folks waste a lot of money on the things trying to make boards. Looks good in the videos but in real world just most just find it more work than they want .
 
Back in the 70's I was working on chainsaws when a wood cutting craze hit here. (Oil prices)

A few people tried them. Takes a BIG saw, lots of power to rip a wide kerf through all that wood. And a strong person to do the pushing. And it's SLOW.

I think you would still be better off shopping for a used bandsaw.
 
I have never used one. Worked with a man who was using one to make the exterior walls on a log house. He said it was very slow. Too slow to be practical. Those big saws use a lot of fuel too.
 
No experience but I see a lot of online info on making your
own bandsaw pretty economically, makes less sawdust (more
useable wood) and faster and less upkeep than the chainsaw
versions from what I hear.

Paul
 
I still have what is called an Alaskan mill which is a chain saw mill. While it does work it is very very slow and will work a man to death just to get a board or 2. You need a rip chain or you get a real rough cut and it takes a long time to cut even a 2X6 10 foot long.
 
I built a small barn, more or less, with a Haddon Lumbermaker and a 2100 Husky. I spent all of one summer doing it. It's okay for beams and squared stock like 6x6's. But for doing anything else it's soooooooo slllllloooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwww. The next year I had a guy come in with a bandsaw mill and turn 9k feet of logs into everything from stickers to 2x12's. Cost me about $1200.00, left me with at least $6k of lumber. The logs cost me nothing but time and effort.

Long story short- for a few beams they work fine. Otherwise it's a very, very, very long process.
 
Here's the one that lives here. A buddy bought it with Stihl's largest power unit and discovered he doesn't have the shoulder to start it, even with compression relief. As you already heard, good for large timbers, slow for boards. A major advantage for me is length, no limit to how long you can mill other than tree size. 40' is no problem here, 50' long takes an exceptional tree. I use a boat winch to pull the saw to me at the end of the log.
mvphoto9610.jpg



I also needed long oak rafters.
mvphoto9611.jpg


Sometimes I have an exceptional log I want to mill for resale. This one worked great, after milling for figure.

mvphoto9612.jpg


I tried several rip chains and found none that cut worth a damn until I refiled the angles, then got pretty good production. This is what I expect everyone was talking about concerning slow milling speed. I have yet to try a chain that cut decently out of the box.

Like you, I don't want to mill enough lumber to justify a bandmill's price. My solution was to get an old circular mill, that I haven't yet brought to my property and set up.
 
I never used one but would think you would waste a lot of wood with the chain kerf, especially if you tried cutting boards. If any way you could get a loan or something and buy a band mill, saw your timber, then sell the mill I would think that would be the cheapest in the long run. Of course if you bought a mill and found out how easy they are to use and cut lumber to sell maybe you would want to keep it.
 

Check out the Logosol mill. Friend and I have cut over hundreds of board feet of lumber. Uses a Stihl 90cc unit; he was in his eighties and it started easily; of course he took excellent care if it. We resided half of my barn among other things.
Logosol had a team at one time that competed at shows etc. Did well; much better than the Alaskan types.
 
The point to remember is, has been said here several times, at best they are slow. BUT, there is a special chain available, especially for cutting with the grain. The Granberg company who makes the Alaskan mills sells the chain, and I am sure others offer it as well.
 

I used the ripping chain. I also reground my own chain to various recommended angles trying to speed things up and cut straighter. I don't care what chain you use, it's going to be slow compared to a band or circle mill.
 

That's why I like coming on here and asking questions. I knew I would get some honest answers. I didn't know how well they worked and now I know. I remember being at the scrap yard the other day and somebody had scrapped a bandsaw. Maybe I need to get it and build a bandsaw mill out of it.
 
My dad would work out a deal with saw mill. He
took them logs and they gave him a % back. We
built a lot of things with that lumber.

I do the same with trees that either blow down or
trees that I remove because they are too close to
buildings.

Now I have boards that I don't know what to do
with. Usually my kids come up with something they
want to make.
 
My cousin bought one and the logs he turned to lumber are nice
but its slow and he ended up blowing up his saw. We are looking
to get an old circular saw set up or a band saw rig.
 
Sorry you couldn't figure it out better Bret. I make a 30' pass in about 3 minutes with the re-filed rip chains I use. That is not a cut any mill available here can make in that time.

Bandmills get real interesting when you mill long logs.
 
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