Mill your own lumber! It's free! It's easy! (well, kind of)

There is a certain satisfaction that comes with being able to mill your own lumber. Last summer, we had a pretty wicked windstorm that brought down a lot of trees in the Sudbury and surrounding area. I was still with the tree company then and we were extremely busy with the cleanup. A friend of ours was able to salvage a lot of his wood and he sold it to a mill in Ottawa: they removed a double-bunk truck load and there is still more to be cut up.

Although we didn't suffer any great losses around here, we did get some blowdown and some windthrown tops; all of which I would like to get cleaned up at some point. Because so much of the damage is to good trees (those with large canopies were the hardest hit due to their sail effect) it would be a real shame to see them all go to firewood. Plus, I have a few projects to accomplish this summer, all of which require lumber and so it was this afternoon, I set up my Alaskan Mill to start milling some of my lumber.

In the course of two hours, I was able to get both these 9-foot six-by-six inch beams milled. It may sound like a lot of time spent milling these beams, but really, I was talking with my neighbour during the milling process and I also had to switch between my mill and my 'beam machine' rig because I don't have my guide rails set up yet. Without a long explanation, these guide rails provide a surface to make my first cut straight and even and although it is a bit of a pain to constantly switch between two different sets of chainsaw attachements, things seemed to go rather smoothly anyway.

I used the mill in Whitehorse to mill a bunch of poplar logs into trim for our kitchen in the cabin I built. The mill itself is fairly accurate and I expect that it is the most efficient way of making lumber until one moves up into the portable bandsaw mills... oh, to dream.

Below is one of the kitchen cabinet doors that I made out of the wood I am milling above. I treated the wood on the door with steel wool soaked in vinegar to age the wood and I added the patina on the copper insert using peroxide, vinegar and lemon juice. They are really nothing that spectacular, but since everything was an experiment, I think they turned out okay.

I don't have doors to build this time, though; instead, I have a drive shed to build and a frame for the dogbox so that I can take it off the truck. I'd better get milling.