Ask The Trades - Milling an Oak Tree

jasonB

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Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice!
Reply #17 - Aug 14^th, 2006, 12:33pm

Its all to do with the way wood moves. Quatered boards will move less over their width than tangentally sawn timber, this is because the wood shrinks less radially to the center of the trunk than it does when at rightangles.

Having the trunk sawn through & through will give you crown cut boards at the top & bottom and quatered ones near the center. If you ask the sawyer to cut all the trunk for quatered timber there will be a lot of waste and it takes a lot longer so the cost will go up.

Jason

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bik038

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Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice!
Reply #18 - Aug 15^th, 2006, 1:19pm

Quote:

Its all to do with the way wood moves. Quatered boards will move less over their width than tangentally sawn timber, this is because the wood shrinks less radially to the center of the trunk than it does when at rightangles.

Having the trunk sawn through & through will give you crown cut boards at the top & bottom and quatered ones near the center. If you ask the sawyer to cut all the trunk for quatered timber there will be a lot of waste and it takes a lot longer so the cost will go up.

Jason

Thanks for that.

I'm still confused...!!

I can have the timber quarter sawn - benefit being that it will be more stable and I will have more chance of being able to use the timber. Down side is that there's more waste (not really a big concern for me) and that it will take longer to mill - hence cost more.

If I have the timber cut through and through then about a quarter of the timber will be 'quarter sawn' with the rest being crown cut. The upside of this is that there's less waste and it's cheaper to mill. The downside is that the crown cut timber is more likely to warp and be less stable, so it may end up being firewood.

To me the additional cost of milling isn't a major concern - my main priority is getting wood as stable as possible from the tree, especially given the fact that it will be drying in my garden rather than in a timber yard / kiln dried.

From the research I've done and knowledge I have (albeit limited!) I thought that quarter sawn would be the best option for me on this basis for the two main sections of the tree trunk. The rest I will have sawn through and through, but I thought that the trunks would get the most stable wood through quarter sawing.

The last few posts have confused me a bit and now I'm not sure what I'm best to do if:
- i am not concerned about increased waste
- i am not concerned about higher milling costs
- i want boards to be as stable as possible for decking - 30mm x 90mm.

Maybe it's just that there isn't one answer?!

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jasonB GDPR opt-out	Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice! Reply #19 - Aug 15^th, 2006, 4:28pm Best compromise would be: Have as much timber as you will need for the decking (plus 25% wastage)quater sawn into 30mm boards but leave the ripping to width until they have dried. Have the remaining timber cut through and through into an assortment of widths 30, 50 & 70mm say and keep this for other projects. Jason
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bik038

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Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice!
Reply #20 - Aug 16^th, 2006, 9:54am

Quote:

Best compromise would be:

Have as much timber as you will need for the decking (plus 25% wastage)quater sawn into 30mm boards but leave the ripping to width until they have dried.

Jason

Sorry to be a pain (again!) but earlier on in this thread someone said I shouldn't use 6" wide decking because it would warp and twist more.

Does that mean that the width of the timber when it is in stick makes NO DIFFERENCE to the quality of the final timber? If that's the case then I agree it makes sense to rip it once it's fully seasoned, but my concern is that 3" wide boards will season better than, say 7" wide boards?

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jasonB

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Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice!
Reply #21 - Aug 16^th, 2006, 6:33pm

As the timber will move by the same amount per inch a 6" board will move twice as much as a 3" board so the advice was right though I would probably go for 4" wide boards as 3" may look a bit on the thin side.

When it comes to air drying you may actually find that 3" wide boards just dry too fast causing splits. Also you only need the 3" board to bow by 1/2" and you will then end up with a 2" board by the time it has been straightened out on a planner. Properly sticked a wide board will not cup excessively particularly if quater sawn.

Also if you buy hardwoods you seldom find they are available as narrow boards, 6" and wider is usual.

What you want to avoid is shown in the first two pics in this album Grin

Jason

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« Last Edit: Aug 16^th, 2006, 6:36pm by jasonB »

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splinter

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Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice!
Reply #22 - Aug 16^th, 2006, 10:42pm

I've had a look in my olde carpentry book and for oak it reccomends firstly quartering the log ,from there the diagram then gets to complicated for me to explain ,it also shows a log halved then run through into boards .I suppose this process could be carried out on a quartered log.Which I think will be better for you ,as you don't want all your log coverted in to boards ,so you could convert 1 or 2 quarters into different stock sizes .
the reason for quartering a oak log is that oak relies on the medullary rays for its beauty.You wouldn't get this effect in the grain if you just ran a log through &through tangentially

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Scrit GDPR opt-out	Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice! Reply #23 - Aug 17^th, 2006, 5:10pm In reality true quarter sawing is incredibly wasteful, so most sawmen deem to opt for what I believe is called "false" quarter sawn where a log is quartered then alternate faces sawn away - less waste, lers scrap material to dispose of, less set-up time, too. Dcrit
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bik038

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Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice!
Reply #24 - Sep 14^th, 2006, 4:38pm

Just to let you know (for anyone that's interested!) the Oak tree was milled a couple of weekends ago. The 2 main 'trunk' sections were cut into quarters (using a mechanism with chain saw) and then sawn on the mobile bandsaw.

I have got over 70 3m lengths of 6.5" x 1.25" planks to use for decking (hopefully I will end up being able to get about 5" x 1" from this), 4 x 2.25" x 13" slabs, some 2.25"x2.25" and some 3.25"x3.25".

I've very happy with what I've got and I'm just praying now that the seasoning process isn't too cruel to me!! It's nicely covered in my garden and I just need to patiently wait for about a year and a half (easier said than done!) to see what the wood is like.

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Scrit GDPR opt-out	Re: Milling an Oak Tree - advice! Reply #25 - Sep 15^th, 2006, 11:55pm Actually the 2-1/4 in will take 2-1/2 to 3 years and the 3-/14 in is possibly a 4 to 5 years wait.... Happy waiting..... It'l;l be worth it in the end Scrit
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