Logosol - Big Mill

[Ian Flatters]

Thinking of buying one. Has anyone got one. If so are they good in your opinion?

£547 upwards on price too.

[wills-mill]

Thinking of buying one. Has anyone got one. If so are they good in your opinion?

£547 upwards on price too.

 

Very versatile bit of kit, Logosol are a great firm- they are happy to allow people to mix and match parts from different sawing systems to create their own bespoke kit to suit different situations. I've used my Big Mill for quartering big logs for Wood Mizer milling and milling on on its own in tight spaces, it seems very adaptable and can be set up in all sorts of different ways.

 

I'll dig for some photos, they're on the other computer at the moment

[Ian Flatters]

Very versatile bit of kit, Logosol are a great firm- they are happy to allow people to mix and match parts from different sawing systems to create their own bespoke kit to suit different situations. I've used my Big Mill for quartering big logs for Wood Mizer milling and milling on on its own in tight spaces, it seems very adaptable and can be set up in all sorts of different ways.

 

I'll dig for some photos, they're on the other computer at the moment

 

Cool sounds good to me, can't wait to have a ganders at the photo's:thumbup:

[wills-mill]

Here we go!

[wills-mill]

part 2, captions coming in a sec!

[wills-mill]

Part 3

[wills-mill]

can't seem to edit the previous posts to add captions, will have to do it here, although it's a bit clumsy

 

I bought a Big Mill mainly to help when quartering large logs to fit on my Wood Mizer for further processing, but have used it quite a few times in confied spaces for start to finish milling.

For this job we wanted nice wide slabs of Oak from a back garden. Saw used was a Stih 660 with a 30in bar. In the end it took the best part of two days to mill, remove the boards and clean up.

Your model for today will be Lee, who dismantled the tree, we were sharing the wood and the labour. I wasn't just poncing around taking photos. Honest

 

1st set-

Setting up: The Big Mill uses the basic Timberjig unit which is a very handy and cheap carriage that bolts onto the saw which can be run along a flat surface to give parallel cuts. It mounts using extended nuts that fit onto the saws side cover, very quick and easy and you don't lose any bar length. it's best to unbolt the dogs from the front of the saw, they tend to get in the way....

 

The Big Mill systems uses brackets which are screwed to the end faces of the log and hinged support arms which hold a beautifully made aluminium guide rail. This is 9ft long as standard (extensions are available), but once you've attached everything you're limited to around an 8ft long log. The Timberjig slots onto the guide rail, so you can take the saw off at any point during a cut.

Have a look at the vertical bars with the ribbed finish- they allow you to drop the guide rails by a set amount to give different board thickneses.

The other clever feature is that you can leave the brackets screwed in place and rotate the mounting arms and rail around the log in nice, crisp 90 degree increments to give you squared timber straight off the log.

 

Cutting:

It's best to support the guide rail to stop it vibrating and take some of the load off the brackets. In this case we used an elegant multi purpose broom handle. With the slab of bark and sapwood cut off in the scond photo the first board is free apart from the furthest bit of wood that the saw's nose can't reach which can be nipped off to release the board. You can see the dust piling up already!

 

In the 3rd photo we've rotated the log and wedged it securely, and then rotated the brackets by 90 degrees and re-attached the guide rail. All boards will now have 3 sawn sides and one nice waney, bark covered edge. The saw can get closer up to the timber and cut to full depth as well. you can see in the next photo hos the Timberjig sldes on the rail, it hooks around a lipped edge on the aluminium. As a bonus, a mighty plank has been revealed....

 

2nd set-

Things going pretty well, chomping through steadily. You get a pretty good idea of the mounting of the system, Logosol do all sorts of alternative extension arms and heavier brackets as well. You can see why we took the trouble to do this, lovely colour and grain in this butt.

Did I mention the dust? As you can see in the last 3 photos, we've actually removed the guide rail now that we've got a square edge, and are running the Timberjig directly on the timber surface 'freehand'. It gives excellent results when running the saw fairly much vertically, but the droop of the bar when running with the saw hirzontally can give some deviation and twist.

 

3rd set-

Did I mention the fuel consumption? At this width of board it takes a tank full per cut. And a tickle of the chain, otherwise progress is really, really slow.

You can see the set up of the Timberjig, the flat black plate can be adjusted to hold the saw at a set distance from the last cut, this gives you a set depth of cut. If you had access to old pitch pine beams or new oak sleepers you could resaw with just the 'jig!

Almost there, and then a truck load of some of the goodies....

[Ian Flatters]

can't seem to edit the previous posts to add captions, will have to do it here, although it's a bit clumsy

 

I bought a Big Mill mainly to help when quartering large logs to fit on my Wood Mizer for further processing, but have used it quite a few times in confied spaces for start to finish milling.

For this job we wanted nice wide slabs of Oak from a back garden. Saw used was a Stih 660 with a 30in bar. In the end it took the best part of two days to mill, remove the boards and clean up.

Your model for today will be Lee, who dismantled the tree, we were sharing the wood and the labour. I wasn't just poncing around taking photos. Honest

 

1st set-

Setting up: The Big Mill uses the basic Timberjig unit which is a very handy and cheap carriage that bolts onto the saw which can be run along a flat surface to give parallel cuts. It mounts using extended nuts that fit onto the saws side cover, very quick and easy and you don't lose any bar length. it's best to unbolt the dogs from the front of the saw, they tend to get in the way....

 

The Big Mill systems uses brackets which are screwed to the end faces of the log and hinged support arms which hold a beautifully made aluminium guide rail. This is 9ft long as standard (extensions are available), but once you've attached everything you're limited to around an 8ft long log. The Timberjig slots onto the guide rail, so you can take the saw off at any point during a cut.

Have a look at the vertical bars with the ribbed finish- they allow you to drop the guide rails by a set amount to give different board thickneses.

The other clever feature is that you can leave the brackets screwed in place and rotate the mounting arms and rail around the log in nice, crisp 90 degree increments to give you squared timber straight off the log.

 

Cutting:

It's best to support the guide rail to stop it vibrating and take some of the load off the brackets. In this case we used an elegant multi purpose broom handle. With the slab of bark and sapwood cut off in the scond photo the first board is free apart from the furthest bit of wood that the saw's nose can't reach which can be nipped off to release the board. You can see the dust piling up already!

 

In the 3rd photo we've rotated the log and wedged it securely, and then rotated the brackets by 90 degrees and re-attached the guide rail. All boards will now have 3 sawn sides and one nice waney, bark covered edge. The saw can get closer up to the timber and cut to full depth as well. you can see in the next photo hos the Timberjig sldes on the rail, it hooks around a lipped edge on the aluminium. As a bonus, a mighty plank has been revealed....

 

2nd set-

Things going pretty well, chomping through steadily. You get a pretty good idea of the mounting of the system, Logosol do all sorts of alternative extension arms and heavier brackets as well. You can see why we took the trouble to do this, lovely colour and grain in this butt.

Did I mention the dust? As you can see in the last 3 photos, we've actually removed the guide rail now that we've got a square edge, and are running the Timberjig directly on the timber surface 'freehand'. It gives excellent results when running the saw fairly much vertically, but the droop of the bar when running with the saw hirzontally can give some deviation and twist.

 

3rd set-

Did I mention the fuel consumption? At this width of board it takes a tank full per cut. And a tickle of the chain, otherwise progress is really, really slow.

You can see the set up of the Timberjig, the flat black plate can be adjusted to hold the saw at a set distance from the last cut, this gives you a set depth of cut. If you had access to old pitch pine beams or new oak sleepers you could resaw with just the 'jig!

Almost there, and then a truck load of some of the goodies....

 

Nice pics and a good explanation. I think i'll probaly get one now, the cut quality looks better than i expected a bit of a sand and job done. Althugh i would only really use it if i fell a oak, beech, walnut etc (probaly everything)

[Quickthorn]

Some good pictures there, Will. It looks like you've taken a few cuts with the bar totally buried. Do you get any kickback working like that, or is it quite safe?

 

The good thing about the Logosol stuff is that you can start off for less than £100. I've got the tightwads version, where you make your own guide rails. I've had very little time to use it, apart from for a few hours on some small Western Red Cedar below, but I'm quite pleased with it. I can see me buying the extra bits to make up the proper Big Mill system.

[wills-mill]

Some good pictures there, Will. It looks like you've taken a few cuts with the bar totally buried. Do you get any kickback working like that, or is it quite safe?

 

The good thing about the Logosol stuff is that you can start off for less than £100. I've got the tightwads version, where you make your own guide rails. I've had very little time to use it, apart from for a few hours on some small Western Red Cedar below, but I'm quite pleased with it. I can see me buying the extra bits to make up the proper Big Mill system.

 

Not had a problem when using it at full bar depth, the saw seems very well behaved to be honest. They are a really helpful bunch at Logosol- as you say expansion is dead easy and they've got some excellent manuals and parts lists if you want to do something a bit different to their standard kits.