beerkan mill

[Graham S]

Stunning fair play

[Pan]

Hi flames - Impressed by your mill and milling, very impressed by your flooring and now having just seen your website seriously impressed by your wood turning!

 

I don't mean to derail the thread too far into wood turning but being a fairly novice turner just wanted to ask you a question about seasoning.

 

When you rough turn your bowls etc from green wood that you have just milled, how long and what techniques do you use to season them to the right moisture content before you remount them on the lathe to turn true and finish?

 

Any help and advice gratefuly received!

[flames]

Hi Pan, thanks, glad you like my work (check out my web site everyone ).

 

-drying rough turned bowls; I normally finish turn when the moisture content is at about 15%. For say a Ø12” simple bowl, I will normally rough turn the wall to about an 1” thick. Time wise, from tree to on the table ~6 months. This is a very simple guide, all of which I adjust according to shape, wood type, end use, desired end result… if you’d like some more info, there’s loads in the milling forum about drying wood, and probably some turning specific drying info in the craft section, otherwise feel free to drop me a PM and I’ll go in to more detail.

 

Cheers.

[flames]

A new addition to my DIY mill family: a mini mill.

A few pieces of wood and a piece of old mill... worked really well, accurate and fast.

 

(thanks for the ripping chain Rob D)

 

(see more here:

)

[canoehead]

really impressive, a huge amount of work. like your drying rack, with the ratchet straps, great idea to keep the boards from twisting, cupping etc, and in the shade. i learnt the hard way of not doing that. that you cut tounges and grouves on all your flooring is a feat itself, let alone planing, recutting all the stock, and finish sanding. how has the floor stood up over time? has it shrunk back much? ( i only ask as i ended up with gaps everywhere with mine, even after i thought it was completely dry).  really admire your inventiveness, that you built 2 mills.

[Woodworks]

Might have to make myself one of those mini mills. Great stuff Flames

[flames]

Thanks. Floor is holding up well, visiting people often comment on it. My floor too ended up a bit gappy, but I anticipated this, as I'd only been able to air dry outside, hence I knew the M/C would be a little high. I compensated for this by chamfering all the edges making any gaps less apparent. It's no piece of master carpentry but it still looks good.  

[flames]

Having not posted in ages and not milled anything in anger in even longer, I thought this might be of interest...

Recent efforts from the 'Beerkan' mill & its little brother my upgraded mini mill.

I got a job to mill beams for a porch build from a tree in the clients garden. Huge 4' Oak, must have been 200 years+. I didn't fell the tree, just hired to do the milling.

Briefly, I used the 'Beerkan' mill to cut the slabs, about 40" wide, then the mini mill to cut the beams. Worked really well, surface finish was generally excellent (sorry RobD, I haven't tried the hyper skip yet, as my normal milling chain was working well).

The 1st and 2nd slab cut (40"+) seemed really fast, 2.3m in about 5mins about 0.45m/min (Granberg milling chain) which seemed really good, for such a wide cut. 3rd slab cut was painfully slow, 1/3 of the speed, chain still seemed sharp, also this was the centre of the tree. I resharpened but this only made a slight improvement on the 4th slab. Slabs 5 and 6 I swapped the chain to a chipper, was slightly better, not as fast as the slab 1 and 2. Couldn't put my finger on the cause of the difference - engine RPM was a bit low 6.5k - 7k in the cut, but this was fairly consistent throughout. However it was cutting well enough, and the finish was good.

Mini mill - this continues to amaze me how quick it cuts. It did all the beams, didn't have to resharpen once!

 

Also see more pics and time lapse video here:

https://www.facebook.com/pg/Phoenix-Turner-466495826726895/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1914463385263458

 

 

 

Edited August 27, 2018 by flames