Sion

What Guilliet are you running with a Stenner rack bench? Thats a curious combination, is it home brew? The guides on alot of wide band sawmills are now one sided too, I think they're called pressure guides. fitted on the inside of the blade they deflect the blade from its true line between the wheels outwards 10mm or so, using pieces of low friction/hard wearing plastic.

I thought those wheels were unusual too, I would really like the length of that carriage, Ultimately somehow I need to cut at least 26' and small sizes too so the 6 dogs would hold it well. I've been pricing double cut blades, their quite expensive as you might expect. I thought it would be fun to convert the stenner 42 head I have to a slanted double cut with a longish carriage for small diameter stuff, handling speed is important to me as the small finished sizes include 2 1/2" x 1 1/2" and 7x1, 8x1 and 4x1 1/2", also alot of 5/8" weather board. Quite a bit of that I would like to saw to completion on the bandmill, I know that is not quite the orthodox method but I have some particular reasons to want to do that, at least for a time anyway. Ive been thinking about the combination of the slant double cut with a small circular edger to do alot of the resawing in the one pass, basically trying to maximize a single operator. I'll probably continue to saw the longer lengths on a stenner bandrack.

I really like that, and a hell of a carriage with 6 knees. The end ones look to be manual, so quite an oldie? I suspect it wont make a great amount, they're quite strict on the removal terms, probably not for me unfortunately, it is a lovely machine though. Thanks.

Hi Will, yes that is me! Now the mill is in demand and all the Sagar stuff is pushed into a corner... That stenner 48 machine sounds amazingly similar, I don't quite recall the plywood shed bit, but it may have been, I only really looked at the carriage and set works (probably 10 or more years ago now), it all seemed like a jump too far back then, and probably would have been. Now its definitely not and I would be very keen to hear more if its not out of your way. I especially like machines that are residing in brambles. Brambles are good. Have you found yourself a comb jointer yet?

A LumberPro?! Ah, yes well sort of.. Thankyou, that link is awesome, exactly the sort of thing im hoping to find, and the rest of the mill thrown in too, even better! Ill be giving them a call. Ive been planning to build a slant head setup. i've got a couple of options for the headrig, a spare stenner vb42 from a bandrack or I have a unknown make (wilcox?) 48" double slabber with 7" face wheels, ive been wondering about a home brew double cut, would be good fun - like this Salem: [ame= ] [/ame] I bought the double slabber locally many years ago, part of an 8 head setup that had been gas axed out and I got just the 2 heads and nothing else. A double slabber would be excellent but not entirely appropriate for my needs, something that can see more of the process through on the one machine would be better, hence the want for a bandmill, i just thought the slant setup looked more interesting, and i'm sure even if one was available in the uk it would be well outside my spending limits, so self build is the only way to go. About 10 years ago I made a trip to almost Aberdeen to view a 48" Stenner with i think a 4 knee carriage, electric set works and it had been made slightly portable by being fixed to 2 massive box sections. I'd be quite interested in that now if I had any idea where it was or could find the guys number, unfortunately theres little chance of that now. Great to have an option already, I hope more stuff surfaces too before I push the button too hastily. Thanks!

I'm hoping to find a 3 or 4 knee log carriage from some old sawmill, its for a project so something that needs work would be ideal, parts missing/broken or just the very bare bones of one would all be helpful right now. I'm in the west of wales but happy to travel anywhere in the uk for the right thing.

Nice looking machine, never seen one of those up close but they do seem to appear on the market occasionally. Ive heard a few people mention one existing locally here but i've no idea if its still around. I'm running the same machine but the static version. Stenner states wheel speed as 600 rpm, or 6600 fpm. I would recommend Lancashire saw company for blades, ~£150 a pop for the 18 gauge swedish steel version, which i think is the one to go for. The wheel condition is very important, they will clean up with the first use but dont run rusty blades on there, if there are blades with it you think are good but a bit rusty then clean them up with a belt sander first (inside at least anyway). That machine should have a crown on the wheels of 40' radius - ~7 thou high but not quite in the middle of the wheel, the high point is about a third way across the face of the wheel from the front edge. Once you get going if you find blades cracking regularly then you will need to check the condition of this crown, which can be done with a straight edge and feeler gauges. Hence no rusty blades as these will eat away the wheels on the front edge and speed the machine towards needing a regrind. That and bearings is about all there is to go wrong with your machine. What have you to drive it? Mine was flat belt drive for quite a while from a tractor, and I used it with a david brown as they have a high speed pto gear so the tractor was just purring along, you dont need a deal of power, mine came with a 25hp electric motor so 50hp diesel would be plenty.