# CSM like a Swing Mill?



## Kicker_92 (Mar 31, 2010)

Has anyone tried following a swingmill style cut pattern with a chainsaw mill?

With having the alaskan (horizontal) and mini-mill (vertical), I'm thinking that this might be a better approach to slicing up big logs. Currently, we slab off sections to make a cant, then re-saw those offcuts later.

You could make a top pass to get a flat surface, do a couple shallow vertical cuts to the width you want (at say 4" depth), then slab these off to get a bunch of pieces 4x10, 4x8, etc.

Anyone tried this approach?


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## BobL (Mar 31, 2010)

Kicker_92 said:


> Has anyone tried following a swingmill style cut pattern with a chainsaw mill?
> 
> With having the alaskan (horizontal) and mini-mill (vertical), I'm thinking that this might be a better approach to slicing up big logs. Currently, we slab off sections to make a cant, then re-saw those offcuts later.
> 
> ...



Your approach would work better with two different size bars, a shorter one to do the verticals and a longer one to do the horizontal cuts. 

Will Malloff showed an unusual swing CS mill working on his website (www.willmalloff.com) but I see that site is no longer active. The saw was slid along a metal beam or rail running along the full length of the log with the bar at 45º to the horizontal and then the saw was rotated by 90º to cut the other face so you ended up cutting in a diamond formation. Seems like an interesting way to break up big logs. One problem with this and your approach is there is a lot of nose cutting involved and nose wear would be substantial


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## Kicker_92 (Mar 31, 2010)

BobL said:


> Your approach would work better with two different size bars, a shorter one to do the verticals and a longer one to do the horizontal cuts.



How about two seperate saws? Have a 16" bar on the mini-mill for the verticals, and the bigger bar setup on the alaskan. 

The goal is to minimize the amount of material moving and resawing of offcuts.


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## BobL (Mar 31, 2010)

Kicker_92 said:


> How about two seperate saws? Have a 16" bar on the mini-mill for the verticals, and the bigger bar setup on the alaskan.
> 
> The goal is to minimize the amount of material moving and resawing of offcuts.



That's basically what I (intended to do - check out my minimill WIP) but I rarely cut lumber direct from logs as I have no idea what I plan to do with the wood so I just slab it into various thicknesses and resaw it later when I work out what I need the wood for.

Another way to do this would on a carriage mill or slabber with two carriages. One carriage has a standard slabber bar and when it has done its pass it sits parked at the other end of thge log. The second carriage carrys a saw with say a 24" trailing bar set at a shallow angle so it is close to cutting noodles. The depth of the cut would be controlled by rotating the vertical saw slightly. It would then be a matter of lifting the slab slightly off the log and placing some large stickers underneath it and then slicing off beams to suit. The benefit to this would be one could have an accurate horizontal adjustment on teh second carriage which also would make the lumber parallel and remove the need for the repeated PITA adjustment of a minimill. It would be a lot of work to set up and I reckon it could work well, but it would also turn a lot of wood into sawdust!


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## Kicker_92 (Apr 1, 2010)

BobL said:


> I rarely cut lumber direct from logs as I have no idea what I plan to do with the wood so I just slab it into various thicknesses and resaw it later when I work out what I need the wood for.
> 
> would make the lumber parallel and remove the need for the repeated PITA adjustment of a minimill.



The mini-mill takes about 2 minutes to mark, unscrew and reposition. We have a 16ft long guide board now with 4 screws, and a cordless impact driver to attach them. It goes pretty quick, but like you said the accuracy is not there.

It's a PITA to position offcuts to resaw, especially when they have two live edges. Maybee it'd be better to saw the whole log through & though, then edge an resaw them as a stack? There's just gotta be a better way.


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## Kicker_92 (Apr 19, 2010)

Tried something different this weekend, and it worked out great. Much less time spent moving offcuts to resaw.

Needed some 7"x7" posts:






And then some 2.5"x7" to plane out for trim:






Remembered that a triple stack would be better that the double/quad so the log we cut today went with a triple stack for the last log (no photo).

There's more variation in the board width due to the two vertical mini-mill cuts, but since that's the short edge, it'll be easy to joint and plan out later. I can now see why the swing mill guys are so quick!


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## deeker (Apr 19, 2010)

Kicker_92 said:


> Tried something different this weekend, and it worked out great. Much less time spent moving offcuts to resaw.
> 
> Needed some 7"x7" posts:
> 
> ...



Wow!!! I am very impressed!!

Kevin


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## Old Hilly (Apr 19, 2010)

Do a search on Googgle for a "Wombat chainsaw mill". This is a monorail CS mill that will work in both the horizontal and vertival planes. It looks easy to make and might just be what you need.
Dennis.


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## BobL (Apr 19, 2010)

Nice work Kicker, I must try that method some time!
How fast are you able to do those blind cuts?



Old Hilly said:


> Do a search on Googgle for a "Wombat chainsaw mill". This is a monorail CS mill that will work in both the horizontal and vertival planes. It looks easy to make and might just be what you need.
> Dennis.



The wombat mill [http://www.sawmill.ausmade.com.au/] is a very interesting design but it has several limitations.
It is a single ended mill so I wonder about it's ability to maintain a truly horizontal cut for widths wider than about 25".
A minimill and an alaskan will be lighter than the wombat mill.
AS member Railomatic's mill is a smilar design


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## Kicker_92 (Apr 19, 2010)

BobL said:


> Nice work Kicker, I must try that method some time!
> How fast are you able to do those blind cuts?



The blind cuts don't seem to take any longer, just more sawdust in the face. One downside is that the flat cuts are allways cutting through the bark, unless you trim it off first.

I'm not much of a fan of the mono-rail style mills. That is a 41" bar in the photo, and I would be doubtful that that could accuratly be supported from just one end.

The main goal here is to reduce the movement and setup of logs. You don't get as nice of product as if you were to turn and move pieces more, but the time savings offset that a lot. Plus with the mini-mill, theres only guide board screw holes in the top piece!


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## Old Hilly (Apr 19, 2010)

Well, when you get to wide bars you are into a completely diferent area. There are limits to how much weight a chainsaw bar will support without some sort of assistance and my guess is about 18" which is still a bit better than a swing-mill will cut. 
Perhaps someone needs to design a bracket that fits on a wide alaskan mill that will hold a saw in the vertical position and the slab can then be cut in both the horizontal and vertical planes where it sits on the log.
It means more weight and another saw but if it saves moving things around it could be handy.
Dennis.


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