# Grade Sawing A Sugar Maple



## Sawyer Rob (May 5, 2009)

I was given this sugar maple by a friend who lives in town. I wanted it for my own use, so i milled it all to 5/4, as that's what i prefer... 

First, i rotated the log to pick where i would start, loaded it on the mill, and got ready to "grade saw" this log. I had a well used band on the mill, but it was still sawing dead flat, so i left it on and took the first slab off, and then a flitch...







then with a turn of the log, i took the second slab off and another flitch, and turned the log once again to remove the third slab!






and "finally" with the last turn, off came the last slab, 






exposeing the "cant", so i could see what the "grade" was going to be... None of the choises were "perfect", but in this case, i just picked the best and went with it, untill the grade fell off...






Actually, the grade wasn't all that bad either!






and the cant gave me some nice 12" lumber!! With that, i noticed the saw head pushing a bit harder than it should, so i took the band off, sharpened it and got back to sawing...






until i got to the last couple of boards,






And here's the "tally", that ended up at just over 130 bd. ft. of lumber...






As you can see in the pile, i didn't trim the boards as much as i would have, if they weren't mine. I don't mind a bit of "wane" on my lumber... Also when i edged the first flitches, they ended up 10" wide instead of 12"...

Well, that's it for this time...

Rob


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## MotorSeven (May 5, 2009)

Rob, man that's nice.....I am jonesin' to pick up my LT15 & get into some wood. It looks like 2 weeks as I am waiting for some property that we sold to close. 
Do you turn by hand or did you get the 12v turner? I think I am going to make one.

RD


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## English Oak (May 5, 2009)

Thats some nice wood. Are you going to dry it yourself if so any plans for it? T


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## excess650 (May 5, 2009)

Norwood's log loader makes it ridiculously easy to turn a log. It uses a manual winch on a mast, but I suppose you could attach an electric winch to it if you were so inclined. In that the LM2000 is generally "on the ground", it isn't difficult to turn a log with a cant hook until they get large and long.


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## wavefreak (May 5, 2009)

Slightly relevant question - I recently read on a drying forum that "hard" maple and "soft" maple dry differently. I thought all maple was hard. Is silver maple hard and sugar maple soft?


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## Sawyer Rob (May 5, 2009)

Thanks Guys...

I turn my logs using Norwoods log turner, that uses a hand powered winch to turn the logs... It's not a cheapo winch though, it's geared down quite a bit, and easily turns any log that you can saw on the mill... It's miles better than the cheapo china winches!!

Yes, i air dry all of my lumber, and the maple is already on stickers. I'm not sure what i will build with it yet?

No, not all maple is hard, and surgar maple is hard, silver maple is a soft...

I'm glad you guys liked the picts.!

Rob


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## BobL (May 5, 2009)

Great looking set of boards there Rob. They look already partially dry?


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## woodshop (May 5, 2009)

Nice pics Rob, thanks. It should be noted that there is not actually much difference in actual hardness between most soft and hard maples. Yes sugar maple IS a little harder than most of the soft maples, but not a whole lot. There are some "soft" maples that are very hard. Example, the norway maple I milled few years ago machines in the woodshop, as well as looks and feels just as hard as sugar maple. Of course it doesn't have the pure creamy homogenious look of sugar maple, norway as well as many soft maples is more colorful with subtle shades of reds, tans and browns mottled throughout the boards.


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## aggiewoodbutchr (May 5, 2009)

Nice work!


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## bowtechmadman (May 5, 2009)

Great lookin lumber!


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## Brmorgan (May 6, 2009)

Nice stuff. In the third pic, the can't doesn't look square. Is that just an effect of the photography?


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## Sawyer Rob (May 6, 2009)

Brmorgan said:


> Nice stuff. In the third pic, the can't doesn't look square. Is that just an effect of the photography?



I'm not sure if it's the pict. or not, as i already don't remember the sequence of the picts... lol BUT, i took the band off, sharpened it and went back to cutting. I made a couple cuts and noticed the cant WAS out of square, and found that i had not put the band properly in the guide on one side, and it was holding the band down a bit. 

How i never noticed that when installing, is beyond me? OLD TIMERS maybe??? 

In the last pict, you can see a THIN cut board that i took to even up the cant... I give those thin cuts to a friend who likes to scroll saw... 

And to answer BobL, the log WAS cut last fall, so it DID dry out a little since then... It still milled up pretty nice though!

Rob


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## Backwoods (May 6, 2009)

I was wondering if it was out of square as well. I have had trouble with logs tilting slightly when milling the way you did here. I found that when I make the second cut, I like to have the first cut flat on the bed rails, and then stand it up for the third cut so that there are two flat surfaces to clamp to rather then the rounded edge of the log. This helps to keep everything square.

That will give you a decent little jag of lumber out of that log for some future projects.


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## Sawyer Rob (May 7, 2009)

In the past, there's been a lot of discusion on sawmill forums of how to get square cants... I use to saw using the 180* turn after the first slab, but since i mounted a log turner on my mill, i don't do it so often any more. I used the 180* turn because it gets a lot of weight off the log faster, making it easier to turn manually, not because i ended up with square(er) cants...

In my above "maple" case, it's not so important that the cant be perfect, as the lumber is mine, and all of it will be run over the jointer or be sawn off in time anyway...

If i want to be assured the cants are perfectly square, i'll check them from time to time as i'm "dogging", with a frameing square to the bunks. But my log post are adjustable for "square" and i keep them VERY close to dead nuts on, so there's really no excuse for out of square cants...

Rob


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