# Square chisel chain for milling



## huskyhank (Feb 20, 2010)

Is there any advantage or disadvantage to using square ground chain for milling? I'm about to buy a grinder and I'm thinking it might be a square version. I can file a chain plenty well but the time to file long chains and especially long damaged chains is a bother.

Right now I'm using hand filed round chisel with standard angles. I've used 0 degree ripping chain in the past and though it gives a smoother finish I think standard round chisel is faster and the finish is good enough.

So what about square chisel for milling? Has anyone tried it?


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## BobL (Feb 20, 2010)

huskyhank said:


> Is there any advantage or disadvantage to using square ground chain for milling? I'm about to buy a grinder and I'm thinking it might be a square version. I can file a chain plenty well but the time to file long chains and especially long damaged chains is a bother.


I agree grinders are good for damaged chain buts for hand filing not being fast enough all it takes is a bit of practice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWwLEuY5Iao 

BTW - I can't see how a grinder is specifically made for sq ground. Isn't it just the wheel profiles that determine if its grinding square?



> Right now I'm using hand filed round chisel with standard angles. I've used 0 degree ripping chain in the past and though it gives a smoother finish I think standard round chisel is faster and the finish is good enough.
> 
> So what about square chisel for milling? Has anyone tried it?



I have two loops for my 42" bar and persisted with using it regularly for about 10 logs and now only use thee chains as spares.
For clean green Aussie hardwood it cuts the first 1/3rd or so of a big (40"+ wide x 9 ft long) slab marginally faster than semichisel, the middle 1/3 about the same speed, and the last 1/3 is much slower.

If the wood is even partially dry, or the tree is prone to sucking silica it's generally slower. This is all probably because it goes blunt faster. I've taken to lopping the first 6" or so of the ends of dry logs because just getting through those first few inches of hardened engrain will quickly take the tips off sq ground or chisel chain.


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## mtngun (Feb 21, 2010)

I assume the OP is asking about square ground full chisel vs. round ground full chisel ? 



BobL said:


> BTW - I can't see how a grinder is specifically made for sq ground. Isn't it just the wheel profiles that determine if its grinding square?


Special grinder and it costs big bucks.

I have not tried square ground yet for any application. One of these days I'd like to try it on my firewood saw, just to see what it is like.

If the question is round chisel vs. round semi-chisel, I wonder about that, too, but BobL seems to have answered that question for me.

Most milling chain is semi-chisel. It seems to work ok.

What got me wondering was Aggie's speed tests with 0.325" chain. He claimed a 17% faster cut with 0.325" compared to Bailey's 3/8 milling chain (which is semi-chisel). I'm sure Aggie was telling the truth, but I'm wondering if his 0.325" was chisel and that's why it cut so much faster ? Just a thought.


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## TraditionalTool (Feb 21, 2010)

huskyhank said:


> Is there any advantage or disadvantage to using square ground chain for milling? I'm about to buy a grinder and I'm thinking it might be a square version. I can file a chain plenty well but the time to file long chains and especially long damaged chains is a bother.


I don't personally think it's a good idea. The reason why is that square ground chain will go dull the fastest, even though it is the sharpest chain in clean wood, the square corner will dull quickest if the wood is not clean.

When you are milling, your milling logs that have the bark on them, typically, and that will dull the square ground chain.


huskyhank said:


> Right now I'm using hand filed round chisel with standard angles. I've used 0 degree ripping chain in the past and though it gives a smoother finish I think standard round chisel is faster and the finish is good enough.


You should try the square ground for yourself. You'll see that it goes dull very fast. I do use square ground chain on clean wood, and when I say clean, the bark has been removed, the sides milled flat, and the live edges drawknifed to take the cambium layer off. This is not the type of wood you find to mill.

I honestly believe that some fleam is good, and fleam is the the outcome of filing at an angle, or IOW, crosscut vs. rip. Since you see a better cut with a normal crosscut chain, I think your seeing the benefit of having some fleam on the cutter. This is also true of handsaws, where some fleam helps in various woods, and especially hardwoods. What type of wood are you milling?

One thing that might be worth trying is to use .325" pitch, if your using .375" pitch now. The spacing of the cutters are closer together, which will act as smaller teeth on a handsaw. In days of lore there were a lot of folks that filed their joinery saws (i.e., a Dovetail saw) with fine crosscut teeth, while in modern times people mostly use rip. The smaller pitch might show better results, would be worth a try. The bottom line is that it is best to use rip chain for ripping, and crosscut chain for crosscutting. At least I am a big advocate of that with all saws in general. I would look into why the rip chain doesn't cut better for you, could be to do with pitch and/or RPM, a different rim could show better results.


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## Brmorgan (Feb 21, 2010)

I haven't milled with it, so I can't speak to the square ground issue other than the basics that (as already mentioned) it should cut faster in clean wood but will dull faster and is much more picky about the file/grind profile whereas round-filed or ground chain is fairly forgiving to a point.

As for the other mentionables, I'll be trying a bunch of different options out tomorrow, so I'll try to take some pics. My old woodworker friend that I milled a bunch of Cedar shorts last April for called me up yesterday morning to ask me if I'd like to come over this Sunday to slab up a bunch more for him (He calls at 7 AM mind you - "Oh, did I wake you up?"... Um... Yeah, just a little bit... Old farts, sheesh!)

Anyhow I'm taking a few different saws to try out. The Husky 395XP will be wearing the 3/8" .063 semi-chisel milling chain at 10° on a 33" bar w/ 7-pin sprocket for the bigger pieces. The 288XP has a 28" 3/8" .058 full-house full-chisel chain filed at a regular 25° firewood bucking profile (which is its job most of the time), and will probably be used in the vertical homebrew Mini-Mill-type jig.

For slabbing the clean, squared cants I have the 3/8" low-profile .050 on a 25" bar on the 066, and I'm also going to try a .325 full-house full-chisel chain at 25° on a 22" bar on the ported 181SE. Its higher RPM and better torque band might make this one a pretty quick cutter; I just put the bar and chain together tonight so I've never tried it before.

Last but not least I have a 28" 3/8 skip chain on the 041 Geardrive which I want to try out. I certainly don't plan on burying it in wood that big though. Just want to give that saw a good run to see what it can do before making it pretty to sit on the shelf. It's worth too much to mill with.


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## woodsrunner (Feb 21, 2010)

Brmorgan said:


> (He calls at 7 AM mind you - "Oh, did I wake you up?"... Um... Yeah, just a little bit... Old farts, sheesh!)



 

Hey Brad, that reminds me of the old Warren Zevon song "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead". Us old farts kinda live by that mantra. It's not as good a song as "Lawyers, Guns and Money" or "Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner" but it is a line I repeat an awful lot lately.
Sorry for the digression guys.

Scott


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## DRB (Feb 22, 2010)

Brmorgan said:


> I haven't milled with it, so I can't speak to the square ground issue other than the basics that (as already mentioned) it should cut faster in clean wood but will dull faster and is much more picky about the file/grind profile whereas round-filed or ground chain is fairly forgiving to a point.
> 
> As for the other mentionables, I'll be trying a bunch of different options out tomorrow, so I'll try to take some pics. My old woodworker friend that I milled a bunch of Cedar shorts last April for called me up yesterday morning to ask me if I'd like to come over this Sunday to slab up a bunch more for him (He calls at 7 AM mind you - "Oh, did I wake you up?"... Um... Yeah, just a little bit... Old farts, sheesh!)
> 
> ...



Looking forward to seeing your detailed reports. Really interested in seeing the difference between .375" low-pro and .325". I would like to run one of these on my 365.


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## Brmorgan (Feb 22, 2010)

DRB said:


> Looking forward to seeing your detailed reports. Really interested in seeing the difference between .375" low-pro and .325". I would like to run one of these on my 365.



Well, I didn't get to use everything I took so I never really took any pics. The pieces he had were a fair bit shorter and smaller than some that I did last year, some down into firewood length territory, so all I did was square the pieces by cutting them lengthwise by hand with the 395 / 33" down to where I could slab them with the 24" Alaskan (and let me tell you, can that 33" milling chain throw some noodles!). Some had already been squared off on one or two sides by the log home builders before being chopped off, which made them really easy to work with. 

I started out with the 181SE & .325 for slabbing, but the chain was a complete dog. It was a brand-new full chisel chain, so it was certainly sharp enough, and I even dropped the rakers four or five strokes with the file to try to get it to bite in a bit better. Still didn't seem to want to grab, and the saw wasn't having any trouble pulling it, so rather than waste time fiddling with it I just got the 066 with the low-pro and got busy. What a difference! It was cutting a bit rough because I have it filed fairly aggressively, but the pieces are all going to be planed and resawed so it's not a big deal. The cedar blocks were a bit dirty on the ends from being tossed around in the cull pile, so I ended up touching up the chain four or five times during the day, but when it was freshly filed it was cutting really quick. 

I have some 6-foot ~10-12" Pine pieces I have to flitch cut for a fellow sometime soon, so I'll be using the lowpro for that and hopefully will have the .325 modded a bit more to try again.

Woodsrunner - it isn't that I sleep a lot, it's just that if I don't have something to get out of bed early _for_, I'd rather stay up well past midnight and get up a bit later. I've always hated mornings.


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## ms290 (Feb 23, 2010)

has anybody tried filing at 0 degrees on semichisel? my milling saw (laugh if you must) is going to be my 170. im willing to try a few different angles here to see whats what. Matter of fact how does a 0 degree angle perform for bucking?


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## BobL (Feb 23, 2010)

ms290 said:


> has anybody tried filing at 0 degrees on semichisel? my milling saw (laugh if you must) is going to be my 170. im willing to try a few different angles here to see whats what. Matter of fact how does a 0 degree angle perform for bucking?



Zero degrees works fine for milling. Just be careful it is not say, -1 or -2º. Negative angles will force the cutters to cut a smaller kerf and you can easily end up jamming the chain so far into the wood you will need another chainsaw to cut the chain out.

Theoretically 0º should produce the best finish but be a touch slower and place a slightly bigger load on the saw than say 10º.

In practice the set up of the mill/bar/chain, flatness of rails or previous cut, and the operator are more important for finish than top plate angle. An operator see sawing down a log with a wonky guidebar/mill/bar setup and a blunt chain with different length cutters etc will dominate the finish over any top plate angle effect. Only once these other factors are minimized may the top plate angle effect on finish be seen.

With milling, the top plate has to shear cut fibres. A 0º top plate angle means it's like using a knife to chop whereas adding some top plate angle adds a small slicing action. In practice this effect is minimal at 10º compared to 0º. Easier cutting at higher angles is negated by the fact that the chain now starts to dive sideways and cuts a slightly wider kerf so now more wood is cut and some energy has to be diverted into doing this. In theory there is a optimum top plate angle for every cut to minimize all these effects and get the best finish. Clearly one cannot be changing these for every cut so so compromise position is needed. 

25 - 35º top plate angles are used for crosscutting because they create a slightly wider kerf. Crosscutting means the wood fibres are cut (actually quite a high percentage of fibre are torn) by one side plate leaving lots of small dangling fibres in the kerf that are then cut/torn by the opposite cutter. However not all fibres are removed especially when teh chain is blunt. These fibres partially block up the kerf leading to jamming the bar if low top plate angles are used. One can use 0º top plate for cross cutting especially when the chain is new but as the chain wears and the cutter gets narrower then a higher top plate angle becomes more important to reduce bar jamming.


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