# My newest BIY updated sawmill build.



## J & L Creations (Apr 8, 2017)

Well guys, as you know I ended up giving my new freshly built homemade sawmill away, to keep the peace with my X partner. So here I am building another sawmill for myself. It will be better than the first one I built, with quite a few changes or modifications built in. Will be shorter than the first (not as tall) and will be able to cut 36" or better diameter logs, the drive pulley system will be housed in the fender wells, neither axle will turn, just the wheel hubs, rims and tires will. The new 18 HP engine with a 1" diameter crankshaft will turn a clutch from an automotive A/C compressor to drive one hub and an alternator, the other hub will be adjustable left to right or horizontally to tension the bandsaw blade. Here are some photos of what I have already built. I bought (in kit form), new hubs, axles, wheels and tires. The axles ended up being to short for my purposes, so I made longer ones from 1 1/2" diameter steel stock I had, then threaded them. Used the same nuts that came with the axles I had already bought. Bought a new winch and 18 HP engine. The winch will be modified to drive Acme thread lead screws to raise and lower the sawmill. More photos to come.


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## J & L Creations (Apr 8, 2017)

Photos of the 6' lead screws I bought, the back plates for the fender wells and the fender wells themselves I fabricated then welded together. The flange bearings I bought, along with the longer axles, flange bearing boxes I made and wheel hubs. Now you can see why the axles had to be longer and not turn, so as to be adjustable on the back end for aligning the hubs, wheels and tires to set up the band saw blade tracking. The bolts on the rear of the 4" square tubing serve to adjust the axles in any direction. The flange bearings are designed to turn at high speeds and tilt in their housing in any direction so as to self adjust "articulate" for an out of level condition, but for my purpose they will not turn and I will use this self adjusting "articulating" feature to adjust tracking of the blade.


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## J & L Creations (Apr 8, 2017)

More photos.


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## IyaMan (Apr 8, 2017)

J & L Creations said:


> So here I am building another sawmill for myself. It will be better than the first one I built, with quite a few changes or modifications built in.



Considering the bad experience you had, I am very happy for to hear this.


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## J & L Creations (Apr 8, 2017)

IyaMan said:


> Considering the bad experience you had, I am very happy for to hear this.


Thank you IyaMan, I will not let this little hiccup slow me down, I will prevail.


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## Hddnis (Apr 9, 2017)

Looking real good so far.


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## J & L Creations (Apr 10, 2017)

Hddnis said:


> Looking real good so far.


Thanks Hddnis, they'll be much more to come.


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## J & L Creations (May 29, 2017)

Well guy's it's been a while since I posted an update and not allot of headway thus far. I have done more work to the wheel wells, joined them together and beefed them up in the rear middle section. Now starting to build the engine support and bracing for the blade tensioner adjustment assembly. Also in the photos you see two frames, the one the wheel well is hanging off of is going to be the sawmill frame. The front frame will be cut up to build log supports and what ever else I see the need for. The wheel well is just hanging on the back of the frame to make it easy to build onto but when ready will be mounted to the front of the frame with pipe to slide up and down on with leadscrew support. Thanks for looking.


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## J & L Creations (Oct 7, 2017)

Hello everyone. I know it’s been a while since I posted and sorry for that. I had to stop working on the saw for a bit, had a death of a close family member, still dealing with that somewhat. Hurricane harvey, high wind and plenty of rain, but really no damage other than the top of one of our trees broke off, and it’s just been to hot. Now working on my welder, fixing the wire feed on it. Once that is done I’ll be able to get back to building the sawmill. I did score some 20’ I beams for the rail bed from an old mobile home. So I’ll be welding them up to what I need. Saved some money there, a GOOD friend gave them all to me. I’m 65 now, got on Medicare and fixing to retire, need this sawmill finished so I can supplement my income. We’ll see how it goes. Made a video of me repairing the wire feed cable on my welder so here it is, enjoy, have a good one, Jeff.


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## Hddnis (Oct 14, 2017)

I've rebuilt the board in my little welder, also the mig gun liner and gun itself, that can take a bit of time away from a project.


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## J & L Creations (Oct 14, 2017)

Hello Hddnis. 
Yes indeed it has, the good part is, that once repaired, I will have saved some money not having to buy a new mig welder and that I now have the time as I just recently semi retired.


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## J & L Creations (Oct 28, 2017)

Made some progress repairing the control board on my welding machine. Replaced the IC’s TL494CN location U1, LM324N location U2, LM317T location U3, TIP122 location Q6, 2N6668 location U8, 2N6292 location U9. Also made some modifications to the board. In case any of these IC’s go bad again I will not have to unsolder and resolder components as I soldered in plugs for U1, U2 and U8. U8 also soldered in a leaded plug and installed another heat sink as I suspected It could have been overheating a bit. I might even install a little 24volt fan to blow on the board to keep it cool. Well hope this will help others with the same problems. 

Above was way last week or so.

Today I got my mig welder up and running. Wire feed works great now. After all the electronic components I had replaced, about 16 in all, I still had a problem with the wire feed stopping after about 12” of weld from a cold start. Took the feed motor off, tore it down, found nothing wrong, greased it and put it all back together. It really acted like something was overheating and breaking down, opening the 24 volt circuit. After welding about 12”, I could release and pull the trigger on the gun, the wire feed would start for a second then stop, spit and sputter. So I started checking other items besides the board, what the 24 volt transformer power was going through before it went to the board. Started lightly wiggling wires, all of a sudden one side of the thermal disk broke off, disk is between the two SCR’s mounted to the aluminum plate, this was breaking down and opening the circuit-24 volts to the board. Well I happened to have some disks from past work I have done, drilled out the rivets on the old disk, installed the new one with screws, plugged the wires into it, fired up the welder again, I welded 3 different paths of 12” long welds with no problems, so all the time and effort finally paid off. I now have a good welder that was given to me as they said it was junk. There was quite allot wrong with it. The transformer aluminum leads were melted off at their connections when I first received this machine, so I had to pull the transformer out, cut the melted parts off, there was still enough aluminum lead wire to reconnect them. Took a steel bar and hammer, flattened out the leads, drilled holes in them, reinstalled the transformer and reconnected the repaired leads. It did work and worked well to my surprise. So it took allot of enginuity to get this one going again. Well now I can start welding up the railbed for the sawmill.


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## rarefish383 (Oct 31, 2017)

Jeff, go back to work, you'll have more time. Just kidding. I retired 2 years ago, no regrets. I did pick up 7 lawns to mow for some extra hunting and fishing money. Then the computer went out on my 99 Ram $400, then the Cat and exhaust $1900, two new tires $400, the PTO on my walk behind $600. I did get my annual fishing tournament in, but now I'm going into hunting season broke. I made enough money I think I'll keep the lawns next year, it's just that every thing I own seemed to break this summer. Thanks for all of the detailed work you've kept us up on, Joe.


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## J & L Creations (Oct 31, 2017)

Thank you so much Joe, and I know what you mean. I have manage to repair most of my equipment before I retired. But my forklift I'm going to have to get serious about soon. the synchronizer's gears and brake master cylinder are going out on it, needs tires also. I can do the work myself but I want to finish the mill before I start another project. As unbelievable as it is I've got guys coming out of the wood work wanting me to do work for them, I guess that's a good thing. Doing some aircraft consulting right now and building a fully adjustable electronic spot welder for aircraft thrust reverser insulation blankets. there really thin sheets of SS that crack and have to be patched alll the time. Seems like I have less time now than when I was working. I'll be posting more on the mill soon. Thanks again Joe, have a good one.


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## J & L Creations (Nov 23, 2017)

Hello everyone. Just aquired an 18 HP Kohler two cylinder electric start engine from a Cub Cadet riding lawn mower. It is equipped with an electric clutch and a built in alternator. The mower was given to me and the trans was bad on it, so I junked it out and kept the engine for my saw mill. With this engine and clutch I'll have less moving parts, it will simplify the build and even though I had already bought a new engine for this purpose, it did not come/have an alternator or clutch, now I can use it for a log spliter I have in mind to build. So I consider this a real plus and it will also cut down on labor to build the sawmill.


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## J & L Creations (Jan 9, 2018)

Man, I started this second mill in March 2017 and now here it is January 2018. Time sure does fly. Didn’t get any thing done of what I wanted to in November and December, things just kept getting in the way. So now I’ve Gotten started again on my band sawmill project. Worked the last few days setting up and mount welding the pipe slides and wheel well frame together, then mounted the wheel well assembly to the frame. More photos here.


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## J & L Creations (Jan 9, 2018)

More photos.


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## Hddnis (Jan 9, 2018)

Always feels good to make progress.


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## Rosss (Jan 11, 2018)

I am impressed. Looks beefy


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