# 088



## DRB (Feb 9, 2008)

Today I went to my local steel supplier to price out steel for a pro-cut type CSM that I was planning on building. I told him what I was building. Turns out he had a chainsaw mill that he had acquired and has no use for it and it comes with a Stihl 088 Magnum. The mill carriage is set up with chain and sprockets for depth of cut & aux. oiler. I did not get to see the bed rail set up as it was buried under three feet of snow but it is supposed to about 30 feet long. The good part is that the 088 looks like it still has the original bar and the paint is not even worn off the bar.

Sorry no pics for now.

He is asking 1500 for the set up.

Do you guys think this is a good deal?

I think the steel alone for the mill I plan on building will be over a grand. He joked that he would price the steel real high so his mill looks good.

Ryan


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## parrisw (Feb 9, 2008)

Sounds like a great deal to me, That saw is worth most of that price. I would buy it, even if it needed a bit of work.


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## Juicemang (Feb 9, 2008)

I bought an 880, alaskan mill, 48" bar and ripping chain new for around 2100. I would try and talk him down a little. The second the saw leaves the store and hits wood its value drops considerably.


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## Matildasmate (Feb 9, 2008)

DRB said:


> Today I went to my local steel supplier to price out steel for a pro-cut type CSM that I was planning on building. I told him what I was building. Turns out he had a chainsaw mill that he had acquired and has no use for it and it comes with a Stihl 088 Magnum. The mill carriage is set up with chain and sprockets for depth of cut & aux. oiler. I did not get to see the bed rail set up as it was buried under three feet of snow but it is supposed to about 30 feet long. The good part is that the 088 looks like it still has the original bar and the paint is not even worn off the bar.
> 
> Sorry no pics for now.
> 
> ...


I like it the bloke's a comedian , I cant give you any real advice , Stihl's are dear over here , I paid $2000au for my ms660 over here $1788us , original price was $2400au before dealing . Cheer's MM


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## wdchuck (Feb 9, 2008)

You'd miss out on the fun of building your mill, your way, but on the other hand, you can start milling right away, and have a second saw to work with. You can have a stationary mill for at home, and a portable one for the road, sounds like a good setup to me.


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## hermit63 (Feb 9, 2008)

sounds like a steal


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## Jim Shockey (Feb 9, 2008)

DRB said:


> Today I went to my local steel supplier to price out steel for a pro-cut type CSM that I was planning on building. I told him what I was building. Turns out he had a chainsaw mill that he had acquired and has no use for it and it comes with a Stihl 088 Magnum. The mill carriage is set up with chain and sprockets for depth of cut & aux. oiler. I did not get to see the bed rail set up as it was buried under three feet of snow but it is supposed to about 30 feet long. The good part is that the 088 looks like it still has the original bar and the paint is not even worn off the bar.
> 
> Sorry no pics for now.
> 
> ...



I paid over $1500 for the steel,axle,tires,and the lights and wiring for my pro-cut type mill when I built it. With the winches, electric for loading and turning the logs and manual for pulling the saw thru the log, I have over $2000 in the mill.I started with one little saw and now have a 026pro,075AV,066Mag,and 084 Mag. I have no idea how much I have in the saws,30 some different chains and bars,Maxx grinder and Nick the grinder and all the other related support things that go with it.The only thing I would do different would be to start 20 years sooner. It is hard work but when you take a 28 inch wide by 10 foot Oak or walnut board off of the mill you don't remember about the work.
Jim


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## Locoweed (Feb 9, 2008)

hermit63 said:


> sounds like a steal



I'll rep ya for that.


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## DRB (Feb 9, 2008)

wdchuck said:


> You'd miss out on the fun of building your mill, your way, but on the other hand, you can start milling right away, and have a second saw to work with. You can have a stationary mill for at home, and a portable one for the road, sounds like a good setup to me.



I agree with you I was looking forward to building a mill my way. But this deal may be to good to pass up? It comes with a 088. Oh ya i said that already.


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## Gumnuts (Feb 9, 2008)

Sounds good .Obviously check the saw out first.It's been on a mill !!!:greenchainsaw: 
You know ,take the muff off and check the barrel.Look for oil leaks.
God forbid - am a Stihl man too............... will wash my mouth out later.

 THEN NEGOTIATE.


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## MotorSeven (Feb 9, 2008)

Sounds like a good deal. I paid $1200 for 20' of Woodbug & a 066 that had about 50hrs on it. Like parrisw said, the saw is worht close to that price. But heck, offer him $1300 & wave those puurty canadian hundreds under his nose:hmm3grin2orange: 
RD


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## DRB (Feb 16, 2008)

I bought the 088 and mill set up. Saw appears to have very little use. Mill looks like it should work out OK, not quite as I would have built it but OK for now. Only down side I could come up with is it has 404 bar & chain.

Pics to follow when I get around to it.


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## BlueRider (Feb 16, 2008)

Jim Shockey said:


> I paid over $1500 for the steel,axle,tires,and the lights and wiring for my pro-cut type mill when I built it. With the winches, electric for loading and turning the logs and manual for pulling the saw thru the log, I have over $2000 in the mill.I started with one little saw and now have a 026pro,075AV,066Mag,and 084 Mag. I have no idea how much I have in the saws,30 some different chains and bars,Maxx grinder and Nick the grinder and all the other related support things that go with it.The only thing I would do different would be to start 20 years sooner. It is hard work but when you take a 28 inch wide by 10 foot Oak or walnut board off of the mill you don't remember about the work.
> Jim





Sorry for a slight thread hijack, but how would you compare the 075,066 ad 084 as far as milling speed on various sized hardwood?

$1500 is not a bad price for the saw and mill set up. the .404 thing is not such a bad thing as that saw has the power to pull. All it will take to swith is to buy a new chain, the bar groove is .63 and is used for several sizes of chain.


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## user 19670 (Feb 16, 2008)

You got a bargain and you can always modify at least as easily as you can build from scratch.

G O O D FOR Y O U!!


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## wdchuck (Feb 17, 2008)

DRB said:


> I bought the 088 and mill set up. Saw appears to have very little use. Mill looks like it should work out OK, not quite as I would have built it but OK for now. Only down side I could come up with is it has 404 bar & chain.
> 
> Pics to follow when I get around to it.




Changing it over to a thinner kerf setup is easy, and you can sell your unwanted parts in the 'Trading Post'.


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## Freakingstang (Feb 17, 2008)

404 from the little I've messed with it, seems to be more durable and last a little longer between sharpenings. Short of a bandmill, there is going to be so much lost in the kerf. The difference between 3/8 and 404 isn't that great to me to justify swapping everything over. I might be interested in that bar should you decide to sell it, depending on how long it is.


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## DRB (Feb 18, 2008)

MotorSeven said:


> Sounds like a good deal. I paid $1200 for 20' of Woodbug & a 066 that had about 50hrs on it. Like parrisw said, the saw is worht close to that price. But heck, offer him $1300 & wave those puurty canadian hundreds under his nose:hmm3grin2orange:
> RD



I did and it worked.

Looked over the saw this morning for a bit it looks like it has very little use. Looks like the original bar & sprockets to me with very little wear. Man it sure takes a pull to turn the thing over with out the decompression valve.

I am going to have to wait till the snow melts before I will be able to set it up. Still have 3 feet of snow and it did not come above freezing today.


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## user 19670 (Feb 18, 2008)

*Good for You*

Hope you enjoy your new purchase


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## MotorSeven (Feb 19, 2008)

Cool, keep us posted. At least the snow melts in BC before it does on Manitoba where my wife is from, so you should be milling soon.
RD


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## slabmaster (Feb 19, 2008)

Switching over to 3/8 .050 would be alot easier on your saw and cut alot faster. That's just my thoughts. I tried .062 once and it was not only harder on the saw,but me too!


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## DRB (Feb 19, 2008)

slabmaster said:


> Switching over to 3/8 .050 would be alot easier on your saw and cut alot faster. That's just my thoughts. I tried .062 once and it was not only harder on the saw,but me too!



I agree. I mostly only mill softwoods. But I may have to wear out this bar first or use it for bucking instead.


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## 2cyblowtrch (Feb 19, 2008)

Yep. I'll check in on the positive side. That way you can try the actual milling right away and as you gain experience you'll know exactly how you want to build
your own mill!! Just check out that 088 to make sure there is no hidden agenda
with the Stihl. You'll eventually have several of everything if you like it anyway!!


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## Jim Shockey (Mar 9, 2008)

BlueRider said:


> Sorry for a slight thread hijack, but how would you compare the 075,066 ad 084 as far as milling speed on various sized hardwood?
> 
> $1500 is not a bad price for the saw and mill set up. the .404 thing is not such a bad thing as that saw has the power to pull. All it will take to swith is to buy a new chain, the bar groove is .63 and is used for several sizes of chain.



I'm sorry for tacking so long to give you an answer BlueRider.
I can not tell you the different speeds of the saw because I use them deffernetly. I will use the 066 to slab the 40" and smaller logs done to 28 or 30"" so they will go thru my mill (pro cut).I have the 075 on the alaskan for the big logs. I do most of my milling with the 084. Anyone of the three will do a great job of milling. I have always been going to time some cuts to see how they compared to each other on the same log, but I never seem to get the time to do it.


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## DRB (Nov 24, 2008)

*Finally up and running*

Its funny how long it takes to get things done sometimes. The older I get the longer it seems to take to get anything done. 

Anyway I finally got the 088 and mill fired up after some mods to the milling carriage, log bunks and dogs and laying out the tracks.

Here are some pics of some Doug Fir 4x12's I milled this past weekend.

With this one log I ended up with 2 heart free 4x12's, 1 - 2x12 to cut out the heart and a bunch of 1by and 2by stock from around the 12x12 beam.

Now hopefully the snow stays away for a while so I can finish the pile of Doug Fir logs.


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## parrisw (Nov 25, 2008)

Nice work man. I'd like to see closeups of that mill, if ya ever get the chance to snap a few pics.


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## irishcountry (Nov 25, 2008)

Don't know how I missed all this thread but awesome you got a good deal and looks like it can cut some good lumber! Nice setup enjoy it.


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## Zodiac45 (Nov 25, 2008)

DRB said:


> Its funny how long it takes to get things done sometimes. The older I get the longer it seems to take to get anything done.
> 
> Anyway I finally got the 088 and mill fired up after some mods to the milling carriage, log bunks and dogs and laying out the tracks.
> 
> ...



Outstanding DRB! How lucky is that! You go in looking for steel and come of with a deal. Nice going.


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## dustytools (Nov 25, 2008)

DRB said:


> Its funny how long it takes to get things done sometimes. The older I get the longer it seems to take to get anything done.
> 
> Anyway I finally got the 088 and mill fired up after some mods to the milling carriage, log bunks and dogs and laying out the tracks.
> 
> ...



Very nice!!! I would love to see a close up of how the bar mounts to the allthread.


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## slabmaster (Nov 25, 2008)

Great set-up you have there.Looks like it saves alot of time not having to put on and take off a guide rail. I'm inspired buy your mill and will have to build me one now for doing yard logs.Great job on the lumber too,it looks nice. Mark


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## RPM (Nov 25, 2008)

parrisw said:


> Nice work man. I'd like to see closeups of that mill, if ya ever get the chance to snap a few pics.




+1....nice mill and lumber. Would make some nice chuncky stair treads.


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## Brmorgan (Nov 25, 2008)

Zodiac45 said:


> Outstanding DRB! How lucky is that! You go in looking for steel and come of with a deal. Nice going.



Or, he went in looking for steel and came away with a steal. Sorry, couldn't resist that. Looks like a nice setup, and you already have it cutting nice and smooth from the looks of it. Now you can build a portable Alaskan-type mill so you can mill anywhere. By the way, where are you in BC that you have 3 feet of snow already? We've only had a few inches fall a couple of times so far and it never stayed for more than a day or two. Ground's bare still and it's been very warm so far for this time of year.


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## woodshop (Nov 25, 2008)

Beautiful beautiful doug fir log, some very nice pieces of lumber there, enjoyed seeing that. We don't get much of that here in SE PA.


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## DRB (Nov 25, 2008)

parrisw said:


> Nice work man. I'd like to see closeups of that mill, if ya ever get the chance to snap a few pics.





dustytools said:


> Very nice!!! I would love to see a close up of how the bar mounts to the allthread.



I'll post some more pics when I get a chance. Batteries were dead in camera today.



RPM said:


> +1....nice mill and lumber. Would make some nice chuncky stair treads.



That's the plan. I am cutting some 4x12x16' beams for stair stringers. Might have them cut by tomorrow.



Brmorgan said:


> Or, he went in looking for steel and came away with a steal. Sorry, couldn't resist that. Looks like a nice setup, and you already have it cutting nice and smooth from the looks of it. Now you can build a portable Alaskan-type mill so you can mill anywhere. By the way, where are you in BC that you have 3 feet of snow already? We've only had a few inches fall a couple of times so far and it never stayed for more than a day or two. Ground's bare still and it's been very warm so far for this time of year.



We only have a skiff of snow now. But last Feb. when I made that post we had 3 feet.


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## wdchuck (Nov 26, 2008)

Nice looking setup, and great lumber.


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## Brmorgan (Nov 26, 2008)

Ah, I see, this thread is from before I joined the site. I just assumed it was new.


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## DRB (Nov 27, 2008)

parrisw and dustytools hers a couple more pics of the mill.

The guy that I got the mill from had the all thread rod right through the bar. This made for a nice solid connection to the all thread rod but it made it a pain to remove the saw from the carriage. I built the adapter plates so I could remove the saw by removing the six 1/4" nuts and lifting the saw out. This is not how I would have built it but this works out ok for now. On the engine side I built a couple of plates that replace the side cover. The first larger plate is long enough so that it bolts to the adapter plate to the all thread. The second plate sandwiches the bar to the engine. This set up stiffens up the engine to bar connection and also allows the sawdust to fly straight back away from the mill.

Hope this helps if you guys plan to build one.


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## DRB (Nov 27, 2008)

A couple pics of the chain cover replacement plates. Sorry about the bad pics but it was so dark I could not see what I was taking a picture of. I am amazed they even turned out.


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## parrisw (Nov 28, 2008)

Nice work I like that setup.


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