Yellow Cedar

Daninvan · Mar 16, 2011

I was starting to feel a bit sorry for myself, my last couple of milling outings had not worked out well. I had basically been skunked by bad logs.

This yellow cedar had been lying around for months, it was a quarter of a log, twisted, cracked, weathered, and covered in sand. An excellent candidate for more disappointment! That being said, it did have some clear sections, and I love quarter sawn old growth yellow cedar, so I figured I'd take a chance on it.

First I cut it down to just under ten feet long. It doesn't look very yellow in this picture, I blame the camera.

The embedded sand was murder on the chain though, I spent quite a bit of time cleaning and peeling off the outer layer, but there was still a ton. I was sharpening once per slab, and on one slab I had to stop and resharpen in the middle of the slab! It was worth it though, I wound up with five nice planks, probably 12 to 16" wide. The yellow is more obvious in this picture.

As a bonus, it was a very pleasant day with no rain and just enough breeze to blow the dust and exhaust away!

BIG JAKE · Mar 16, 2011

When you have alot of sand or dirt....

I like to pick the cleanest side on the log, and cut or mill with the chain pulling into the log at that point(cutters facing clean side). My theory is your blowing the dirt out rather than pulling it all the way through the log and thus trashing many cutters instead of a few. Your chains will last alot longer.

bigbadbob · Mar 16, 2011

Nice cedar, love the smell.
It sure turns nice on a lathe.
Still trying to figure out how you get past the leaf lickers in Van.
and get on the beach with a saw/mill and loader, and take their wood!!! :dizzy: