Cutting 2x4’s

[b116757]

Last Saturday my middle boy 13 and I cut down three large cottonwood trees not huge but large. I ran chainsaw and hooked chains he ran the bulldozer. We ended up with three 12’ logs and four 8’ logs. He loaded them all on the trailer with the crawler. We dropped them off that day at an Amish sawmill cost me $.25 a board foot to have cut. They finished cutting them Wednesday we picked them up Friday evening. 127 twelve foot 2x4 and 148 eight footers we stacked them on drying sticks today. Cost me $337 for about 275 2x4’s that the carpenter bees don’t generally care to borrow into.

 

[hillrunner]

Will cotton wood lumber stay straight while it dries? That's cheap lumber as long as it's useable when it's all said and done. I often dream about buying my own sawmill but the thought of a bunch of twisted warped lumber always scares me off.

 

[b116757]

I needed a bunch of purlin material for some of the barns at the farm. I’ve got to put some new tin on some of the buildings in the next couple years. I prefer cottonwood over pine really because the wood bees leave it alone and right now prices are guano crazy at the lumber yards.

 

[b116757]

It’s not perfectly straight some will be but I stack it high in the same piles and then lay concrete slabs on top of the lumber stacks to help hold it straight as it dries. In that photo my truck was still in front of the pile and I hadn’t set the concrete slabs in place yet. I generally use the concrete slabs for most lumber when I’m drying it. At least initially while it air drying before I load it in the kiln. I normally do grade hardwood not dimensional lumber this lumber I will not kiln dry. As far as buying a sawmill they are great fun I loved running mine when I had it to me there are few things as interesting as seeing what beautiful lumber a log was going to produce. Then the Amish moved into the area and now we have about 6 amish mills in the area at $.25 board foot I just let them cut it and sold my mill. I could cut it for less per bdft but my time seems to become more valuable to me the older I get and my lower back is about shot.

 

[Bill]

That’s cool.

The old barn on my place is rumored to built all with cottonwood from the farm.

Some of the floor boards on the second story are over 24” wide.

Still there after at least 75 years.

 

[buckdeer1]

It will get so hard you can't drive a nail after awhile

 

[b116757]

I built my wife a 1200sqft catering facility several years ago out of ICF’s for her catering hobby. Most of the interior walls where cottonwood. I had very little trouble driving nails or screws in them. She gave up the catering after a couple years and we used the facility for family gatherings for a few years. I then decided to add 1600sqft onto it. I used ICF’s again and we just moved into it. Now I have a 1500sqft farmhouse I use as a reloading room. I love the ICF construction after we moved into the new house the tornado alarms where going off in the community we leave near. My wife in a panic asked what we should do I told her we live in a concrete bunker if I where you I’d bake cookies. Now the old farmhouse was built in 1903 out of native oak lumber that stuff does indeed get pretty tough to drive nails into after it dries out.

 

[hillrunner]

C

It will get so hard you can't drive a nail after awhile

Cottonwood? I've got a lot of that I would love to make lumber out of.

 

[b116757]

These cottonwood where probably near 20’ tall or taller to the first limb and about 30” on the stump. I was running a husquvarna 394 with 24” bar and had to cut from both sides to put them on the ground. As long as there are not limbs coming out of the logs they should make decent lumber. I use drying sticks every 16” apart or so and try and have one within 4” of each end of the pile of lumber so they dry flat.

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

I'm having my place logged right now and I they cut down several dozen nice cottonwoods. The largest was over 5' in diameter and while it isn't worth much per board foot there is a lot of board feet in one big tree.

 

[b116757]

Cottonwood is pallet wood generally speaking but good clear logs do make decent dimensional lumber.

 

[fishin coyote]

My question would be What’s on the top rack

 

[b116757]

alaskan milled sycamore slabs they will make beautiful table tops someday. I have around 5000 bdft of hardwood lumber on hand at any given time. Those are just some of the bigger slabs I currently have on hand.