The Alaskan sawmill is simply a guide frame that bolts to a chainsaw guidebar and gives a cut parallel to an existing flat surface. The first cut is made using a ladder nailed to the tree and thereafter, adjust the thickness of cut, and use the surface from the previous cut as the guide surface for the current cut. See the sawdust exiting the cut on the bottom right of the second picture. This is the ultimate in portable sawmills, is relatively cheap to buy (apart from two £800 chainsaw heads) but backbreaking work, expensive to run and creates a mountain of sawdust.
The Woodmizer is probably the best known portable sawmill but is still a serious finiancial outlay. It has to be towed to its work site and the log sits on the machine while a carriage containing the motor and bandsaw head travel up and down the log. This is much easier and faster to use, produces much less sawdust (ie wasteage) but is limited as to the size of log it will cut. It is geared to producing wide thin planks in a 'through and through' pattern ie. a series of parallel cuts giving waney edged boards. If you want fixed size, straight edged boards, it is possible but not so straight forward.
The Peterson Sawmill is known as a "swingblade mill" in view of its very large diameter circular sawblade that swings between horizontal and vertical for consequitive cuts. The motor and blade unit is pushed by the operator along the log and cuts horizontally in one direction and vertically in the other. Each round trip cuts out one straight edged plank. This saw is intermediate in both capital cost and timber wasteage between the Alaskan sawmill and the Woodmizer. It is geared towards producing straight edged planks up to 10" wide and can easily cope with any size of log. Extra effort and addons allow the cutting of wide, waney edged boards. There is also the Lucas Mill which is also Astralian; I am not sure which is the original and which is the copy. Pictue 2 shows one plank (actually bark waste) having been removed with with two passes up and down the log. Picture 5 shows the next plank (again waste) being removed. Picture 8 shows the first flat surface on the log; we are now ready to start cutting usefull timber. Picture 9 shows another flat surface on the log after some good planks have been cut; see the planks at the bottom left of the picture with stickers on them ready to take the next layer of planks. Picture 10 shows the flat actually through the centre of the tree which in oak usually has lots of faults and cracks. Note also a lot of sawdust on the ground by now; there is much more off the right of the picture.
Timber Drying My kiln is an Arrowsmith timber drying dehumidifier unit that I have mounted in the insulated container from a freezer wagon. It dries much slower than a commercial kiln and at lower temperatures but requires less attention too. I have found it gives a better texture of timber than commercial kilns and can be considerably faster than air drying. Picture 1 shows a load of timber on my trailer ready to be 'stickered' and loaded into the kiln. Picture 2 shows the load in the kiln and ready to start the drying process.
