Portable Sawmills?
 

I live on a piece of property right along the Sheep River. The recent flooding destroyed a portion of some of the property, wiping out a number of mature trees. (We were very blessed that it was only trees and one small shack).

The flood also deposited hundreds of washed-out trees in place of those that it destroyed. Some of them are nice big, thick timbers (spruce) and seem like they may be more valuable than just for firewood. I've never milled my own lumber, and am curious to know if it would be worth it to get a small portable sawmill and make something useful from the mess left behind. Thought, suggestions?

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5507/9...342e481d_o.jpg

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2878/9...3ce493d6_o.jpg

Might be hard on blades
 

Enough silt and sand in the bark of those floodwater trees might dull a blade immediately?

Most of them look fairly clean, actually...although perhaps if I took a closer look I'd see otherwise. I think rain washed a lot of the silt off the trees as the water went down.

i can't really see anything that would be worth milling from the pics. not too hard to chip the dirty wood off.

i'm a big fan of the alaskan mills. nice to be able to take the mill to the tree. can't beat free lumber.


some pics from this spring.

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I have run a few mills(woodmizers) for several years.You can`t just set one up and start sawing,you have to know how to get it running true,how to sharpen the saws and have about 14 grand in your pocket to buy a decent mill.And,those trees are garbage and probably full of sand.Even cutting them for firewood will keep you busy sharpening the chainsaw.
Braggadoe has some serious good wood there,if you don`t have anything like that then forget it.

We had the same problem a few years ago, had a bad wind that took down lots of big spruce and pine on our property. Got tired of just cutting it into firewood, so last year I bought a Woodmizer LT 15 portable mill. I may be doing things wrong in the eyes of a professional sawyer, but I sure have some nice looking lumber and buildings going up around here.

just a thought, but you could buy 2 new saws,alaskan mills,5 chains, and a chain grinder for 1/4 the price of a wood mizer.

[IMG]http://i1142.photobucket.com/albums/...pseefe7f0e.jpg[/IMG]

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[IMG]http://i1142.photobucket.com/albums/...e/DSC_0110.jpg[/IMG]

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Thanks for all the replies fellas! I'll consider the mess and see if I think it's worth it.