After looking at chainsaw mills and pricing bandsaw mills, I determined that the best option for me to achieve my purpose would be a Sawmill Kit. I searched the internet and decided on a basic kit that is a copy of a Linn 1900 mill. You can buy genuine Linn plans and a video from Linn. They allow you to build a mill from their plans for your own use, but not to sell for profit. They also sell parts and kits of various size, depending on how much fabrication you want to do yourself. I paid about $1300.00 for a basic kit, delivered. It includes the basic saw components. There is a picture of the kit farther down the page. I will use a 13 H.P. motor and a Hilliard centrifugal clutch. This thing will cut a 36" log up to 16 feet long. Most of my timber is a lot smaller than that.

Here's a picture of what it is supposed to look like when it is finished. We'll see......

8/13/2010

It was ordered 2 days ago, should be here in a week or so. Meanwhile, I'm waiting for a material list for the structural steel which I can buy locally and have delivered free.

8/16/2010

First update: Got the plans, video, etc. in the mail today. Looks kind of daunting at first, but after reading through a couple times, I think I've got it pretty well figured out. I can see this thing will nickle and dime me to death. Even with a good supply of hardware in my shop, I still spent about 70 bucks on just nuts, bolts, washers etc. So far I'm at about $1750 and haven't bought the steel yet! The guy that sells the kit gets about $5-6000 for a complete mill, so I'm still ahead.....so far!

8/17/2010

Ordered my hardware from Grainger.com yesterday and it showed up on my doorstep today. Good sign.

I was going to make the 20 foot rails all in one piece, but after thinking about balancing 20 feet of 3X3X3/8 angle iron on the drill press, I decided to follow the plans and make 2 10 foot sections and bolt them together. This will be a semi- permanent installation. The 20 foot track will be bolted down to 8 4X6's pressure treated spaced per specs of the plan.

I ordered the engine and centrifugal clutch. Engine is 13 H.P. Clutch is 3.7" dia pulley for "b" belt.

8/18/2010

Spent part of the day rummaging through my scrap metal and started making little brackets and stuff. I think this is the most time consuming part of the whole job. This thing has a zillion parts.........

Update: I probably cut a few things that I didn't need. Next time, I'd wait for the whole thing to get here and cut the little things as I needed them.

8/19/2010

Steel arrived today. Got here late so didn't accomplish much. Cut the cross pieces for the track and welded the flanges on them. Instructions call for EXACTLY 41" wide on these so I rigged up a jig so they would all be the same and as close to 41" as I'm capable of measuring. Tomorrow I'll cut the main track pieces and install these cross pieces.

8/20/2010

Spent hours cutting pieces of steel, must have made a hundred cuts or more. The Chinese blade on the bandsaw held up well and is still going strong. I drilled the holes in two of the four rails. The rails weigh about 50# each and it's too much for one guy to balance on a drill press so I did it on the table with a 1/2" drill motor. Kind of time consuming and not much fun. I think I've spent all the big money, so from here on, it's nickels and dimes I hope.

8/21/2010

Lotsa cutting, drilling, tapping. Got the track assembled today. Top of rails is 41 3/8" c to c. length is 20 feet. Assembly is simple using 3/8 x 1 1/4 bolts. The picture pretty much tells it all. Started making the loggy doggys today. Disassembled track for painting. My back's killing me!

8/23/2010

Engine arrived today, looks good. Hope it will run. Finished all the log dog assemblies and primered the track. I'm going to assemble it again so I can check out the saw carriage before doing a lot of welding. Now I can finally start building the actual sawmill.

8/25/2010

Put the clutch on the engine. Had to make a 9/16" wide spacer to slide over the shaft to move the clutch out 1/8" from being flush with the shaft so I could put a bolt in the shaft to hold the clutch securely. The dinky set screw didn't look all that healthy. Started the engine (after adding oil and gas). It fired off on the second pull and sounds fine. It was 106 degrees today and I didn't feel like working. I love being retired!

8/26/2010

Built the framework for the rollers today.

Here's what it looks like. The instructions are very specific as to where things get welded. One of the plates in this tubing leaves 5/8" to get a Tweco nozzle in. No way. I had to resort to my antique stick welder to be able to weld the thing in. Had to retrain.

Doesn't look like 5 hours work, but all the measuring, drilling, tapping, welding, takes time at my age. I was taught to measure twice and cut once. Now I measure three times, cut once, tack weld, measure again, then weld. So far on this project, I have not had to redo anything. This is unusual.

It's been 2 weeks since I ordered the kit and nothing has showed up yet. I'm getting to where I need some of the stuff, so hope it arrives tomorrow.

8/31/2010

More drilling, tapping, making little gizmos. Made the part to carry the sawframe which will attach to the carriage.

Got the carriage fairly well completed as far as the basic frame goes. Still have to attach the lifting screws which should be here day after tomorrow along with everything else in the kit.

9/1/2010

Well, the carriage assembly is pretty much done. I built the engine mount and installed it after this picture was taken. If UPS comes through, I'll have all the parts tomorrow and will finish assembly. After that, I'll give it a test run and if it works, I'll disassemble it, clean everything up and paint it. Then it will be ready to use, I hope.

9/2/2010

So, UPS came through as scheduled and the stuff got here today.

I assembled everything per instructions and common sense and did the final mock up.

Tomorrow I'll take it apart, finish all the welds and paint the thing. I still need to make belt and blade guards and take a link out of the lowering arm chain. Then it's off to the woods!

9/4/2010

Going to spend the day painting. When it's all painted, I'm going to photograph a step-by-step assembly so it will give a little better picture of each part. It may be a week before I get it all hauled up to the property so stay tuned..........

The Final Assembly

The ad for the kit says this can be assembled in about 40 hours. Maybe, if you have all the right size steel available, but if you don't want to buy a 20 foot stick of 1/2" flat bar to use 1 or 2 feet, you need to improvise and cut and trim larger sizes. This takes a lot of time. Also, if you're a dummy like me, it may be necessary to study the prints for awhile before jumping in. Anyway, I won't make it in 40 hours, but it will be made right.

The Final Assembly

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