Anyone have any input on board edgers I was looking at the 2 blade woodmizer {AH the orange coolaid is working again} but at a timber show I saw one made by Riehl Steel in pa and the quality was excellent for a low priced edger with 2 blades I am hoping to stay less than 7000.00 any input would be great I am starting to saw to much to keep edging on the mill thanks JB
We got one in the family, but I have never been around it when it was used, but just heard the guys saying that "takes all the work out of sawing lumber". I would think, once a person got one they would wonder how they ever got along without it. The only thing bad that I could see, would be like anything productive; a person would just end up sawing boards and not flipping the cant around a few times to get the best lumber possible, and instead "just run it through the edger". But most of the time, 90% of the boards I cut really do not matter on quality anyway, it more about strength. My neighbor (a great guy) has one for under $7000 Edger
Thanks for the reply lodged tree most of my sawing is locust and you spend a lot of time turning cant to try to get the most yield as possible the edger should help recovery and yield because you tend to edge several boards bat one time on the mill and more times than not I will edge to one size to save time when I might have got several sizes from those boards The main customer for locust I have uses it for decks and takes random wide and length down to 3' long so at 3.55 a board ft it all adds up
I understand, and know that PA is a long ways from Maine. Just bring up a truckload of your wonderful coal, sell it at high prices here, and backhaul a an edger! I have a lot of trouble edging on the sawmill I am using now. It is borrowed and junk (Norwood), so that has a lot to do with it, but it is hard to get a decent cut on the live edge side, then flip it to get the opposite side and have even lumber (as in a 6 inch wide board the entire length of the board). Edgers do well with that, and at $3.55 a bd/ft, you could justify the cost of an edger fairly quickly. Heck you could buy a $7000 edger, recoup your money, then sell it used and buy an even better one and really be ahead of the game in a year or so. For me, I jut cut my cant to the size I need in width, then start slamming out lumber. There is a little more slab waste doing that, but saves a lot of edging for me. For what I am doing it does not matter though.
Good idea sometime we will have 30 hour days and ill be able to go back to maine I fished at embden pond years ago and caught some outstanding trout One thing I do on the mill is put a 4x4 behind my slabs and a 2x4 in front it helps clamp them tighter giving me a better cut thanks again JB
I got the perfect excuse to come to Maine: we are working on possibly putting together a Firewood Hoarders Get Together next summer at my farm. If you scroll all the way down to the bottom of this board, you will see a subforum for events and we are discussing it on there. No time set up for it yet though. Still, come up to that, meet a bunch of us woodchuckers, then go back with an edger: all tax deductible as it is to fetch the Thomas Edger! It is a small world though, my oldest daughter is from Emden, Maine
I have a woodmizer edger, it was under your budget and works well (it was a twin blade). We have used it for both edging off the mill and also for cutting straight boards out of dried lumber that ended up crooked. Its a two man machine to keep it going, one on the infeed, one on the outfeed. Get extension tables as well if you are doing 8ft lumber. I cant find a picture of it right now but heres some 1x and 2xs i made with it
Hey thanks for the info that is one problem I usually work by myself [Just the three of us Me , Myself and I] and all the pictures of the wood mizer edger showed 2 people is the feed capable of pushing the board all the way through? if I would put a roller table on the output side would I be able to use by myself or does it require somewone on the output side Thanks JB
Yeah you could work it by yourself, but you are not going to get the production out of the machine that it is capable of. Of course you would have to walk from one side of the machine to the other to offbear the boards after loading. Might be easier to just edge on the mill?
Assuming the sawmilling is done in the same area most of the time (and not a custom, portable operation), why can't such an edger be set up like the old sawmills of yesterday. On them, the back of the sawmill had a set of roll conveyors that once the board was sawn off, would scoot down, and out of the sawmill. Ultimately it would still pile up, but after 10 or so boards and not every single one. For the edger it would just be a matter of grading the area so that transfer from sawmill to edger, then down hill to storage/trailer would be ideal.
That is what I like about my log loader, my sawmill will stay in one place and my log loader can take the logs from the stump to the mill. No dirt, no wasted movements, and the mill is set up in the best spot. (It loads the logs onto the mill pretty nicely as well) Now just to make the sawmill set up ideally!
Yep you could set it up that way, but you have to clear all the waste on the out side to keep it running. The waste on the engine side of the edger will essentially build up and not allow the boards to come out straight (there is little room between the frame and the non adjustable blade, only one blade moves on my edger) . If you dont need very straight boards, not a issue. the conveyer doesnt like the waste on it either when you are running wide boards. Hope this helps.
