I'm doing a bit of woodlot maintenance for a client; cleaning up some deadfall poplar. The homeowner also wants some of the Buckthorn removed as it is an invasive species. I'll say it is; if all the Poplar fell and the Buckthorn were removed, the woodlot would become a vacant lot. I don't have a mill or a bandsaw, but these two logs are only about 4" & 6" thick so I'm going to try milling them on my table saw. Anyhoo, here is a pick of some I culled. Check out the beautiful red/orange grain:
That looks just like some American Smoketree I found on the curb about 3 blocks north back in late 90's.Quite dense & pretty stuff,its hard to dry without major cracking unfortunately though. Compared the leaves on those pieces to what was on a small volunteer shrub in my backyard - turns out I also have one here.Its about 20 feet tall now,5 inches diameter with lots of small dark purple berries (think elderberries but larger & single stemmed instead of in clusters). I don't remember what the flowers look like,but those berries are usually plentiful in July-August,can be messy. Cotinus - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I might take a hint from your post and paint the ends so it doesn't check so easy. You might want to get rid of it if it is indeed Buckthorn (and it sounds like it is) It can take over a lot in a few years and is thick & thorny. Here is a link to ID and it's behaviour: Common Buckthorn | Ontario’s Invading Species Awareness Program
Fire up the tablesaw! I can't wait to see what this looks like inside. Just be careful, milling on the tablesaw can definitely get interesting.
Subscribed! And anxious to see some pics!! Only and I second the idea of painting the ends. A couple coats of cheap latex paint should suffice.
That looks like a pretty thick cut for a tablesaw. Mine won't cut all the way through a 4x4. You might be able to get away with it by first removing the 'wane'; I've used that technique with the CSM to fit the mill around a log that was too wide to cut otherwise. But you'll want to use some sort of clamping sled jig to establish the first straight edge, to keep it from rocking during the cut, and to keep your hands off the workpiece. I've experienced a couple of kickback events with a tablesaw. You have absolutely zero time to react. Always remember, give up the workpiece, not your fingers.
Here's the latest and greatest that I came up with for my bandsaw. You could scale it down and use the same sort of system for a tablesaw as well. Mine has a runner that registers in the miter gauge slot, but you could even make one from a straight board that you ride along the fence. I've gone through several different versions of this jig. It can be very simple. One of my first ones used a couple 90 degree angle blocks that you simply screwed into the end of the log, then down onto a piece of plywood. But I would recommend these Jorgensen deep reach pipe clamps - they work great for this task. The pipe clamp saddles are getting harder to find though, you might need to order them direct from ponytools. In this version of the jig, I was just screwing the clamp down on a piece of OSB with a runner.
