best way to turn firewood into slabs?

[mark]

I'm sure someone here has done this...I have a pile of salvaged maple firewood, where the figure is too beautiful to burn. As I stack, I set them aside. I recently got a small portable delta planer, and decided to turn some of it into parts for this music stand I'm building. I was wondering as to the best way to get a flat side on what is essentially split firewood. The method I used, (and it doesn't appear to be the easiest) is to "eyeball" a cut on the band saw, then flatten that side as much as possible by hand, then cut slabs off it. Once they're thin enough, I run them thru the planer to get them dimensioned, then fasten a straight board to them and run them over the table saw. Then I have 3 straight sides. The hardest part seems to be getting the bandsaw to cut a relatively straight line when there is no straight part of the log to run against any fence. Any brilliant tips or techniques?

[Lars Stole]

[Dave Balderstone]

Draw a line. Cut to it.

[Keith Carlson]

What about a tall fence? Use a flat board - at least flat on one side, and straight on the adjacent edge. Then drive some screws (countersunk) through the flat board into the firewood chunk. Use the flat board as the guide along the fence, make cuts on the firewood. When you get close to the screws, remove the guide board and screws, flip the firewood chunk over and use the new flat side on the fence.

I don't know how well this would work - it's a question.

[Tony Mo]

Mark, I think I sent this link to your e-mail instead of to the group. Anyway, I saw this device at the local woodshow. They were using it to cut boards from logs from a firewood pile. Seemed to work great. They were using it on a 1hp bandsaw.

Tony

[mark]

like this. I tried the "draw the line. cut to it" idea, and with no flat on the chunk of firewood it didn't work too well.

[Tim and Stephanie]

I've done this in the past with the jointer - I just run it across until I get a flat surface. And, once you've got one surface, you're off and running. It's slower, certainly, than a bandsaw, but then I don't have a bandsaw, so it's a lot faster than _my_ bandsaw.

[Silvan]

Hand plane(s). Plane one side of it flat and then you have something to run against the fence.

[CW]

Fasten the log to a board. Run the board against the fence.

[mac davis]

get a lathe and have a great time with that maple!!

[George]

Flatten one face with your scrub/block plane first, then saw to a pivot block.

I use firewood all the time.

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Easy. I've turned lots of slabs into firewood. Just watch me in the shop and do the reverse.

[mark]

Excuse my ignorance -- what's a pivot block?

[res055a5]

wood, then use the bandsaw and then the planer.

I even use my hand electric planer for carving large logs in some spots. i bought one at a pawn shop...it seems that most people buy them to flatten out dimensional lumber. then they find out that they only end up using them about once a year at the most...so they sell them. it's great for us that use them on rough wood.

they are also useful in smoothing burls for tables and clocks. rich

[George]

It's a fence which only establishes the distance from the teeth to itself, allowing free pivot to account for lead in the blade, density difference in the piece. Think of a capital "L", with the horizontal clamped to the table, the vertical just prior to the teeth. It can have either a "V" or a rounded vertical component.

If you've got Duginskie, he shows it.

[Old Nick]

On Sun, 12 Dec 2004 14:32:12 GMT, "Edwin Pawlowski" vaguely proposed a theory ......and in reply I say!:

remove ns from my header address to reply via email

But you'll burn your hands....

[mac davis]

is that sort of like my "wine to water" trick??

[makesawdust]

-- makesawdust