The Chainsaw Mini-Mill: We’ve Tested Two

By The Mother Earth News Editors
Published on September 1, 1984
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The Lumbermaker uses the setscrews to anchor the saw's guide bar. Tighten the two bottom screws, then
The Lumbermaker uses the setscrews to anchor the saw's guide bar. Tighten the two bottom screws, then "snug up" the top screw. The screws tended to loosen during use, necessitating retightening.
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Scenes of mini-mills in use.
Scenes of mini-mills in use.
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Both mills offer stable platforms for chain sharpening — which you'll be doing a lot of if you choose to mill your own.
Both mills offer stable platforms for chain sharpening — which you'll be doing a lot of if you choose to mill your own.
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The Lumbermaker (left) and The Beam Machine offer workable (hard-workable) alternatives to
The Lumbermaker (left) and The Beam Machine offer workable (hard-workable) alternatives to "store-boughten" lumber.
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By standing on the same side of the log as the saw and reversing the normal hand-hold position, our sawyer felt he gained maximum comfort and leverage without sacrificing safety. But be prepared to eat saw1dust! To save labor, attach a rope to the saw so a helper can pull the saw while the sawyer
By standing on the same side of the log as the saw and reversing the normal hand-hold position, our sawyer felt he gained maximum comfort and leverage without sacrificing safety. But be prepared to eat saw1dust! To save labor, attach a rope to the saw so a helper can pull the saw while the sawyer "steers."
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Before nailing the guide board down, measure the width you wish to cut, allowing for the offset distance from the rail edge to the cutting bar. The guide rail should extend beyond the log end.
Before nailing the guide board down, measure the width you wish to cut, allowing for the offset distance from the rail edge to the cutting bar. The guide rail should extend beyond the log end.
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The locknut on the Lumbermaker's swivel bolt can be tightened to hold the cutting bar at any angle.
The locknut on the Lumbermaker's swivel bolt can be tightened to hold the cutting bar at any angle.
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The Beam Machine uses two setscrews (actually, 3/8
The Beam Machine uses two setscrews (actually, 3/8"-diameter bolts) to secure the guide bar.

Put simply, a chainsaw lumber-milling attachment is a device that clamps to the guide bar of a saw and rides down a rail attached to the top of the log being milled. Most are uncomplicated aids that allow a patient sawyer to make perfectly straight, parallel ripping cuts just like those made by an honest-to-gosh real lumber mill.

These milling attachments can be roughly divided into two categories, depending on whether the saw mounts horizontally for “flat” milling, or vertically with the saw riding atop the log rather than beside it. The horizontal units are generally larger, more complex and expensive, and much more efficient for high volume professional work. The vertical “mini-mills” are smaller, less complex, and less expensive, but we wondered just how capable they could be.

So we rounded up the two least-expensive vertical mills we could find and headed out to MOTHER EARTH NEWS’ EcoVillage research center to make some sawdust. From our battery of chainsaws we chose a midsize Poulan Model 3700 (3.7 cubic inch powerhead) with an 18″ guide bar, because it fell within the size range (14″ to 21″ bar) of saws owned by the average nonprofessional woodcutter. We were working with 8′ lengths of 16″-diameter pine log, freshly cut, green and sappy (why make it easy on ourselves?).

Of Beam Machines and Lumbermakers

We decided to evaluate the smallest, least-expensive mills on the theory that very few folks will ever have reason or opportunity to run enough logs through a multi-hundred-dollar horizontal mill to pay back its purchase price. But more than a few industrious MOTHER EARTH NEWS-readers will build backwoods cabins during their lifetimes, and even more will have occasion to mill out a beam or a few boards from time to time. Neither of the tools tested — the Haddon Lumbermaker and the Bushpilot Beam Machine — retails for over $50. That means, at least hypothetically, that milling just a few boards, or even fewer heavy beams, could pay off either of these tools in its first day of use.

Great. But do they work?

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