Sawmill Days at Higmo's!

[Willin']

Any of you midcoast Maine folks that have any interest in a combination logging/ sawmill demonstration may want to check out Higmo's Sawmill Days.

Located between Bath and Brunswick, it's an old family run farm/ logging/ sawing/ music operation on the shores of Merrymeeting Bay.

http://higmos.com/events.html

In addition to showcasing logging practices from horsedrawn to modern day and bandsaw as well as circular saw milling, there are prizes, a bonfire and free camping.

Here's the schedule:

Activities

Saturday November 7th
"Logging In Action...Past & Present"
Including ax, cross-cut saws, horses, antique & modern chainsaws, crawlers, farm tractors, skidders & log trucks. Also special road building crew at work with a cable shovel & antique dump trucks plus Tow behind & Power Graders.

"No formal dinner plans but there will be a Bonfire at Dusk... Maybe bring your own toastables?"

Sunday November 8th
"Saw Mill & Wood Processing Day"
*Running 2 different sawmills...Band Saw Mill and Circular Saw Mill.
*Log Scaling
*Lumber Grading
*Various types of firewood processing
*Ax throwing
*Sawdust Pile Treasure Hunt for Kids

"This is a FREE FOR ALL Fun event. There will be food & raffles"


Allen's Mom and family cook up a mess of delicious free food too. This is a genuine community outreach program and well worth a look for those of you hoping to find a sawyer willing to do custom milling (he cuts for several local boatbuilders). There'll be live music at noon on Sunday, too.

Here's a link to pictures from last year's event:

http://higmos.com/sawmilldays08.html

Highly recommended, especially given the warm weather report.

[BobW]

That looks like a fun weekend!

Becoming August sounds a bit like the Pretenders...

Bob

[PeterSibley]

I'll be there !

[Willin']

Originally Posted by PeterSibley

I'll be there !

You bring the VB and Bundy, I'll supply the lobsters!

[StevenBauer]

We were heading up to Bath today to drop some things off at my sister's house and see my niece in a performance of Dracula so we went up a little early to check out Sawmill Days. Thanks for the heads up, Mark.
What a cool event! From the minute we got there we were already seeing some fantastic stuff.

Like this:



And this:



And this:

[StevenBauer]

But there's more!

How about this wood splitter?






I've got video uploading now.

A cool Massey-Fergusson:


With this scary looking saw mounted on the back:


Video of this one, too.

[Garret]

Rats! I'm going to Georgetown in 2 weeks. Timing is everything...

Having both logged & worked in a sawmill, I'd have found that interesting.

Cool trucks & stuff too!

[StevenBauer]

There were a couple of Woodmizer bandsaw mills running:



But the most awesome thing was the big mill:

[StevenBauer]

We missed the logging demos yesterday, they cut some trees down by hand (misery whip!) and dragged the logs out of the woods with a team of horses. There was a huge spread of food and drinks and the band was great. They had a couple of raffles going, one for a chainsaw and another for a third of a cord of firewood. We had to leave to go to the play but we had a message on our answering machine from Willin' when we got home that we won the firewood raffle! Woohoo! Mark told them to drop it in the back of his truck and he's bringing it down to us tomorrow. Mark, you are the Man!

Here are a couple of stray pics:













We'll be going back again next year for sure. Stay tuned for videos. They're worth waiting for.

Steven

[purri]

I get the shivers any time I hear a big sawmill operating, scary stuff!

[StevenBauer]

Here are a couple of videos.

The first one shows the scary cutoff saw on the Massey-Fergusson and a cool machine that drags a whole log in one end and slices it to length with a guillotine then splits it in quarters. Log in, cordwood out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_b1xszvwvw


The next one shows a wood splitter made in 1916, still going strong:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gip9rWap8K0



Steven

[Garret]

Originally Posted by StevenBauer

Here are a couple of videos.

The first one shows the scary cutoff saw on the Massey-Fergusson and a cool machine that drags a whole log in one end and slices it to length with a guillotine then splits it in quarters. Log in, cordwood out.

Hi - thanks for the videos. I (many years ago) worked in a similar sawmill. Once upon a time, northern New England had 100's of those small Lane mills scattered around the countryside.

The first job for any new employee was running the "slab saw", which cut up the slabs from the outer part of the log (just as the guy is doing in the video) & trimmings from the board edger into 16" lengths - which were then sold as stove wood.

No guards, nothing covering the belts driving it - OSHA woulda had a field day if they'd been around then. However - because there were no guards, everyone knew that they had to be their own "guard" & that the consequences of not paying attention could be catastrophic. I'm not 100% convinced that putting guards on everything is safer. I think too many people take the guards for granted & assume that absolutely everything is guarded & therefore don't pay as much attention.

I'm not saying we shouldn't use guards! Just that no guard is a substitute for uncommon sense.

That old splitter is pretty cool. Very easy to lose a finger with the speed it travels at! I like my hydraulics - where I control whether or not the ram is moving ;-)

[StevenBauer]

I wish we had seen the big mill running but we had left before they fired it up. They had a board edger, too, but I didn't get a picture.


Steven

[Garret]

Originally Posted by StevenBauer

I wish we had seen the big mill running but we had left before they fired it up. They had a board edger, too, but I didn't get a picture.


Steven

You woulda wanted ear defenders! I must admit that I'd think twice before firing the mill up with all those people there.

It also may be a real task to fire it. The mill I worked in had a WW2 caterpillar tank engine. Grease everything, check fluids & then fire up a 2 cyl gas pony engine, get that running smoothly, then use it to turn over the diesel. Was usually a 45 min operation every AM - if things went well.

[Mrleft8]

Raycon has one of those cordwood saws hooked up to the back of my old 8-N. My grandfather used to have me cutting firewood on one just like it when I was 8 or so years old. Scared the crap outta me then, and still does today! Right at the end of the wood splitter video it looks like someone fired up an old Cletrac skidder/dozer....Did you get a good look at that?