Storm Isha cleanup

Storm Isha left an obstacle that needed cleared up in a hurry, here are some pics!

In the early hours of the morning, blocking our way out past our neighbours farm at the end of our track:

This was the start of my “lunch break”:

Things went quickly, this was about half way through:


All packed up (nearly – I went back for those big bits later!) and off back to work:

Milling massive beech tree trunk

Pics and updates on milling a large beech tree trunk.

This is the trunk section from this massive tree:

that blew over in a storm back in 2019.
I posted progress on here:
https://www.donaldsimpson.co.uk/2020/07/27/slabs-sleepers-and-stumps/

This giant chunk of wood has sat patiently outside my shed for the last 2+ years, like a massive looming todo list…

Now this is all that’s left in the spot it occupied for so long:

It took me years to get around to it, but only a couple of Saturday afternoons to mill it.

I used my Husqvarna 365 X-Torq chainsaw, along with a 42″ low-profile bar fitted with a 3/8 Lo Pro .050 ripping chain with 137 drive links… I am not looking forward to sharpening that lot!

This, for me, is a whole load of bar and chain to run. It more than maxed out the cutting width of my Alaskan Mill setup, which was just a little too short to cope with the widest parts of this trunk, so I had to take a couple of edge sections off.

The Husqvarna 365 did a great job getting through this much solid beech wood – I expected more of a struggle, but as long as I took it slowly and used wedges to keep the weight from pinching the bar & chain, it chugged through it no problem.

Great chain and bar from https://www.chainsawbars.co.uk/ along with their usual great service and helpful advice too, thank you again.

Here are some of the slabs that were produced – I don’t think the pics properly show how big these are, and they definately don’t convey the weight of them! I had to ‘walk’ the thicker ones over to the shed, one corner at a time.

These slabs are now stacked, spaced and weighted in my wood shed with a dehumidifier and fan on them (running off my small solar setup). Hopefully in a year or so I can try giving the thinner slabs a final flattening with the router sled then turn them in to tables.

I’m hoping that void and inclusion on two of the slabs could work out quite nicely too – I’m not normally a fan of epoxy resin but this could be a good place for it. Maybe?

There are three 4″ thick slabs that will take even longer to properly dry, but if they don’t warp or split they should become very characterful – and heavy – tables.

To fit these in to my shed I had to take out a load of planks I milled a couple of years ago, many of which have come out nice and straight – so making something useful from those is now next on the todo list. My wife has already placed an order for some waney-edged bookcases for the Yurt… possibly curved to match the walls… ?!

Storm Arwen- windfall beech tree 2022

Cleaning up a beech tree that fell over in late 2021 during storm “Arwen”, squishing some stock fencing. There were ditches on both sides so getting the tractor close enough to be much help was awkward, but I used it to drag out the thickest trunk sections and bring things home. I plan to mill the trunks in to slabs, and will add pics of that (and whatever becomes of them) to this post.

Pics of the fallen tree and damaged fence

Progress pics – a fun day or two of chainsawing and throwing logs around…

Bringing things home – mostly firewood but a few big sections…

All cleaned up like new – the fence needed some new posts & staples but it’s now stock proof again. The stump and a section of trunk are left to keep bugs & critters happy:

Will add posts on progress when milling the trunk sections….

Slabs, Sleepers and Stumps

Some pics on a range of wood-related things I’ve been working on recently.

Bringing home the last of the Beech tree 2019, finally! Dealing with the massive trunk & stump sections – they’re to be sealed, slabbed and stored away for milling next year…

Some nice Oak Sleepers brought over by a friend, which I’m experimenting with – hopefully going to be some chunky tables, benches and maybe other things too.

Slabs from old Beech wood that’s gone a bit soft with white rot, and some slabs from decent beech that’s been drying for about a year – more tables coming soon hopefully.

Lockdown lumber

Some pics of a fallen beech tree being chopped up for firewood and milling.

One half of this tree had fallen on a neighbours track, and I spent a sunny afternoon self-isolating with it and a couple of chainsaws.

The “before” pics… it looks like a branch in these shots, but it was quite a lot of wood.

After some limbing and bucking and a mild case of sunburn:

Gear – the Husqvarna 365 with its 20″ bar on and a recent chain from chainsawbars did almost all of the work no problem. My old Mountfield was having an off-day.

Root cause analysis – the lower 4 foot was rotten through.
The other half of the tree is still standing and looks to be ok though.

The good bits – I left these nice and straight looking 6 and 4 foot sections in place to bring home with the tractor later.
The ends have been sealed and I plan to mill them in to 2″ planks and maybe some thicker slabs

The (panoramic) aftermath

And a truck full (ok, not quite, it was a long afternoon) of firewood that was delivered to a neighbour

Random Landy pics

Big spalted beech bowl

Some pics of a recently turned beech bowl.

This was made from a wind-fallen tree I chopped up about 3 years ago. I sealed the ends of some of the nicer logs and left them outside to dry out slowly.

This is the first bowl made from one of these logs, and I’m very pleased with the result – really nice spalting and not too many cracks, plus it was nice and easy to carve on the lathe too.

The unsorted selection of pics below show it on the lathe and on the log it came from, with the random traffic lamp for scale…

Beech Tree 2019

Recording progress on a large wind-fall Beech tree a neighbour has kindly let me have.

Most of this will be chopped up for firewood for next winter, but hopefully some of it will become bowls, planks, spoons, stools or other stuff over the next year – plan is to update this post with progress as that happens…

Some pics of the early stages and first few cuts:

This attempt at a panoramic pic shows the size of the tree better, pity I cut off the top of the photo though 🙁

Most of the first day was spent clearing the branches and chopping off the small bits in preparation to get at the multiple trunk sections next time.

And some shots of the first few tractor loads brought home and added to the woodpile – still nice and green….

Wooden boards

A few pics of some roughly milled Ash planks a friend gave us, which I planed/thicknessed and cut to length & height to create kitchen kick-boards.

Followed by a few pics of a chopping board I finished off at the same time.

The planks had been sitting around the yard for quite a while… here they are after a quick initial run through the planer:

Close up after sanding and applying a load of Danish oil:

Drying in the sun:

The boards are in place now and I’ll add some pics if the kitchen is ever clean enough 🙂


Some close up pics of a couple of chopping board made from a sleeper another friend gave me about 5 years ago – he’d had it for yonks so it must be pretty old wood. I left them extra chunky so when they get too scored and cut I can resurface them several times:

Spalted Beech bowl – green woodturning

The weather’s finally warm enough for me to do some woodturning again.

I’ve been wanting to make some more “green” Beech bowls from the trees I chopped up early last year. Here are pics of the process.

chainsawed a “50p” shaped bowl blank from a slab of wood that’s been sitting in the shed:

quickly and easily made round – green wood cuts very easily, and smells good too!

spinning at about 2,000 rpm:really nice spalting all the way through: some homemade beeswax and oil applied, with help from a bit of heat: inside done too… and the underneath finished in the reversing jaws: all done – will try and let it finish drying out slowly to avoid serious cracking, but it’s bound to warp a fair bit…

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