Sawmill – No More Pile – Planer and Ripsaw

Worked for several hours today at the saw mill. Helped to relieve the stress from the 10 page pre-assignment paper I handed in earlier that morning. Otherwise I would have just gone back to my room and slept.

Today I stepped my game up. Mathias allowed me to use the massive planer they have there and after watching I hopped right in and started to help so he could go and size up more stuff to be cut.

Jacob’s wife brought us fresh bread and meats and insisted on me trying a sandwich. Great bread and meat …good lord!!

I arrived at the sawmill today at around 1:30pm and stayed till 7pm. I’ve got projects around the shop that I want completed. One was to cut a pile the sawdust and scrap wood pile that comes off the ripsaw down to size. As of then it was pretty inefficient. Larger pieces prevented the saw dust from going down the auger and being collected. Additionally, the larger pieces were not being collected so that they could be placed in bundles to sell. I saw this as money sitting around, however little or big the amount might be. Lastly, it is just nicer to have a cleaner and more organized working environment. It helps your brain and helps you concentrate on tasks, especially knowing that someone else will be there to help you clean up.

The pile of wood and sawdust used to go up to the top of the metal bin. So about 6ft and the pile just spread out from there. I didn’t even know there was a box under the pile, let’s just say that. I wish I had taken a before picture…I’ve really gotta get better that this lol. I always think, oh I have a picture of it, but the picture is just in my head and or I forget and move on to the next project.

 

It took me about 2 days to do but it’s now much better. The sawdust will build up again but we are able to recycle the bigger pieces of wood much easier now. Since the  picture was taken those wood chips have been sorted and the box cleaned again. I then put one of the wicker baskets beneath the shaker/sorter to collect the larger pieces. Then I can just throw them in with the scrap wood that gets bundled up and sold to a woodchip manufacturer who then makes…well…woodchips out of the scrap wood.

Now to most this would seem like a fairly arbitrary task but I swear I learn something new everyday. I often want to go about things the most efficient way the very first time. But that often results in getting a whole lot of nothing done. Now, I can see some saying, “Well planning routes or the way you will complete the process can definitely help.” And I would not disagree one bit. But, sometimes for me this is the trap I get myself into. I try to be the most efficient with everything. Especially when trying not to make things harder or more work for myself which I often do. But as I sat (or rather, stood) I noticed  myself just going in circles. Because by trying to do things perfectly the first time around…well we know it’s impossible. There are constant changes, improvements, and new discoveries that you find along the way. And, yes you can derive all of this from shoveling sawdust, if you so choose. Or at least it is the type of thing I tend to think about and get out of work like cleaning.

So, what I had to do was just start. I just had to jump in and do, literally. I had to stop myself from thinking about doing it perfectly the first time around. Being a perfectionist is one of my biggest inhibitors by far. So, I jumped in and well, I wasn’t able to do it in 1 day (that falls under listening to yourself and knowing when you’re too tired to keep going…oh and the whole school work thing :). I realized that it was definitely going to take me more than a day..this pile was probably over 6ft tall and stretched the width of the machine. But here’s what I ended up doing:

What I did to sort the dust / scrap wood

1. Moved the entire pile out from underneath the sifter
2. Resourced a pitch fork
3. Lifted the mounds of sawdust / scrap wood on to the sifter above (kind of hard to see but it’s right above the sheet metal collector)
4. Re-sifted remaining pile
5. Gathered all scrap wood from under the bundle station, rip saw (above) and added to the scrap wood that is produced from the rip saw machine (the machine you’re looking at in the picture above)
6. Finished after 2 days

How this helped me / what it taught me:

1. One day at a time (break tasks up)
2. It doesn’t have to be perfect the first time around (it won’t be I guarantee it)
3. Do things that will help the others that you’re working with…not just something you want to do. It’s fine if you’re doing something that you just want to do, but especially if you’ve offered to help another person…find out what it is that would be most helpful to them
4. Think of and make a process for doing the work. It does help to think a little bit about what you will need to get the job done (in this case, pitch-fork, large shovel, small shovel, broom, wicker basket, place to pile excess large wood chips)
5. Clean from the top down (you learn this when detailing cars as well)
6. Clean up when you are done for the day – there are certain times when cleaning immediately after you’ve finished makes sense. For instance if someone is going to use the area or whatever it might be right after you. But other times you’re just creating more work for yourself.
7. By doing something over and over again you will eventually find more and more efficient or smarter ways of doing something. Always looking for a easier, faster  way is what I do and that’s what gets me stuck the first time around because that’s extremely difficult to do, your first time.
8. Make mistakes – lol but around some of this machinery…that statement might not work out to well. So make smart mistakes is what we’ll say for this time around.

Lastly:

The conveyer belt seen above collects dust from 3 machines. From the rip saw it travels by auger down to the main cutting machine. Here it’s dropped in to a conveyer belt and begins the travel. Also the bandsaw feeds into this conveyer belt as well via auger. It then travels up and out to a holding room seen below. Here the sawdust is collected weekly and sold to farmers who use the sawdust as bedding and some in the concrete industry.

Well all this sawdust has to go somewhere right? (crack heaven)