Exposed beams/timbers, Sawmill, and lumber questions??? New house build.

[Bama67]

Hello everyone,
I am building a house that we will be starting around January hopefully. I am not building it all myself (wish I could) but there will be some things I will be doing (electrical, some doors, etc). I will have cathedral ceilings thru the living room and kitchen area. I want to have wood ceilings in there with exposed wood beams. The beams will be cosmetic only, non-structural. Also keep in mind I am a rookie when it comes to home construction.

The problem is, is that I am having a hard time finding some locally that aren't outrageously expensive. The room is wide(24 ft)so the long span will be 25'-26' beam, the others tieing in with that one will only be 12ft or shorter. Beams of this length are hard to find, and expensive. For size I am thinking 5"x10" or 4X10" I am not sure if 4" is to narrow for such a span, do I need larger?

My place is 50 acres of timber, so I was thinking I could just have someone cut them from the trees on my place as I have some really large, tall and straight poplar trees, and some pines. But then, I am wondering how I will get a 26ft long, 3 ft wide poplar log out of a damp wood bottom, I guess I would have to hire a skidder?
Can portable sawmills even saw logs this big and heavy? It would be nice to say that the wood came from right off my place.
And the wood cut off to get the timbers could be cut thin and used for the ceiling. But then I guess I would have to carry that wood somewhere to be kiln dried as I don't know if a few months is enough time to dry out.

I am located near Troy AL if ya'll now any portable sawmill outfits that could handle that. Or if you know of a cheap place to get the timbers, I would be willing to travel 6 hours or so one way to pick them up. Thanks all! And I am sure this is just one problem I will have of many as we get ready to build this place. I am glad to have a resource like this of knowledgeable people. :thumbsup:

 

[rekees4300]

. The beams will be cosmetic only, non-structural.

Have you considered fake beams? Nowadays they are so realistic it's hard to see the difference from wood.

Faux Wood Beams | The Look of Natural Wood for Less

 

[Raspy]

Since your beams will be cosmetic only, why not fake ones? Or are they already fake if they are only cosmetic? :laughing:

The fake ones would be really light. Maybe you could just put some double stick tape on the edge and press them into place against the sheetrock after the house is done and painted inside. :scratchchin: Or, you could just photograph some beams and hang the picture up there.

You would save a lot of work and cash. And your home will look very strong.

Seriously, fake beams are probably better than real ones if they are not going to be structural anyway. They'll look beautiful, be easy to install, be light and stable. Plus, you won't have to take any trees down.

 

[lockhaven]

OK Bama with a little Yankee ingenuity, sorry I could not resist :dance1: since the beams are not structural it would not be wise to use solid real to life beams. use some thin as in less then 1 inch thick and make the beam hollow it will take far less to hold it in place and a whole lot easier to put up. I think using fresh cut would be a mistake because they would not be cured and warping would be a problem. They will be far enough away that no one will be able to see the corner seems. I did this in my house to cover beams made by laminating 2X's I covered them with some white oak fence boards I had, the boards were ripped then I used the plainer to take them to 1/4 now every visitor thinks that I have white oak beams.

 

[Bama67]

I have looked at the fake ones, and they are more expensive than the real ones, also I have yet to find one 25' long.

I have also thought about casing the beams as lockhaven mentioned, but have yet to see any that I couldn't tell were cased. I know a lot of people wouldn't pay attention enough to notice, but I do, and I would know, and I just can't really get over not having real ones. Also the long one running across the 24' span would only be 9ft off the floor, so it will be fairly easy to see. Also, these are kind of the focus point of the room, along with the big double sided fireplace, so I want them to look as nice is possible, given the cost.
Also, wouldn't the boards I would use to case them need to be 25' long? Do they even make 1" by boards that long?

I will only be doing 5 of them in the house. So I don't need to cut the whole forest down to make them or anything. Also these large poplars are back in a soft bottom where we never go anyways, and they aren't doing me alot of good back there, so I would never miss them amongst all the other trees. I figure it wouldn't take more than 2 or 3 trees to do what I need to do, these poplars are BIG.

 

[piller]

If you want real wood beams it can definitely be done but they will be heavy and you will need to design the house for that.

More information about the project is needed, the dimensions of the space, desired spacing and layout of the beams, how you want the shorter beams to tie into the main beam, etc.

You are probably going to want to box the heart in the large beams and you would then only get one large beam per log section.

Back in the day someone would select and fell an appropriate tree and then hew it to desired dimensions in the woods using axes (producing the hand hewn surface) and then haul it out using animals. Most portable sawmills today can cut a 21' long timber, some operators know how to cut longer timbers. The main issue will be log handling.

Chainsaw mills can be used to cut long beams, I have one and that's what I use to produce timbers and some boards.

You mentioned having some poplar trees on your place, I just looked up yellow tulip poplar in Jack Sobon's Build a Classic Timber Framed House, on page 52 it says "this fast growing and often straight and tall tree is very useful. Trunks clear of branches for 60 or 80 feet are not uncommon. It's light even grained wood is easy to work and stable. Like white pine it has a multitude of uses and can be substituted for white pine in this frame."

By the way, in that frame the tie beams are 8" x 10" and span 18 feet, since you want to span 24 feet you will probably want something bigger than 8" x 10" to make it look right.

 

[s219]

If poplar or pine (ie, softwood), your best bet may be a chainsw mill (Alaskan sawmill). In fact, for beams, you can get away with the Granberg "Mini Mill" for about $90, which is perfect for squaring up beams. If you were cutting slabs or planks, you'd need something more along the lines of the Granberg Mark III, which is around $180. You will need at least a 75cc or bigger chainsaw, but this might be a good excuse to get one. Also need a ripping chain (about $20-40 depending on size).

Most portable mills I have worked with, like a Wood Mizer, could not efficiently handle a 25-26 foot log, though they can be configured to for big $$. The thing is, you need a lot of equipment to load something that big into a mill. So I like the idea of a chainsaw mill, which you can bring to the log. Then you need to be able to skid or trailer the cut beam to a location where it will dry.

Drying could be the biggest issue, as the beams will take ages to fully dry out. I know early settlers built with green wood all the time, so maybe you just need to work out the proper design and technique. The beam will not shrink appreciably in length when it dries -- the big changes are in the lateral dimension (width, height). If you can deal with that, then you might be OK only letting them season for a short while.

As far as moving the wood, you might be surprised what you can skid with a tractor if you get the nose of the log off the ground. Recently, we cut and skidded several cypress logs out of a swamp, which were 30" diameter and about 30 feet long. We used a logging rope and pulley block to yard the logs out of the rough terrain, pulling with a Deere 3005 tractor. Then, once the logs were easy to get to, we lifted the butt end with the 3-pt hitch (using a simple skidding plate) and dragged them about 60 feet to our chainsaw cutting area. Those cypress were standing dead, and already 14-20% moisture content, so we plan to saw and use them very soon. They will become 6x10 beams for a porch, and then some other pieces for mantels and interior trim.

 

[s219]

Some photos from that day logging the cypress:

http://hunter.pairsite.com/craig/photos_092312/

 

[caver]

Ask on the Forestry Forum under the sawmill section. Loads of experienced sawyers there.

 

[RandyBell]

Poplar would do fine for making the beams, but I do agree that drying time is where it will hurt, then you will need to have it planed and hope after all this that it stays straight and doesn't twist. I think that you can build a beam alot easier and lighter to cover that span, but it is your project.
Good Luck

Randy