Milling a 5-year-old cypress log

We have a kitchen remodel which we are working on in the shop and the wood of choice is cypress to match a door I built about 15-years ago. To match the rustic setting of his cabin, the customer recently decided to cover a wall with cypress and we needed a little more lumber. I had a few remaining cypress logs that have been there for about five years, so I took a gamble and milled them to see what I could get. It was a small gamble because cypress is very rot resistant, and it is common for us to find logs in this condition and still find plenty of good wood inside (click here to read more about milling rotten logs). The sapwood was starting to rot, which happens first in all species, no matter how rot resistant they are, but most of the heartwood was fine.

Check out the video below to see the process and hang out with me on a nice winter day at the sawmill.

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About wunderwoods

Hi! My name is Scott Wunder and I am the owner of WunderWoods Custom Woodworking. We build wine cellars, built-ins and furniture from local woods, here in St. Louis, MO. Recently, I finished a three-year term as the President of the St. Louis Woodworkers Guild, which had me writing a monthly article for our newsletter. I love to write, especially about wood, and found that I still had more to say. Every day I run into something wood related that I realize some of my customers don't know and this seems like a great forum for sharing what I have learned (instead of telling the same story to each person). The main thing to remember is that I try to keep it light and as my wife always reminds people that have just met me, "He is joking."

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