How Do You Eat An Elephant?

One bite at a time, of course.

A couple weeks ago we ventured back into Mordor to do some yard work and house work in preparation for the return of Youngerbarndottir’s family to the region, as they might need to encamp at that house for an indeterminate time.

Unbeknownst to us there had been a microburst storm a few nights earlier and we were greeted with the sight of a large chunk of maple tree laying in the yard and on the deck.  While I had brought my chainsaws, this was an unexpected, uh, pleasure.

To give you a sense of the scale, the trunk snapped off about twenty feet up the tree, and the base of the snapped off section is just under 24 inches in diameter.

I have made no bones about my fandom for the Craftsman 20V product line, owning several drills, saws, string trimmers, and chainsaws.  Are they the “best” performing cordless tools?   No.  Are they the least expensive cordless tools?  No.  But I do judge them to be the best value of the type.   (PS- as much as I would welcome Lowes/Ace/Craftsman to support and underwrite my tool acquisition disorder, these are all tools I bought myself.)

The 20V chainsaws are invaluable for routine yard work and even more demanding work.  Just before leaving Shangri-la the little chainsaw made short work of a 12-inch locust post.  With that in hand I worked many hours in cleaning up the tons of maple, one bite at a time.  75% of the cleanup was accomplished with the little 20V chainsaw, including sawing up to a foot of trunk.  Admittedly it took a couple of fresh batteries, but I had them on hand, so it was no big deal.  For the more routine cutting the trunk into roughly four-foot boles I used my gas-powered Stihl.

Although the silver maple is somewhat of a junk tree, I decided to salvage the best of the trunk stock for some future use.  I was particularly interested in two crotches which will be turned into some sort of bowls on the lathe.  But first, that will require fabricating an outboard turning plate on the ancient lathe my pal MikeM gave me eons ago.  That will be its own series of posts later in the summer, I hope.

For the moment the boles are laying in the yard awaiting relocation to the old goat house where they will remain protected from weather and dry out slowly until I can cut them into whatever I need them to be.