What wood to use for a sugarhouse

[Johnjenner]

Want to get back into syrup making and want to build a small sugarhouse to work in. Any suggestions on what kind of wood to use or what wood to avoid. I am blessed and have a sawmill so can saw whatever i need if the trees are on my property

[Thompson's Tree Farm]

Hemlock weathers better than pine

[Russell Lampron]

Hemlock is pretty much worthless if you want to sell it but it makes some nice framing timbers and boards if you don't mind a lot of knots. I used pine because it was what I had to clear out of the area where I built my sugar house. If I had hemlock or spruce there I would have used that.

[amasonry]

built mine out of hemlock. called a local saw mill. an 8x10x1 ruff cut 4.10 a piece, can't beat that. built a 12x16 shack for 1500.00 with metal roof.

[NhShaun]

Used all pine for my sugar house as well. Except for the six oak beams 6x6 that I salvaged from an old barn. Be sure to put wood on the ceiling under the metal roofing, not just 16" oc strapping to screw to. Otherwise you'll be getting rained on when boiling.. unless you have a steam hood.

[Haynes Forest Products]

If you get inspected for retail sales all exposed wood in the kitchen must be sealed. You can paint it or use a clear sealer.

[DMF]

I framed all of mine with hardwood timbers from our property. Oak, ash, hickory, whatever I had. I am siding it with shiplap pine that I had to buy since I have very little pine on the property.

[maple flats]

Mine was built pole barn style. Except for the PT posts, everything is hemlock off my property. I started the project taking the logs to a neighbor 2 miles away, he took so long to get them cut that I bought my mill and finished cutting my own. I even made a truss jig and made all of the trusses myself. Be sure to put a solid deck on the roof, under the steel, it rained in mine the first year, then I added a hood.
Try to find hemlock without shake, I apparently had one log with shake and had to beef up 2 truss bottom cords.

[Ghs57]

As a timber framer, I usually work with white pine. My shack is mostly white pine, even the siding (which is not local though). I have some hemlock rafters because I ran out of pine and did not have time to cut more. The local arborist had a pile of hemlock timbers already cut.

We are hit here with the pine bore, and most of my large white pines are dead. I have been trying to salvage what I can from the trunks, but you have to be quick otherwise the worms have their way with the wood. Last year I came into several large poplar trees which were down on a friends property. I now have a number of heavy poplar timbers ready to go for my planned expansion later this year of my shack for firewood/equipment storage.

The first year I ran my 2x6 without a hood, there was only one place I could sit in the shack without getting rained on. That was even with a insulated wood ceiling and metal roof. It's better now, but water still drips off the hanging light. My hood is only about 80% efficient when it comes to steam removal.

My only other strong recommendation would be to install a real floor, either framed or poured concrete. It's so much easier to keep clean. I am considering pouring one this summer, but it would have been so much easier to have done it first.

[Maplewalnut]

I used hemlock on exterior and tulip poplar for dimensional lumber framing

[TapTapTap]

we built ours just this year - out off pine from the property. I have almost no rain, and no hood. i think the secret was the 12:12 pitch on 9 ft walls. metal roof was partly lined with pine boards - ran out of time and boards

[sap retreiver]

Use what you have. You didn't tell us what you have, as most others have said that's what we use just what God gave us. If you want an opinion on what you have tell us what you have

[Johnjenner]

Most of our snow has melted so i am starting up the mill tomorrow. As for what i have, mainly pine and oak. I am sawing jackpine,red pine, spruce, cedar, and oak this year. Not sawing white pine since i have lots already. So this should answer the question as to what i have to select from. Depending on what i use will probably do tongue and grove On the roof and cover with steel. On the wall will do ship lap to match the other buildings

[Russell Lampron]

Most of our snow has melted so i am starting up the mill tomorrow. As for what i have, mainly pine and oak. I am sawing jackpine,red pine, spruce, cedar, and oak this year. Not sawing white pine since i have lots already. So this should answer the question as to what i have to select from. Depending on what i use will probably do tongue and grove On the roof and cover with steel. On the wall will do ship lap to match the other buildings

Use the spruce for framing, the nails will never back out if you didn't already know this.

[Havingfun]

What the thoughts out there on ash? I would assume it wood be ok for timbers and under a metal rook but how about for exterior 1 1/4"? Of course i would have to treat and no ground contact. Thanks

[sap retreiver]

Needs to be treated if exposed. Otherwise it's a great building material

[Johnny Yooper]

just completed building a vertical log sugar shack in the woods behind our house; 75 cedar logs (and 3 spruce logs) taken from deer camp in the U.P., would have taken more spruce as that's a good choice as well, but only saw the one in the cedar swamp and it was handy and yielded three nice logs; also used about 100 pine logs from central Wis., and about a dozen popple logs from my woods here for door and window headers and jambs. From the species you have, I'd choose cedar for anything exposed, even if you treat it. I've been using cedar for outdoor projects for over 40 years (garden fencing, posts to support deer camp, log sauna, etc.; it's one of the best species for exposure in this part of the country. Even so, treat it nonetheless. You mentioned oak.......not sure if you have white or red or something else; if white, that's better than red if exposed to the weather. As mentioned, hemlock is another good choice for exposed situations, just don't see as much of that milled up as in the past. I had a couple dozen large spruce and white ash milled a couple years ago and I think I'll use that for the ceiling in the shack. This is my first log building project using pine so we'll see how that goes. Good luck with your project.

[claystroup]

Please post some pictures of your vertical log shack. What size is it? I was thinking of doing the same thing with the 8’ cedar fence posts they sell at TSC. We had a 10 x 14 vertical log shed with a dirt floor at our cabin in northern Michigan that we tore down about 15 yrs ago when we built our garage. Burned it up for campfire wood. Should have made a sugar shack out of it!

[Johnny Yooper]

Clay,

I've tried to attach a couple of pics off the shack; it's a unique footprint:20'x30'x8'x32'-4" (trapezoid), reason being is I needed to fit it between the property line and an existing road and the two are not parallel, so I squeezed as much as I could into that pie shaped piece; I split it into two rooms, one for boiling, and the other side will have two sets of double bunks, table, chairs, woodstove, sink, and an 8'x5' picture window, will double as a camp/clubhouse for the kids. The 30' wall is 10' high with a shed style roof with a 2 foot pitch in 20 feet.1863318634

[red dorakeen]

Clay,

I've tried to attach a couple of pics off the shack; it's a unique footprint:20'x30'x8'x32'-4" (trapezoid), reason being is I needed to fit it between the property line and an existing road and the two are not parallel, so I squeezed as much as I could into that pie shaped piece; I split it into two rooms, one for boiling, and the other side will have two sets of double bunks, table, chairs, woodstove, sink, and an 8'x5' picture window, will double as a camp/clubhouse for the kids. The 30' wall is 10' high with a shed style roof with a 2 foot pitch in 20 feet.1863318634

Nice building!

[claystroup]

Thanks for the pictures. Neat building that I am sure you will enjoy boiling in.

[Johnny Yooper]

Nice building!

Thanks for the pictures. Neat building that I am sure you will enjoy boiling in.

Thanks guys; it's been fun so far, much more work to go, will keep me busy this summer!

[Hunt4sap]

18765
Maple boards I sawed with my chainsaw mill from trees taken down around our pond by wind a couple years ago ...