Daryl, we do both types of sawing. But before you hand out any more compliments, I should tell you of the oversite I had. You see I am a farmer first, an arborist second and a sawyer last. The 30" mill was purchased to deal with our scrap from the tree care operation, when we are hired to do a tree job, the clients always gets first dibs on the wood and the chips (12" bandit), so we are a bit hard on the firewood stuff unless instructed otherwise. The chips can be hit-and-miss, depending where we are working, and we always have to deal with the large diameter wood.
My oversite was the fact that ALL wood milled in North America that is going to be used in construction MUST be graded. I didn't even think of THAT.
Our closest grader is 175 miles away, and he is a tad expensive to use. Therefore all our wood is being cut for porosity fencing for cattle. If you check on this thread
TreeDimensional's set up you will see that I am a bit limited in raw product.
I am considering taking the grading course, but it is unlikley I will ever re-coup the investment. It is also something that requires continual use or you get stale, just like welding.
While I was typing this RDMOTT made a good point, logs that are not going to be milled immediatley should be cut about 1' longer than their intended use and sealed, especially if the conditions could cause them to desicate.
If you have quality wood, I might suggest that you cut extra long, seal the end, and debark. Let the log dry out slowly and benefit from less losses at milling and drying time. Store as you would milled lumber.
Brent