Some basic concepts and math for you, to help you in future projects. 1. The smaller the drive pulley or the larger the driven pulley, the more torque on the driven shaft. 2. To figure the fps of the blade, you need to know the rpms of the driven shaft and the circumference of the blade drive wheel in inches. (20 inch circumference drive wheel at 1000 rpms = 20 X 1000 or 20,000 inches per minute. Answer / 60 = 333.33 inches per minute. Consult blade manufacturer's recommendation for proper blade speed. 3. To figure rpms of driven shaft, the pulley ratio and engine rpms must be known. 4. For instance, many Briggs type engines run at 3600 rpm at full power, but this can be confirmed with the engine manual. 5. The pulley ratio is a direct size relationship between the two pulleys. A 2-inch drive pulley and a 10-inch driven pulley will have a ratio of 1:5 (one to five), which means that for every single turn of the drive pulley, the driven pulley will only move one fifth of a turn. 6. The rpms of the driven shaft will be the rpms of the engine divided by the pulley ratio in a step down configuration (multiplied if a step up), or in our example 3600 engine rpms/5 (1:5 ratio) = 720 rpm driven shaft speed. 7. Total formula to figure blade speed in inches per second: (E/R X D)/60 where E = engine rpms, R = pulley ratio, and D = circumference of drive wheel. 8. To figure blade speed for feet per second, divide the answer by 12. Tensioners should always take the slack out of the belt by pushing inward, not pulling outwards, and should always be on the slack side of the pulley system and not the drive side. The belt goes from drive pulley to driven pulley, around idler and then back to drive pulley. Connecting the system in any other manner will cause idler hopping and/or belt slippage. This should help you when working with belts and pulleys.
Man thank you so much for this video, I'm making a bandsaw mill right now and this helped a ton. Thanks for being real and for having the guts and gumption to post a video of what you learned to help others. That's awesome :)
I really appreciated the points you covered. The experience you have had with your mill and the honest description of areas of improvement were terrific. The engine thing is called the shaft that the centrifugal clutch is attached to. But I’m sure you’ve had someone else tell you that by now. Thanks for your video it helped me to reconsider some important things to rethink in my plans. You did a great job…👍👍👍
Not sure, but you may need more "wrap around" on the drive pully ....you only have about 30% of belt contact, and may cause slippage issues... Maybe switch to a flat pulley for the tensioner , pushing inwards from the outside of the belt...kinda like a truck serpintine belt. God bless.
i have to say thank you for posting this. i see a lot of vids about "i made a sawmill" but don't see the pitfalls. thank you for your honesty.i am inspired. be blessed brother.
If you look at a factory bandsaw, you will see they use bearings to guide the blade and stop the slip, wobble. You can get the tires foam filled, leaving them relatively solid and no air to loose. As the tires wear, you can use a router on a guide to retrue the tires. Good info you sharied. Also on the belt, use a dbl or triple belt and keep them short as practical or a serpentine belt with more surface area. Also, you need to let the belt have increased contact on the motor pulley, you dont have but less than 25% contact area. the less contact, more slip. With a little math, you want to run the motor at 75%, and at the fpm (feet per minute). Thx. Pulley math. perimeter is Pi x diameter. the Pi cancels out. So motor pulley is 12" / 4" motor pulley, so is 3:1 ratio. So motor runs 3000rpm. so larger pulley is at 1000rpm. 1000 x wheel diameter of 20" (my est) or 1.67ft, so perimeter is 5.25ft x 1000 = 5250 fpm. Recommended speed of blades, depending on the blade is around 2- 3000 fpm. So going backward math. 3000fpm divided by 5.25 is 570 rpm for drive wheel. So ideal would be 370 to 570 rpm. For 570rpm ratio off of drive wheel. 3000 drive motor divided by 570rpm. so Ratio of motor to drive shaft should be 5.25 or 5:1 You can buy a cheap RPM gauge off of Ebay, to calibrate the throttle. The more accurate the blade speed, maximum cutting speed and increase blade life. So drive motor can be 2" to 10" or 3" to 15", the larger the pulley sets, the increased friction, less slip. Lubricant/ water or water blend with wax solution cools and lubricates the blade. Heat in a blade or drill bit dulls it. Cool equates with harder steel and longer life besides reduce friction and increase blade speed. with sap on hot blade, you can end up hot melting your blade to the board like a glue gun. The indians used cooked sap to glue the fletching onto arrows.
Dennis not everything has to be put on paper in order to create, it's called envision, work out the kinks and just roll with it... most great invention never hit paper until someone wants to market it... pastor great build, i will be copying a couple of your ideals and enlisting my own while i build my own sawmill great video...
Hey Coy, you can now use a 19" sheave with a v-belt on it for the band wheels. I priced them out through Surplus Center for $107.00 for a set without shipping.
Hi there Pastor BCoy,I just watched the videos on you handsaw sawmill and am very impressed.I also built my own sawmill, but recently having problems with the blade climbing of the tyres, I tried everything to stop the blade from climbing of, but to no avail, so i decided to rebuilt my sawmill. I really like yours, you don't have any plans that you can help me with. I am a missionary in a small village (Seronga) in the Okavango Delta, Botswana Africa, training church leaders and also do a bit of skills, we have beautiful Teak wood here. Blessings Freddie de Waal
Well done , I built a portable band saw mill a few years ago . So far it has cut around 100,000 b ft of lumber . You can buy a lot of sawmill parts from cook saw mfg in Alabama . My blade travels at 5200 feet per minute . I used cast wheels from princess auto and then I had a local machine shop take 1/8 of an inch off the 19 inch wheels .Then you put a tight v-belt And it will make the tire the blade runs on . By the time you get your own sawmill built one is a lot smarter than when they started . If I had it to do again I would buy the cheapest one I could find and then build my own trailer. By doing that you have a parts book for parts .
Thanks for your video mate! I'm really trying to understand all the pitfalls before I begin building my own. Good points about the tyres and about the sawmill guides. Cheers
Your clutch should have as much belt as possible riding in the groove. Move your idler pulley in front of that clutch and let as much belt as possible ride the groove. It will save your belt and give maximum grip when engaged..:)
That's a really nice build. I noticed someone suggested earlier about filling your ties with foam. There is a kit you can get specifically for filling your tires to make them solid. This would keep them from deforming and might allow you to put more tension on your blade to cut larger diameter trees.
Your motor pulley is engaging the belt for less than 1/4 (90 degrees) of the motor pulley's circumference. That means the belt can slip easily on the motor pulley under load. You should move the motor farther away from the large drive pulley. Your tensioner pulley has a comparatively large engagement with the belt but doesn't need it. It just pushes the belt until everything tightens up and it needs no friction grip at all. It can be located closer to the large pulley so you don't have to change belt size when you move the motor farther away.
First thing I saw. Notice cars & serpentine belts... they OVERWRAP the driven pulley past 180 degrees so the tensioner goes IN not out. It'd have way more traction. Same theory works for knots & lashings, too.
band saw mills are the most popular, yes but if you ever decide to build another consider a swing blade mill. 1 no need to roll log after in place.2 cuts forward and backward /better time yield 3 huge logs no problem 4less blade cost/matenence 5no bending twisting of frame from rolling logs if cutting from suspended track beam 6 this type saw wins in the sawmilling shootout contests hands down btw admire anyone that can make their own machine like that Henry
Its all about your guides. They have to contain the blade as it is cutting, keeping the blade square to the cut and true. This is why the blades are coming off and cutting your tires. A minimum of 2 bearing guides on each side of the cut, preferably 3 bearings with one above, one below and one behind the blade. Also your idler puller between the engine and the drive pulley(10 inch) need to be on the outside of the belt and close to the large pulley so that the belt wraps around both engine and drive pulley more than it is now.
Thanks for the video. I will be building a mill this year and your suggestions have been so helpful. I was considering the tires, but, I think I will pony up the $$$ and get the correct wheels. I am a cabinet builder and finish/general carpenter and was lucky enough to buy an antique vertical bandsaw that has a 12" throat and will serve as a finishing machine. By the way... my "boss" is a Jewish carpenter.
Well you built it so you now know how to fix the small problems you have described. I to have wanted to build my own band saw sawmill. I have several notebooks and sketch pads of all the designs and changes to those designs to various styles and types. I keep telling myself that one day I will build it as soon as I finally figure out what design it will be. I have figured it out but now how to pay for all the materials. Ha ha. Well God bless you and your family.
I have to say this is neat I have looked and weighted my options and after seeing this video which I appreciate very much. I have decided that am going to build a swing blade saw mill it seems to be a much easier build and more efficient am just not sure I can get the bigger timbers out of it. good video
How big of a timber you can get out of a swing-blade depends on the size of the blade. A 14" blade won't yeald as big of a timber as a 30" blade, for instance.
If I were you, I would go to a junk yard and look for aluminum or magnesium motorcycle front wheels (don't use spoke wheels). The front wheels will have enough diameter to be easy on the blade. I would then use old inner tubes (split along the center radius and using the outside half of the tube) that are slightly smaller than the diameter of the inside groove of the wheels and stretch multiple inner tubes over the center groove of the rims until you create a solid blade tire that has a center "hump" for good tracking. That will allow you to make your blade tension much tighter for large logs.
If you use a shorter belt, and move your tensioner to the right, you can get more contact with the belt on your clutch, the more contact you have, the less slippage you will get.
A suggestion, build your saw carriage with the tires flat. Then inflate the tires to provide the blade tension. Cooks saw mills sells a blade guide roller that is adjustable for roller pitch. It is a nice part.
You've done well PastorBcoy. For the naysayers.. "make one yourself" then they can tell you how to do it. The drive pulley off the clutch must have a full half circumference with a simple take-up on the return side. It will last forever too. Think how many revolutions the belt on your car alternator has done over its lifetime! Thanks for posting.. Nice job.
thank you for your mill building videos I kmow you have helped thousands planning to build their own mill .....i'm sure you have gotten out all the kinks by now and are cutting better the way you planned it to
If you used a shorter drive belt you would could increase the torque handling. The belt length you have now is right about 1/4 of the engine pulley surface. If you were to draw imaginary lines to connect the clutch pulley to the driven pulley, you would double the contact area and double the amount of torque that the connection can handle. Its a good possibility the the clutch mech would slip before the belt, but optimizing for larger stock may make this a necessity. Good job on the make!
+PastorBCoy is there anyway you could make a minature one of these with something like a lawnmower engine,that would cut some short planks ,,,,say about 1 or 2 foot logs?....that would be interesting
Inner tube maybe 15 bucks,cheaper than a Tire. Japanese motorcycle wheels are larger diameter and cheaper to use and can be equipped with a spring activated disc brake for an E-Stop.
Thanks for taking the time to explain some of the potential problems with building this. Do you think Filling the tires with urethane foam could help with the tire problems?
Super interesting! Thanks! Im thinking of building my own sawmill sometime so i appreciate it, i think you might be using the v groove casters "wrong" but it seems to be working fine for you, also you might want to have your blade guide be like 1/4" below the bottom of the bandsaw wheels, thats what i read in a cook sawmill tutorial, thank!
If you make another "bearing set-up like you have for the blades and mount it to the top that bearing would push down on the blade to help keep it tight.and if the arm of it goes pass the top of the sleeve and you put a long bolt on that end you can place weights on the bolt to add tension.
Get that idler / tensioner pulley on the smooth side of the belt just like on a lawn mower. It will give you more contact patch on the clutch pulley (more belt around the pulley) and you'll be tensioning the belt into the drive pulley, not pulling it away.
The belt on the drive pulley has very little contact ‘ u are getting belt slip ‘ belt needs to wrap right around the pulley ‘ them wheel shafts are on the small side they might snap off the more tighten the blade the greater the load on the shafts’ pump the tiers up to 60 lbs ‘ good work there don’t give up keep fighting 😊
The blade will track better on the tires the more the tires are crowned. A blade will naturally track to the highest (largest diameter) of the wheel. This is the opposite of how standard V-belt pulleys work. If you use tires that easily make a wide footprint on a road surface the blade won't track well on that tire. Temporary Safety Spare "Donut" tires may be the best tire for this purpose. They are highly crowned and they are inflated to a higher pressure than regular car tires.
Great video and thanks for taking the time to share your experience - you gave me a lot to think about. You have a nice mill, and I suspect most everyone has to make a few adjustments to fine tune their builds after the fact. Especially with large complex projects like this. Enjoy the holidays!
The faster the blade the less the torque it has. The larger the wheel drive pulley the more torque and less blade speed you will have. Also your belt at the motor should be in no less than 50% contact (you have about 25%) with the pulley or it will always slip. With 13hp this saw could cut really fast. I also dont see any water drip for the blade to keep it cool. Hot blades are dull, all the time.
soloasylum: hmm. your first two sentences are false. Not just a little bit, but completely. You must study physics a bit more to get a handle on simple mechanics. Some of us are born with an easier go than others lad. if you are talking about gearing, the first sentence may be true in a sense. the second sentence makes no sense.
Change your belt tensioner to in between your pulleys that way you are using half the diary of your drive pulley not one quaternary as your present setup thus increasing your available torque happy cutting Erik South Africa
If you want a cheap source of wheels junk yards sell the donut spare tires for practically nothing. There is one in every junk car that comes in and they almost never wear out in the life of the car so there is no market for them. I've gotten them for as little as five bucks apiece. I use them for heavy wheelbarrows and garden carts but they should work for a sawmill. They are designed to run at 90 psi so you could put a whole lot more tension on the blade.
The drive pulley theory. A small pulley driving to a larger one actually increases the torque but reduces the speed of the driven pulley. It's all about ratios A 3inch pulley driving a 12 inch pulley means that the effective gearing ratio will be 4:1 (12/3 = 4) This means that the small drive pulley will have to turn 4 revolutions to turn the large one one revolution. 3" pulley turning at 3000rpm = 12" pulley turning at 750rpm. The torque will increase by 4 times of course
I know this comment comes a couple years late - as for the idle pulley design, the placement should always (if possible) be placed in between the drive pulley and the motor pulley. This increase the surface contact of the belt going around the motor (clutch) pulley. Take a look at your car, the fan belt always has the idle/belt tensioner pulley in between the crankshaft and accessory pulley. This could allow you to use a larger (>8"dia) drive pulley and still have the power required since less loss occurs from slippage on the drive pulley.
Use a slot type blade guide and it will stop the blade walking around. There are videos here on You Tube and they seem to work real whell or a bearing roller behind the blade. your system may be cheap but as you said has problems...
The crank shaft is also the drive shaft in this engine most likely. Need shorter belt relocate your tensioner so that more belt wraps around the drive pulley. Won't have an issue with slipping then. Good job!
He might be able to use the same belt. If the idler is moved above the plane of the motor base and shifted right it will increase the bearing surface on both pulleys. Roughly where his forearm is at 10:18.
the tension pulley is changing the gearing most saws with that much hp would not have a problem with a bigger pulley on the tire pulley. If that had a smaller belt with a tension pulley pushing on the outer side of the belt.
there are tires out there that have a flatter tread on the! try those. allso, take a lathe tool and shave some rubber off the tire , leave a sharpe area where the blade pushes against it!
One thing for sure You do have the right Idea. keep working on it You'll get all the bugs worked out of it. The tensioner pulley needs to be pulled up & the belt on top,, in turn giving you more belt on the engine pulley. take your time draw out & write down those idea's. I would bet Money the next one you build will be even better & so on.
Listening to the part about belt tension and power delivery it came to mind that your wheels with tires set up adds far more weight than cast wheels. Power delivery would seem to be smoother with the cast wheel type. They might cost a bit more initially but you'd probably save money on the size of the engine you'd end up with as well as fuel consumption.
Thanks for the Video and Tips based on your Experience and Expewrimenting on the build you came up with a pretty nice setup and design you had me laughing pretty good when you said you pulled that around with your Subaru i pictured being behind you on a major Highway shaking my head this guy is nuts LOL untill you described more details about staying off the highways etc When i was a teenager my Dad had a VW Rabbit that he pulled a pop up camper with although we did live in Florida which is pretty flat and it was only for a Weekend of Camping in the Florida Keys my Dad did actually bolt the ball on the factory bumper with some reinforcement Steel plate ! Ive kind of went the overkill method as i pulled all my trailers with a Full sizeAmerican made Dually Deisel truck from 30 foot boats 10 K lbs to a 19K lb 5th Wheel and on occasion Jet skis which you couldn’t even tell were hitched to the truck and Enclosed Car trailers many people used to comment on the rare days i only pulled a Jet Ski trailer which of course was a joke behind that set up but not what i bought that truck for
I totally disagree with your assessment on the tires and wheels. I made a homemade bandsaw much like yours However the BLADE GUIDES were way different ! and I am sure that is why you didn't like the tires and wheels.... my blade guides consisted of 3 bearings each one on the right and one on the left.... they had the rounded side of the bearing touching the blade under pressure not the side of the bearing... so when pressure was put on the blade the bearing guides took all the pressure not the Blade tracking .... I never had a blade come off and my 8hp B&S milled a bunch of lumber even if the trailer bed I put it all on was slightly curved ! LOL..... I cut 3ft. logs many timesbut mostly they were about 2 to 2.5ft wide at the base.... Digger pine (yellow pine) and White oak were what I cut mostly. the tires and wheels work great if you put about 60 ps.i. in them and true them (Very carefully) with the edge of a file before you use them to mill lumber with....( its dangerous to try and true the tires so be extra careful you know what your doing ! ) .... the most expensive thing I bought for my sawmill was the Raise and lower winch that had a break in it so it would stay put where I left it !!!! it was $65.00.... the rest I scrounged up on the Ranch....including the 30ft trailer that gave all my lumber a nice arch to it weather I wanted it or not ! LOL. .... the Bandsaw is far better than a chainsaw, I made my own Alaskan mill as well, anyone considering making a bandsaw I say this.... buy a pack of 10 bandsaw blades take 1 out ... and build a bandsaw to fit the blade..... even a 3hp B&S can power it, but it's slow the blade guides are very important they are what take the pressure Not the wheels and tracking..... you will go through bearings over time I've been told but I never had to replace mine yet. I have sense turned my Bandsaw lumber mill into a upright Shop bandsaw.... its original 144" blade length was a bit big for my shop so I changed the distance between the wheels and bought smaller blades....... the blade guides are still in use. I also had a 3rd (un-nessarry) blade guide on the return side because I was paranoid.... it's been removed for my shop version. ..... I used a 1 gallon water container to drip water on the blade to help clear sawdust and keep the blade cool. All in all it worked ( all but the Non flat surface to cut on ! ) Remember.... don't rub the bearing on the side... let it Roll with the blade both on the sides and on the back of the blade none of them should turn when not cutting a board.... soon as you cut then they should enguage. ( about 1/32" or 1/16" clearance) ..... Keep your flesh away from that blade, or loose it ! Hope that helps Bob.......
Bob Kelly - nice explanation. I think a couple of jacks at the far points (outriggers?) might of worked to take the bow out. Did you swap to electric motor bringing it inside?
I tried Jacking the trailer up on the 4 corners it lessened the bow only slightly with a 3 ft x 12 ft log on it ! One thing I can see in your video that you can improve and reduce belt slip is use a shorter belt and put your idlier pushing IN.... NOT OUT you want the most wrap you can get on the drive pulley this would give you almost 1/4 more turn of wrap which helped my slip problem as well..... You mentioned having problems when you had a smaller motor on the mill.... I used a 8hp B&S the entire time and although cutting oak was slow going ( aprox 3" a minute) where cutting Pine was about twice as fast. Pushing your blade off the wheels is simply because of the blade guides ! I added extra blade guides to prevent that from happening when it spins without cutting none of the blade guides touch, but when I was pushing into it of course they do . Although those blade guides do work their just not the best having a bearing below and above will stop "BLADE HUNT" where it will cut up for a bit then cut down for a bit then cut up again giving a wavy cut blade tension will also cure that....to a certain extent .... I used a water bottle drip system on mine not for the heat but for the removal of the sawdust I did not try kerosene for the pitch ! that's a great idea I will use of I ever mill my own limber again! ...... When I moved here I brought the sawmill and turned it into a upright Bandsaw , I took off the motor and put on a 1/4hp washing machine motor and believe it or not it works fine with a 1/2" wide blade on it (1/2"x96" ) it was almost as much trouble to convert the sawmill into a shop bandsaw as it was to make the saw mill in the first place but I do have a hefty bandsaw in the shop now ! ...... Seriously , blade guides are very important those cheapie things that you have on there are I believe half the problem ! but as I said ...they do work , just not the best ! I bought a bunch of 1/2" ball bearings and 6 1/4" ball bearings and after a bunch of drilling and fitting found I could adjust everything... the guide up and down , in and out and the bearings themselves..... once the blade it tracking good then I set the guides to the blade both the lower blade guides and the single top guide.... once they were set I could cut the lumber. hope that gives you some ideas , good luck and keep your hands away from that blade ! ... (P.S. my Ranch house burned down 5 years ago and took everything we owned, you were fortunate I do recommend fire insurance... as I didn't have any so I was SOL !!!!! ) Bob.....
Your problem with the "Power" is the fact with the larger pulley your blade was not going fast enough...you had the power not the speed otherwise you could not have gone to the smaller pulley to turn it FASTER. also get a shorter belt and move your idler pulley back so your belt wraps as far around the engine pull as possible and you will have less slippage and not need so much tension on the belt. It will lengthen the life of the bearings and the belt. been there done that..
many of these points, like for example the belt tension (which still isn't set up properly), should be common sense to anyone with experience working on machines.
Thanks for the great information. I've wondered what would happen if you deflate the tires just enough to make them concave so the blade would be less likely to slip off? I didn't get all of the way through the video yet, so you may have addressed this. Thanks!
This sawmill you made seems to be good and durable. I have been thinking wheter its possible to replace the normal wood cutting saw blade with diamond saw blade which are used to cut granite? Any ideas could it be done? I know that the diamond blade needs water to cool down but i do not see any problems with it. You will have to go really slow with it but i am keen to try it - i have a few boulders by my yard so it would be nice to say that i made that granite table topping..
You can do thinker material just fine if you remember one simple principle: The thicker the material you are cutting, the slower you have to feed your material through the blade. So you have to calculate how fast to feed. It will also have enough power to cut just about any material if your calculation is right.
V groove wheels are designed to roll on the cornice of the angle iron, not the edge as it is seen here. laying the angle iron over on its edges so it points up like a triangle creates a lot more strength and will handle weight dropping on it without bending and therefore stay straight. The wheels have approx 100 degree bevel cut so it will still runoff the apex of the angle iron.
The location of the idler pulley is keeping the belt from having more contact with the clutch pulley. Use a shorter belt and move the idler. Actually no reason to use an idler unless you are getting the belt up and out of the way. Tracking issues with the rubber tires? The guide rollers should not let the blade move back. If the blade is dull you would have to "push" tit through the wood. If the blade is dull you are going to have other problems too: diving; rising; over heating. With a sharp blade you feed the blade at the rate it will cut a given log width at a given feet per minute band speed and for the horse power you have. The slightly warped bearing plates should have made no difference. Those axle bearings you used will swivel in their bases to accommodate misalignments. It's a nice built in feature.
Thank for sharing this with us! But as far i can see, it is effective ? Does is meet your need? And it seem to be effective ? Nothing as to be perfect. That will help me a lot in my own project! God bless you my friend!
Have you considered using wooden wheels like Matthias Wandel? Although I suppose with your saw being out in the elements more it might not be so good...
What about a back idler/roller blade guide set with horizontal axes? Might help with the blade tracking. U might benefit by using tires that can stand a higher pressure, say 70 psi.
you dont have any guide pinch and roller arms so you are pressing against the whole length of the blade also tire pressure is important , you need to be able to adjust for the diameter of the log or wood stock, one more thing is that is important using those extra pinch and guide rollers is they have to be set (pulled) down to under the wheel, not much just a tad
I'm thinking your on the right track it sher bets a Chan saw mil and you could mack cabinet out of it keep working and you well get a pile of lumber and if you get to much I well tack some. Have a nice day
on your bearings add two more one on each side stack them so the blade cannot derail ive seen other guys just put a slot in a piece of steel to help guide it
I am in the process of studing and collecting parts and info for a mill. I like yours. Have you tried more air in the tires?Also I have seen people use a thick block of steel (brass?) to run the blade through, mounted near the idle rollers it might keep the blade from dipping down in the front. I have heard that using tires, the tires will take a lot of the heat outof the blade. You may already know this but it is just a few things I thought of while watching your video.
you need a water drip to cool and lube the blade as it cuts, also try letting some of the air out of the tires and tighten belt more and a blade stop with a roller bearing so it cant go back off the tire
I'm getting ready to start building one just like urs, all's I need is what was ur measurement inbetween ur back piece's and what's the length of ur blade? Hope to get a reply soon and thanks 4 the video it was a great build
Hello, I haven't watched all your videos. But I have to say the ones I have watched are beautiful. Thank you for sharing. Are there any plans available for this build?
Just curious,have you looked into neoprene for your tires? It's used in forklift tires and really extend the life of the tires. Love your videos,and a fellow member of the off-grid lifestyle. Keep on keeping on.
It seems to me that the belt slipping is due to not enough belt being on the motor pulley. The tensioner should be between the motor and the blade drive pulley which would give you more belt on the motor pulley. Just move the tensioner closer in and use a slightly smaller belt.
Your telling people to use a 8'' drive wheel, if you will look at the videos of harbor freight mills, you will se that the drive wheel is the same size as the band wheel. Do a search for band speed and you will see that your probably running too fast. I have rubber tires on my mill and have not had any problems with tracking. I increased the drive wheel size to a 14'', with a smaller pulley it would pull the engine speed down, now it runs at a steady speed. There is a company that makes mills with tires, so they can't be all that bad.
