I had the good fortune to tour many big lumber mills with my dad in the 60's and early 70's. Weyerhaeuser's Coos Bay and Springfield mills, where they routinely cut those 5-6" diameter logs in 40' lengths, into 'cants' of 6" thickness before edging and re-sawing to 2'' & 4"...and many Calif Redwood mills, the greatest was the old Union Lumber Co. in Fort Bragg, bought by GP in the early 70's, now long closed. Miller Redwood in Arcata was a close second, although much smaller. They had a special large head rig OUTSIDE the main mill, to split logs in half or quarters, that were too big for the main head rig inside! It could not handle anything over about 7' diameter. Most of these old growth mills are gone now...modern mills with quad saws are fascinating at the speed they can churn out dimension lumber, but the old mills were the real deal...on that note, I'll spend the arvo trolling my old growth Doug Fir and Redwood timber in the workshop...cheers, Jim