I'm looking into alternatives to straight line rip, and then rip, a
couple-three thousand board feet of rough cut ash to make plank flooring. At
this point I'm thinking of going with nominal widths of 4 or 5 inches so
there will be lots of rips. After that they'll be run through the jointer,
and then the shaper with T&G flooring cutters and the power feeder so "glue
line" quality isn't needed. I have two alternative machines upon which I
could mount a power feeder for the ripping. One is a 3 HP cabinet saw and
the other is a 36" 5 HP vertical bandsaw that has about a 3 foot square
table. Initial lengths would generally run 8-11.5 feet but may be as short
as 3-4 feet after initial defect removal. I'm leaning towards a 4 wheel 1
HP feeder at this point.

I'd be interested in seeing photos/videos of the set ups folks are using for
a semi-production run (as compared to the relatively few rough cut boards
used for most of my projects). Google and YouTube haven't yielded much to
this point and those found were not terribly informative. Of particular
interest are the straight edge fixtures and fences being used.

Got any photos, videos, or URLs that show alternatives?

On Sat, 9 Dec 2017 15:37:12 -0500
"John Grossbohlin" wrote:

have two alternative machines upon which I could mount a power feeder
for the ripping. One is a 3 HP cabinet saw and the other is a 36" 5
HP vertical bandsaw that has about a 3 foot square table. Initial
lengths would generally run 8-11.5 feet but may be as short as 3-4
feet after initial defect removal. I'm leaning towards a 4 wheel 1
HP feeder at this point.

never done this so no first hand knowledge

seems like a toss up

but bandsaws seem best suited for this and since the edge is not a
concern even more so