I live in northern New York and just finish stacking my barn with Hemlock for my frame. The trees were cut and bandsawed thru October and November. I would like to get started and may arrange a semi-heated area to work. Can frozen or partially thawed timbers be worked accurately? Any other considerations/advice?
Thank you, Ken

if the timbers were sawn in the fall i don't think you will even notice that they are frozen.
i'm in ontario and there are times when i've worked on a freshly sawn timber in january and had some troubles in the sapwood but never any real problems cutting, more layout troubles on the frozen surfaces.
and if it is hemlock you will be fine
-Mark.

Hi Ken - I worked my frozen and semi-frozen hemlock beams in a semi-heated garage. I had no troubles working the beams. For layout, I used a utility knife to get a nice deep score-line. The beams had been cut in Oct and Nov and I was cutting joints from Dec thru May. I noticed very little difference in workability throughout the process, in spite of the fact that the beams varied from hard-frozen to quite warm. Good luck with your project. jekbear