I have a lot of experience with a hired Woodmizer and want my own mill badly. Unfortunately there are several honeydos ahead of it, like a garden shed, garage, trim of the house inside, etc.
There must be 30 or so companies making mills, each with something good about their design, so the problem bears soome thought before jumping in.
Do you need to make money? There's not a great market for uninspected lumber, but some is sold to farms, septic tank installers and such. Hobbiest woodworkers buy some, but in small quantities. If you are mobile, you can get a lot more business by going to people's yard or property where they have trees and want boards. If you hit it right, you can get a fair bit of work and maybe make some money, but it's work. You really want at least one helper, to do the offbearing and cleanup. Green wood is heavy! Some good used are fencing, farm buildings, stalls, shop floors, and flooring, if you dry and mill.
You'll need a decent pickup and a 16 ft trailer if you plan to move serious amounts of logs or boards. How will you get logs to the mill? I have moved a lot with an 8N Ford tractor, 24HP, but that's about the smallest you cna stand if the logs are substantial. One of the Woodmizer guys I used furnished a Bobcat type loader to handle the logs.
One friend of mine has his mill set up stationary and people take him logs or he hauls them in. He sells green or air dried pine, maple, walnut, oak and hickory...makes some hobby money and has fun.
I would not get a Woodmizer. Their marketing is superb, but I'm not sold on the cantilever design, which is more flexible than the double sided head supports. Many companies make small mills now, some in the $3K range I think, but they are very small and I think they would be easily bent if large logs were handled roughly onto their beds.
It seems to me the smallest trailer rigs woule be better. You can still set them up on a foundation, but can also take them out to jobs. The ground ones are much easier to load, of course. If you are cutting for money, some sort of loading arms are wonderful. I just drag logs to the woodmizer, push them onto the hydraulic arms, and watch the machine pick them up effortlessly. Of course all that gets into money, maybe more than the hobby budget allows.
The guy with the hobby business above has his mill beside a little hill and has bunks that go level from the bed of the mill out to the hill. He pulls logs to the bunks with a tractor and then just rolls them onto the mill. It's a manual mill, so he pushes the head through the cut. It works fine and he has enjoyed it for years. He has a partner who is an eye doctor, believe it or not, and they frequently work together after work and on weekends.
Do some Googling and you should find a list of mill vendors. If I can figure out how to copy my favorites list, I'll put it up for you too.
Here is part of my kitchen, made from my wood. Floor too. Cutting the framing for the house was fun...really fast! I lost 15 pounds as soon as I started offbearing! Then just think of the times I handled that wood...log to mill, mill to trailer, trailer to pile, pile to trailer, and trailer into house!! The hardwood did all that, plus to the kiln, to the mill, and back to the house!
Oh yes. I cut 500 pieces of poplar bevel siding for the exterior...dipped it all in oil stain in a tank made from 2X12 and lined with flashing metal. Fun!
