Splitting some big beech
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benp
Addicted to ArboristSite
zogger
Tree Freak
Big wood to split!
Beech is good stuff. Have a lot here but mostly seems tough as nails, never find many dead ones.
Beech is good stuff. Have a lot here but mostly seems tough as nails, never find many dead ones.
Gotta love the Beech. Here's one we did a few years ago. Right at 5' in diameter
Yeah, that's a full size 3/4 ton Dodge next to it.
These are the 2 sides where it forked 20 ft up. One was over 3ft and the other side was 4ft in Diameter.
The wood JUST from the top. Hurricane remnant winds blew the top out leaving just a totem. Never came back and we cut/split it up the next year. Tree was well over 300 years old. Completely solid which is a rare tree when they are that big.
Yeah, that's a full size 3/4 ton Dodge next to it.
These are the 2 sides where it forked 20 ft up. One was over 3ft and the other side was 4ft in Diameter.
The wood JUST from the top. Hurricane remnant winds blew the top out leaving just a totem. Never came back and we cut/split it up the next year. Tree was well over 300 years old. Completely solid which is a rare tree when they are that big.
Sawyer Rob
Addicted to ArboristSite
Just think of the THOUSANDS of dollars that beech would have been worth "IF" it would have been milled into slabs, INSTEAD of turned into firewood!! A HUGE pile of money got burned right there!
Too bad, really....
SR
Too bad, really....
SR
zogger
Tree Freak
hmmm..I have needs of thousand$. There are some *nice* beeches here. Say just a two footer, what would that be worth?
We actually did try 2 different logging companies and the price they were willing to pay was close to what the firewood is worth. Let alone the damage they would have caused. Our findings have always been the same as their lowball offers exclude them from making anything. Don't have a mill or we might have done that.
If you know of a reputable logging I'm all ears for the future.
Usually the "thousands" is for milled lumber, kiln dried and often S4S, the main value is to the guy who processes it because that is where the time and expense are. If it gets hard to find trees then the property owner will get more money.
Mr. HE
Mr. HE
Sawyer Rob
Addicted to ArboristSite
Lumber mills and loggers aren't what you contact about a 5' beech! NO, they won't pay a premium for something like that, and the premium comes from it being 5' wide, NOT from it being a 2 footer or S4S lumber!
As for the cost of a saw to "slab" it, that's called an "investment", to get the "thousands" of dollars of 5' wide "live edge slabs" out of it! NOW, they would bring a pretty penny...
SR
Sorry, but the investment in equipment and time will not make a person any money in a single log. If they started it as a side business they would need to run it a couple of years and cut several dozen logs before they were making money on their investment.
That is one reason you can find mills with low hours for such good deals. People sit down and price a few boards and think "Look at all the money!" So they charge a mill and start cutting. Soon they either lose interest, can't find as many prime logs as they thought, or realize they are not making any money. So they sell the mill to try and recover a little bit of their "Investment".
At a minimum to mill a 5' tree for live edge slabs you are looking at $4000 for a chainsaw mill, $6000+ for a used forklift that can handle the slabs, and you still need a truck and place to dry the slabs.
Each slab will take two men several hours to cut and move and stack, more time than it takes to turn the same log into firewood.
Then you have to market and sell the slabs, which is several more hours each, unless you sell at a reduced price to a wholesaler. Often you sell several states away and have time into getting a slab shipped.
There are only about six top dollar slabs in a log like that and they'll sell for around $1000 each. Then you can mill some bookmatched sets and get another $3-4000. Rest of the lumber is pretty low dollar, especially if cut with a chainsaw mill.
So, if you are honest about the numbers, what you spend you can make selling the wood retail, and that pays nothing for your time. You can make more with less time if you invest more money, but then you need more logs, and then you need a bigger market, and then you need... it goes on and on.
If a single log was a gold mine there would be more rich loggers is the bottom line.
I hate seeing nice logs turned into firewood, but some situations the facts are that is all they are good for.
Mr. HE
That is one reason you can find mills with low hours for such good deals. People sit down and price a few boards and think "Look at all the money!" So they charge a mill and start cutting. Soon they either lose interest, can't find as many prime logs as they thought, or realize they are not making any money. So they sell the mill to try and recover a little bit of their "Investment".
At a minimum to mill a 5' tree for live edge slabs you are looking at $4000 for a chainsaw mill, $6000+ for a used forklift that can handle the slabs, and you still need a truck and place to dry the slabs.
Each slab will take two men several hours to cut and move and stack, more time than it takes to turn the same log into firewood.
Then you have to market and sell the slabs, which is several more hours each, unless you sell at a reduced price to a wholesaler. Often you sell several states away and have time into getting a slab shipped.
There are only about six top dollar slabs in a log like that and they'll sell for around $1000 each. Then you can mill some bookmatched sets and get another $3-4000. Rest of the lumber is pretty low dollar, especially if cut with a chainsaw mill.
So, if you are honest about the numbers, what you spend you can make selling the wood retail, and that pays nothing for your time. You can make more with less time if you invest more money, but then you need more logs, and then you need a bigger market, and then you need... it goes on and on.
If a single log was a gold mine there would be more rich loggers is the bottom line.
I hate seeing nice logs turned into firewood, but some situations the facts are that is all they are good for.
Mr. HE
Then you have the guy with the log who wants to make money...I tried to get a 13' diameter x 21' oak trunk that was solid. Guy wanted $7000 for it. It was a blow down. I offered to clean up the top and patch the lawn. He liked that idea, but wanted $4000 on top of that, oh, and I couldn't drive any heavy machines in his yard "Maybe the neighbor will let you drive down on his side, he doesn't really take care of his yard."
Several others made offers, but in the end he thought it was going to make him rich.
So he turned it into really ugly firewood, killing several pro-grade saws in the process because he would keep cutting when the bar and chain were smoking. It took him two years, he would rent a splitter on weekends because he was too cheap to just buy one.
But he bragged about selling the firewood for "$3000 and everyone said that tree wasn't worth much! To this day he has not patched the holes in his "pristine" yard.
His neighbor filled me in on the rest of the story some time afterwards and thinks the guy is an idiot, which he is, but he's an idiot that spent hundreds of hours and about $3000 out of pocket to make sure he wasn't cheated and got the $3000 he had coming for his tree.
Oh, and the icing on the cake is he stacked the wood in the back yard and then to get top dollar he had to deliver it using his Toyota Tundra. After the first two cords he switched from moving it 200' with his wheelbarrow to backing his truck into the back yard. Pretty much wearing in a road right where he "simply cant allow heavy machines because the yard is just too nice, my wife and I spent years getting it this nice and it would break her heart to see it torn up."
I was being generous with my final offer of fixing the yard and paying him$1000, which was about $4000 in value, which he knew because he'd gotten other quotes from landscapers.
Some people same you from themselves.
Not saying the OP was this type, just telling a story.
Mr. HE
Several others made offers, but in the end he thought it was going to make him rich.
So he turned it into really ugly firewood, killing several pro-grade saws in the process because he would keep cutting when the bar and chain were smoking. It took him two years, he would rent a splitter on weekends because he was too cheap to just buy one.
But he bragged about selling the firewood for "$3000 and everyone said that tree wasn't worth much! To this day he has not patched the holes in his "pristine" yard.
His neighbor filled me in on the rest of the story some time afterwards and thinks the guy is an idiot, which he is, but he's an idiot that spent hundreds of hours and about $3000 out of pocket to make sure he wasn't cheated and got the $3000 he had coming for his tree.
Oh, and the icing on the cake is he stacked the wood in the back yard and then to get top dollar he had to deliver it using his Toyota Tundra. After the first two cords he switched from moving it 200' with his wheelbarrow to backing his truck into the back yard. Pretty much wearing in a road right where he "simply cant allow heavy machines because the yard is just too nice, my wife and I spent years getting it this nice and it would break her heart to see it torn up."
I was being generous with my final offer of fixing the yard and paying him$1000, which was about $4000 in value, which he knew because he'd gotten other quotes from landscapers.
Some people same you from themselves.
Not saying the OP was this type, just telling a story.
Mr. HE
nathon918
Addicted to ArboristSite
13 ft. diameter?Then you have the guy with the log who wants to make money...I tried to get a 13' diameter x 21' oak trunk that was solid. Guy wanted $7000 for it. It was a blow down. I offered to clean up the top and patch the lawn. He liked that idea, but wanted $4000 on top of that, oh, and I couldn't drive any heavy machines in his yard "Maybe the neighbor will let you drive down on his side, he doesn't really take care of his yard."
Several others made offers, but in the end he thought it was going to make him rich.
So he turned it into really ugly firewood, killing several pro-grade saws in the process because he would keep cutting when the bar and chain were smoking. It took him two years, he would rent a splitter on weekends because he was too cheap to just buy one.
But he bragged about selling the firewood for "$3000 and everyone said that tree wasn't worth much! To this day he has not patched the holes in his "pristine" yard.
His neighbor filled me in on the rest of the story some time afterwards and thinks the guy is an idiot, which he is, but he's an idiot that spent hundreds of hours and about $3000 out of pocket to make sure he wasn't cheated and got the $3000 he had coming for his tree.
Oh, and the icing on the cake is he stacked the wood in the back yard and then to get top dollar he had to deliver it using his Toyota Tundra. After the first two cords he switched from moving it 200' with his wheelbarrow to backing his truck into the back yard. Pretty much wearing in a road right where he "simply cant allow heavy machines because the yard is just too nice, my wife and I spent years getting it this nice and it would break her heart to see it torn up."
I was being generous with my final offer of fixing the yard and paying him$1000, which was about $4000 in value, which he knew because he'd gotten other quotes from landscapers.
Some people same you from themselves.
Not saying the OP was this type, just telling a story.
Mr. HE
Sawyer Rob
Addicted to ArboristSite
Sorry, but the investment in equipment and time will not make a person any money in a single log. If they started it as a side business they would need to run it a couple of years and cut several dozen logs before they were making money on their investment.
That is one reason you can find mills with low hours for such good deals. People sit down and price a few boards and think "Look at all the money!" So they charge a mill and start cutting. Soon they either lose interest, can't find as many prime logs as they thought, or realize they are not making any money. So they sell the mill to try and recover a little bit of their "Investment".
At a minimum to mill a 5' tree for live edge slabs you are looking at $4000 for a chainsaw mill, $6000+ for a used forklift that can handle the slabs, and you still need a truck and place to dry the slabs.
Each slab will take two men several hours to cut and move and stack, more time than it takes to turn the same log into firewood.
Then you have to market and sell the slabs, which is several more hours each, unless you sell at a reduced price to a wholesaler. Often you sell several states away and have time into getting a slab shipped.
There are only about six top dollar slabs in a log like that and they'll sell for around $1000 each. Then you can mill some bookmatched sets and get another $3-4000. Rest of the lumber is pretty low dollar, especially if cut with a chainsaw mill.
So, if you are honest about the numbers, what you spend you can make selling the wood retail, and that pays nothing for your time. You can make more with less time if you invest more money, but then you need more logs, and then you need a bigger market, and then you need... it goes on and on.
If a single log was a gold mine there would be more rich loggers is the bottom line.
I hate seeing nice logs turned into firewood, but some situations the facts are that is all they are good for.
Mr. HE
So, a Husky 3120 with bar and Alaskan, cost $4,000.00 where you live?? You just said YOU could pick them up cheeeep used there??? They wouldn't even cost 4K new here! AND, "you" would need to buy a fork lift and truck to do the job??? You must not be a very resourceful person!!
You need to hang on the milling site, here on AS! There is always a way to do things for a cheaper but fair price...
Your post has not been MY experience with milling and for sure not for milling slabs... I could easily have get r done, even buying a saw and Alaskan mill, AND I would have made money on that log!
IF a person goes into a job believing it can't happen, it for sure won't happen for him!! Like a buddy of mine always said, "can't never did anything!"
SR
I have the machines, contacts, and know-how to move a 58,000lb log and I'm not a resourceful person?
You brag about your tractors, and trailers and mill, and "pressure washer", and a host of other experience and equipment and then you start claiming any guy can make a buck cutting a one off log? Sorry, but all that tells me is you don't know how to properly cost a job.
Like I said, if it was easy, cheap to get into, and made big money, then there wouldn't be any poor loggers. People looking for wood to heat their home are not often looking into starting a business and like it or not that is what you are talking about, only you are pretending it can somehow be done cheap and it can't be. Making money takes time and costs money. If you spend less of one you'll spend more of the other, that is the business side of a making money with lumber products.
Here, you do a cost break down, line by line. When you're done I'll pick it apart and point out everything you missed.
Mr. HE
Sawyer Rob
Addicted to ArboristSite
I have the machines, contacts, and know-how to move a 58,000lb log and I'm not a resourceful person?
You brag about your tractors, and trailers and mill, and "pressure washer", and a host of other experience and equipment and then you start claiming any guy can make a buck cutting a one off log? Sorry, but all that tells me is you don't know how to properly cost a job.
Like I said, if it was easy, cheap to get into, and made big money, then there wouldn't be any poor loggers. People looking for wood to heat their home are not often looking into starting a business and like it or not that is what you are talking about, only you are pretending it can somehow be done cheap and it can't be. Making money takes time and costs money. If you spend less of one you'll spend more of the other, that is the business side of a making money with lumber products.
Here, you do a cost break down, line by line. When you're done I'll pick it apart and point out everything you missed.
Mr. HE
First of all, I've never bragged about anything, sorry you took it that way...
Secondly, I never suggested anyone start a business. I DID say someone could have took a 5' beech, slabed it and made some money... I stand by that, as I did it once myself with a big log...
I bought as saw/Alaskan and slabbed up a big log and made money off it. I didn't want to make a business out of it, I wanted to make money....off THAT log and I ended up doing just that. I also ended up with a nice saw.....that the slabs paid for.
I guess you think much bigger than me, but I'm just happy to make some profit and end up with some nice tools in the end...I never felt that I had to get rich off every job that I do...
Apparently it offends you that someone could make some money off a small project like that??? That's too bad, folks did it all the time in the old days...
Back in the early 80's, I noticed how many loose shocks there was on pu's in my area (including mine) I bought a Pow Con 200 welder, (I started welding when I was a kid) made a little kit to fix that and made quite a bit of money sitting in my drive fixing guys shock mounts on pu's... When that wound down, I noticed guys needed 3 point pallet forks to get their fishing nets off the beach, so I made a bunch of those and made a few bucks doing so...
I also noticed that no one was tilling gardens in my area, so I bought a small Kubota tractor and rototiller for it. I put a "freebie" add on the radio and was swamped with calls. Every day for several springs, I was out tilling gardens and I made a BUNCH of money off that idea... I STILL have that tractor/tiller and I still make a dollar or two with it and it's STILL doing all of my tilling too... That also was in the 80's...
Ooooohhh and that "power washing pump" you referred to, I got that by buying it AFTER a volcano dropped a bunch of ash, plugging all the parking lot drains, after that, EVERY rain, who do you think they called to pump their parking lots??? lol lol
I could go on about the small jobs I've done and made money off them, but that would be bragging... lol
SR
Then you have the guy with the log who wants to make money...I tried to get a 13' diameter x 21' oak trunk that was solid. Guy wanted $7000 for it. It was a blow down. I offered to clean up the top and patch the lawn. He liked that idea, but wanted $4000 on top of that, oh, and I couldn't drive any heavy machines in his yard "Maybe the neighbor will let you drive down on his side, he doesn't really take care of his yard."
Several others made offers, but in the end he thought it was going to make him rich.
So he turned it into really ugly firewood, killing several pro-grade saws in the process because he would keep cutting when the bar and chain were smoking. It took him two years, he would rent a splitter on weekends because he was too cheap to just buy one.
But he bragged about selling the firewood for "$3000 and everyone said that tree wasn't worth much! To this day he has not patched the holes in his "pristine" yard.
His neighbor filled me in on the rest of the story some time afterwards and thinks the guy is an idiot, which he is, but he's an idiot that spent hundreds of hours and about $3000 out of pocket to make sure he wasn't cheated and got the $3000 he had coming for his tree.
Oh, and the icing on the cake is he stacked the wood in the back yard and then to get top dollar he had to deliver it using his Toyota Tundra. After the first two cords he switched from moving it 200' with his wheelbarrow to backing his truck into the back yard. Pretty much wearing in a road right where he "simply cant allow heavy machines because the yard is just too nice, my wife and I spent years getting it this nice and it would break her heart to see it torn up."
I was being generous with my final offer of fixing the yard and paying him$1000, which was about $4000 in value, which he knew because he'd gotten other quotes from landscapers.
Some people same you from themselves.
Not saying the OP was this type, just telling a story.
Mr. HE
We were not looking to get "rich" off the tree but when the offer ends up being way less than $100 a cord, it kind of becomes a no brainer. That firewood has allowed us to get some nice tools along the way as well. Paying for our heating systems, saws and such from not having to pay an arab for what was under his feet. Yes, we had time invested getting it worked up and hauled but crazy me, I actually like doing it.
It was over the span of 2 Winters as the first year we worked up the top and waited to see if the snag would make it. It didn't so we worked it up the next Winter.We had a local friend who was a woodworker and hired a guy with a Woodmizer to come in and saw up his logs. We took a bunch over as well and we gave him some of ours, helped for 3 days doing it and had fun as well. That wood, our share, is mostly still in the top of the barn. Alot of the wood around here is used for skids. There are some veneer buyers around here but the 2 friends that sold them to the guys said never again for the broken promises.
We do not cut live trees unless we're cleaning a fencerow or something. Mother nature's winds and trees dying off provide more than enough for us to heat with.
We used some beech logs to rebuild the original cabin that was on this farm. We tore it down and reassembled it back in the woods. Some of the lower logs were rotted so we hand hewn some out. Makes a nice setting for get togethers and such.
You can see the cabin to the right here.
The main thing to me is that at least it gets used for something as opposed to just rotting on the ground. May not suit others desires but you can never satisfy everyone.
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