Milled Wood Sales:

[Marine5068]

How easy is it to sell milled wood and how many of you out there do this.
Is there a certain species of wood that's more saleable?
Who typically is buying what wood species and for what?
Just some questions that I'm pondering as I get started into a homeowner milling operation.
I will use most of it for my own projects, but I'd like to know what everyone does with the rest of their slabs, beams, etc.

 

[hautions11]

I have sold some wood over the years, typically to people I know. The specialty items sell best. Someone is looking for 4" section for a mantle etc. I even sold 4" X 4" blanks to a guy making baseball bats. It is hard to just cut a lot of stock and then match up to what someone wants. If there are people with band mills selling rough sawn lumber it is hard to compete.

 

[shekoexile]

I sometimes mill the much-maligned Siberian Elm (Ulmus pumila) I take down. It's common to cities in the Southwest and most seem to consider it a "trash tree." My experience with it has been somewhat different.

Recently I left several whole trunks that I'd quarter sawed to 2 1/8" and air dried for two years on a trailer parked in the street for a few days, intending to move it to storage when I had the time. I had guys knocking on the door constantly until one offered too much to pass up.

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[BigOakAdot]

We are still waiting on a lot of our wood to dry at the yard, but we had a customer who wanted two specific pieces. One was a 16" wide 64" long by 2" thick. This piece was for a knee wall in between his kitchen and dining room.

Second piece was 7" x 48" x 1 1/4" thick. That was for a threshold somewhere. He's literally having it installed the same day we milled it. Am I wrong or are these pieces really going to move on him? What would you recommend doing to make it minimal?

 

[shekoexile]

I'd set them but not fasten them for at least a year. If that's not possible then don't set them until the equilibrium moisture content is within the range where you are.

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[shekoexile]

I had wanted to include photographs of the Siberian Elm in the post above, but I just figured out how to do that. (I'm new here, please bear with me).

This is the raw material, one of two 12' sections of a 48" dbh stem (~9000 lbs each, wet), being quartersawn about a month after felling. The ends had been treated with Anchor Seal:

Here it is again, stickered and stacked, right after sawing to 9/8" Some of these boards are 17" wide.

About three years of air drying later, some of the 12" boards were surfaced, tongue and groove, and set in place but not fastened. I let them sit through a winter and spring to gauge movement, but there was very little. The EMC in Albuquerque is around 6.5. I decided to try a French polish so this is the first application of shellac going on

Over the course of a year the shellac was applied, sanded off, and reapplied (three or four times iirc) and then multiple coats of the Tried and True™ polymerized linseed oil followed by their Varnish Oil.

The client was quite pleased

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[ChoppyChoppy]

Make common sizes with what is left over from custom sizes. 1 and 2bys.

 

[Marine5068]

I sometimes mill the much-maligned Siberian Elm (Ulmus pumila) I take down. It's common to cities in the Southwest and most seem to consider it a "trash tree." My experience with it has been somewhat different.

Recently I left several whole trunks that I'd quarter sawed to 2 1/8" and air dried for two years on a trailer parked in the street for a few days, intending to move it to storage when I had the time. I had guys knocking on the door constantly until one offered too much to pass up.

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So how much was the wood you sold him?

 

[Marine5068]

I had wanted to include photographs of the Siberian Elm in the post above, but I just figured out how to do that. (I'm new here, please bear with me).

This is the raw material, one of two 12' sections of a 48" dbh stem (~9000 lbs each, wet), being quartersawn about a month after felling. The ends had been treated with Anchor Seal:

Here it is again, stickered and stacked, right after sawing to 9/8" Some of these boards are 17" wide.

About three years of air drying later, some of the 12" boards were surfaced, tongue and groove, and set in place but not fastened. I let them sit through a winter and spring to gauge movement, but there was very little. The EMC in Albuquerque is around 6.5. I decided to try a French polish so this is the first application of shellac going on

Over the course of a year the shellac was applied, sanded off, and reapplied (three or four times iirc) and then multiple coats of the Tried and True™ polymerized linseed oil followed by their Varnish Oil.

The client was quite pleased

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Nice work. I've actually never heard of Elm used as flooring before. It is certainly hard enough, I'm sure.
How much was it to buy the log(s) and what did you have into it after the job was all done?

 

[BigOakAdot]

Oh and I completely forgot to mention that those two pieces sold for 200 green. It was for a younger guy renovating his kitchen and dining room.

What do you guys think of thag price? I would think its a little high.

 

[shekoexile]

I got paid ~$6,000 for the crane removal of this tree after a lightening strike. My main costs for the job were crane rental (with operator) for a couple of hours and climbers' pay. I also rented a heavier duty trailer than I had, onto which the crane dropped the largest logs (~9000lbs each, we). The crane was costly, but far quicker, so in the end it was cheaper than putting a couple of climbers up there all day. Cartage, hauling, chipping, and disposal costs were also decreased by salvaging the wood. (I took the larger branches as well.)

A gallon of Anchor Seal. Maybe $500 to the mill (can't really recall) for log storage and handling, sawing, and three blades damaged by the various metals one expects to find in urban timber. Labor to load, unload, sticker and stack for drying. Then the materials used for underlay and to finish the wood and the various helpers for surfacing, profiling, cutting, sanding, etc. Probably $3500 all in. There was also the wife's aggravation with having her covered patio replaced with a large stack of wood for three years to contend with.

Elm floors, though somewhat rare (as Oak was then preferred) from the Tudor and Jacobean eras (1485-1625) can still be found in the UK. Elm became much more common as a flooring material in the Georgian period (1714-1811) and beautiful examples survive. Siberian Elm isn't as hard as the English Elms, and I found almost no information about it during my research, but it's hard enough, especially for bedrooms, playrooms, etc.

Albuquerque's EMC is low enough to permit air drying of hardwoods (see chart) so one of the larger cost items was avoided. I still have some boards left, but it looks as though the yield is coming in at about 1400 board feet.



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[ChoppyChoppy]

Your phone having tourettes?

 

[shekoexile]

Got it wet while watering the garden last night so I'm lucky it works at all.

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