Anyone know the people at Sequoia Mills in Wa.? I'm having difficulty getting a call back. I commissioned a mill to be built. Sent them more than 50% to start and after it was done, they have wrote me off? Don't know what to do can anyone give me a clue as to what to do?
If they owe you money, see your lawyer.
If you are paid up, and have your mill, then don't understand the "wrote me off" point.
Welcome to the Forestry Forum, but we can't settle disagreements between you and a business.
I know you can't settle anything just am upset over this and was wondering if anyone had a similar problem with Sequoia Mills? I don't have the mill, they won't send me an invoice or answer my calls. But they have $1100 of my money, I owe them another $950. They just built the basic carrige with nothing on it. Thanks for the response though. My guess is they sold it to someone else and made more money than with me and now they are ignoring me. It's like a girl breaking up with you and you can't get a call back. Lol
Sorry for your delima, I was in email contact for awhile with Neil and I had more questions than he was willing to answer but I guess he was busy they have a lot of CL ads and trader ads thought they were doing well. I was interested in the big special mill he built that had a 54" wide cut. He built two of them but he would never let me contact the owners to get a first hand Sawmiller chat. My fever simmered quickly. Although there is a lot of good press on the other mills he built. There a small fab shop, could be he is busy, keep trying. Its a 1000 mile round trip from my place, if they were closer I'd go shake his tree for you. Hope this works out for you lumberdan
Lumberdan: I checked out their webpage. How long has it been since you sent the deposit? Was it by check or credit card? If check, has it cleared? And how long have you been trying to contact them? You have recourse for either payment method, provided the company hasn't gone bankrupt.
He hasn't called me back in nearly 6 weeks. I sent the first deposit via ground (FedX) in the former of a cashiers check, 7 weeks ago! The balance is going through PayPal that i recently set up. We had some contact through texting but that stopped 2 weeks ago. I'm running out of patience. Lol. Thanks for the advice, and thanks Redbeard for the heads up, we will see... lol
I wish you good luck in all this. It's not happening to me and I get that knot in my stomach because it brings back not-so-fond memories.
Thanks Ox, not a pleasant not feeling is it?
Being in the middle of an unpleasant sawmill experience too, I can relate to how you are feeling. Surely someone on here close enough can go pay them a visit on your behalf. Hopefully someone will volunteer. Good luck.
Failure to respond is not a good sign. How long after accepting your deposit was the machine supposed to ship? If the time hasn't expired, they have not done anything wrong except ignore you. If that time has expired, send an email requesting a refund, followed by a certified letter doing the same. Get serious with them, suggest you will file a lien after winning in small claims court if not refunded. May not do any good if they're on their way south, but it will make you feel better! And without being slanderous you could use social media to their detrement, I see they are on Facebook and others. But in the end, it's about character - let's hope they find some.
First up, I'm not trying to blow smoke up anyone's skirt. I just know how frustrating and costly it can be when a sawmill purchase goes bad, and I wouldn't wish this on anyone.
So, I emailed Sequoia Mills, not because I'm a drama queen or have ADD, but because if they are genuine and somethign has just gone wrong in this case, they have a right to know so they can put it right and hopefully, with that put right, LumberDan can be much closer to getting his mill or money back and eventually into milling wood with any agro long buried in the past.
I have also PM'ed LumberDan suggesting he might want to give them a call in case emails are going AWOL in cyberspace.
Sequoia suggested they tried to log in to FF but could not. I offered to C&P any reply from them, here's what they wanted to write, copied verbatim.
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If you would do that it would be great.
On March 27th, 2015, we received this customers deposit of $1100. We had almost daily contact with him until a few weeks ago when I tried to call him but his line was busy. We sent him pictures of the mill almost completed. We let him know we wanted to ship it within the next few days and we needed final payment and we heard nothing back from him. I gave it a while and text him telling him that we had hoped to have shipped the mill by now. He said he hadn't heard from us and practically called us a liar. I then sent him a screen shot of the text and his attitude changed. He said he hadn't gotten the final invoice, I resent it. Again I heard nothing. He says he doesn't receive my texts and emails. Finally he called on Monday, he asked if there is a problem. We let him know that we have tried to contact him several times, several ways, apparently there is a communication issue. I offered to send him his money back, he said he didn't want his money, he wants the mill. He asked me to send him the invoice again. I sent it three times. I have texted him his pictures, he claims he never got it. We are ready to give him a refund. It seems that we can not seem to make this work and we don't have time to defend ourselves, we have many other orders to fill. We work hard to produce a well built product, we don't need to be slandered. We will be issuing a refund for this customer.
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There would appear to me a very good chance of a great outcome for LumberDan if they give them a call to work through any communication issues.
Best of luck to both parties. I hope LumberDan can be making sawdust real soon.
First of all this is truly a great site, I had never joined anything like this and I am surprised how you guys are willing to help one out.:) Apparently there are many of you that are interested in this dilemma I'm in with Sequoia Mills. Here is the latest, about the lost invoices. I found them, they were in a spam folder on my computer. I rarely use that dinosaur since the smart phone. I thought I would fire up that thing and see if yahoo mail was different on there than on my phone, it was. my phone shows 55 messages on "bulk" and doesn't even have the option for "spam". The computer had 127 "bulk" and 436 "spam". I found their emails of the invoice. I am a man of reason and can say I'm wrong if I am, and I was wrong, I didn't dig far enough. The first invoice email came to my phone back in March, so I had no reason to believe the other one wouldn't? Lesson learned. I sent him the balance of $950 though his PayPal this morning. If he is a man of integrity as he claims, I should be knee deep in saw dust in a week or so? I will keep you posted. But... that doesn't explain other issues of him not getting back with me. I checked my phone records and counted 55 times I have called him and left voice messages since March 20th, he called me back 2 times, the latter was on March 23rd. Busy or not, at some point you need to put the ol truck in park and call your customer. I'm sure that he builds a great product, hence my willingness to stay the course, but he needs to be more intuned with his customers. I am not the only one with customer service issues with him, there was a guy that posted a comment on "Martythemiller" thread that had the same problem claiming he bought a mill and was having no luck with a return call too. Well, I will say this, Neil and Lisa might be great people, Neil was very nice and willing to do what I requested in the build, I believed every word. Perhaps he is overwhelmed and stressed out to the max and just can't put his hand on every aspect of his business. Maybe he will come away from this as a lesson learned as well. I'm putting this to rest now and hoping i will receive my mill soon and I can start asking questions like how to mill straight?! lol Thank everyone on here for your concern and involvement, not sure I could have gotten the attention otherwise. 8)
Looks to be all your fault LumberDan. Time to eat a lot of crow. IMO
Good onya LumberDan. Here's hoping it is plain sailing from here on.
Well "beenthere", I take the crow on the invoice but it could have been avoided. Lol thanks again Kiwi I I think smooth plaining!
Well, now you know about the email stuff between the phone and computer. Too bad you learned this little gem during this sawmill purchase but now at least you know for future purposes.
I also think that a phone call that actually worked or went through to both you and him would have avoided lots of problems. Sometimes this technology isn't all it's cracked up to be.
I hope it goes through as planned and everything happens smoother from here on out.
He "contacted" me today and He said he will ship no later than next Thursday. Still no phone call but I have to take a leap of faith... will keep you all posted .
I admit it's a little strange to me that he seems to avoid phone calls. But email contact is better than nothing, right? As long as there's a steady contact stream available I would reckon everything is OK. After all, he's still in business and apparently very busy so that's always a good sign. I'm feeling confident this will work out just fine.
I must be a wierdo cause I try to answer every call I get while it is ringging. I see people all the time look at there phone and decide whether to answer or not. I almost never leave a message and hate talking to computers that tell me push 1 for this and push 2 for that. I can be rude enough that if it is someone I don't want to talk to I tell them but I never avoid the call.
I feel my rant is in a fitting place and I remember when poeple and companys did answer their phone. It isn't that long ago that they had no choice or maby it just seems like it wasn't that long ago. I must be getting old.
gww
That has been my problem all along, not answering or returning my calls. I had a typo earlier , it wasn't 55 times I called him it was 25 times. Lol enough said
My sawmill carriage is in Dayton, Ohio as of today Sunday, that's only 30 mins from me! 8) I'm excited to see it and to start building the rest of it. I will put up some pics of it when I get it. This experience with those people at Sequoia Mills has been the worst ever. Redbeard, good luck!
Dan, I want to thank you for this entire thread. I work on a ranch, live alone and every now and then I get to missing working around people and occasionally dealing with customers. I'm sitting right now drinking coffee and thinking how awesome cows really are. I've never had one call me once, let alone 55 times ;D and when they make a mess of things and I'm trying to rebuild fences and get them some water I don't think they ever drug my name through the mud, although they have drug my sorry butt through it a few times. :D
I do hope for you (and especially Neil) that your new mill is everything that you wanted and everything is clear sailing for you from here on out.
Hopefully your new mill exceeds your expectations and makes all of this waiting worth it.
Glad that your mill will soon be operational and the experience will subside with the joy of milling some lumber. Nothing wrong with being honest about your feelings and experience. And there will still be some frustration getting your mill dialed in and cutting right. Hopefully Neil will work with you getting the bugs worked out. Its just a machine tool, every one on FF with band mills has the same thing, Two band wheels with a motor and a blade. They all will cut lumber.
Justallan, I did mention it was a typo, was only 25 times. The reason so many was due to him not calling me back. I've not spoke to him since March! He did some custom work on it for me and I had questions. On one of my texts to him not long ago I used these words ; "please, please I beg of you to call me..." nothing! I've been a contractor for 20 years so I know about customer service, the cap he pulled with me was just unexceptable, sorry. He has only been in business 2 years, lots to learn in customer service. I'm moving on and am trying to get excited about my first milling experience. Thanks Redbeard I wrote down your number and will be giving you a buzz sometime. I have a nice pile of ash logs that are screaming to be flooring in my barn! Lol
Dan, whether it's how I feel or not, I probably shouldn't have responded on here in the manner I did. Sorry about that, Bud.
I do hope the rest of your build goes good for you and you get to brag on your mill and tell us about it some in the future.
There is a gentleman on here that a year or so ago was just flat irate that his new mill showed up 2 days early. He caught a bit of teasing about it, stepped back and took a look at things and I'd bet good money he laughs about it now because he seems like a pretty good guy. I hope the final outcome is the same for you.
How is this project going? I remain happy with my experience with Sequoia Mills.
>:( Well guys, lol. I have waited to see what was going to happen and nothing has yet. The mill carriage got here a few weeks ago, but was damaged in shipment. yes I said damaged! lol I unstrapped it from the banged up skid they strapped it to and set it on my garage floor. It was twisted and would not set flat, it rocked back and forth. In other words not all four v-rollers would touch the ground at the same time. I spun it around 360 degrees thinking it was my floor, not! Now I have to go through "Estes Express Trucking" to a "shipping broker"(hired by Neil Akers) to Neil himself( Sequoia Mills ). I got my first phone call from them since March, :laugh: and it was his wife, she said they were going to build me another one and put it ahead of everything else. Sounds great right? That was 2 weeks ago, I think they might get it done but how long? Sometimes I think I will not get the chance at milling, I'm just exhausted and have lost my excitement about the whole thing. I have got over $3000 invested and have a really cool looking yard-art piece. :o
I've got that sickly feeling in my guts for you. :-\
Hopefully it works out. Geez, it seems they oughta cut you a break after all of this now. Take some $ off for your troubles.
I hope when you rec'd the damaged pallet you noted the damage of the pallet on the paperwork, it makes claims so much easier. Some companies such as the one who hauled your frt are notorious for damage. Cheaper isn't always better. Good luck on the claim.
Quote from: LumberDan on June 15, 2015, 11:05:40 AM
... I unstrapped it from the banged up skid they strapped it to and set it on my garage floor. ...
Dan,
I know you are very frustrated and aggravated with the situation. However, part of the situation seems to be hinging on your perception of the manufacturer. Have you considered that the skid you received might have been in perfect condition when it was shipped from the manufacturer's facility and that the damage you see to the skid (and your mill frame) may well have occurred while the package was in the custody of the shipping company? Do you really think that the people who devote so much time and effort to building your mill would purposely use a damaged skid for shipping? Why? What would they gain? Instead, they now have committed to building you another frame at no additional cost to ensure you get an undamaged unit.
I wish you well and hope this all gets totally resolved soon and that you are soon up to your eyeballs in sawdust with lumber stacked up high all around.
Herb
Yes Bradmarks I did note it with Estes Express, well I noted the bent T-handle for the blade tentioner, the twisted frame I didn't know about till I got it home and off the skid. PC-Urban, I know this happened in transit and took pics and sent them to the claims dept. of the shipping broker. They are the ones who mounted it to the skid, and are handling the claim. I believe the manufacturer did nothing wrong in this situation. The pecking order here is Neil (Sequoia Mills) has to file the claim to the shipping broker then they need to file a claim with Estes Express. The question for me is will Neil build me another one and ship it without payment from the insurance company first? I've not heard from them this week, no answer yet. I've been trying to straighten it but think its a loss. also am mounting the engine and winch for the raising and lowering. Doing this to learn the set up, since I have absolutely no instructions on set up. My wife said that was crazy it came with no instructions which my reply was, If a person takes on a build project of this magnitude, he needs no instructions! :D The band wheels was a bit tricky keeping the blade on, I admit. The blade guides will be next, maybe someone can give me some insight? A big learning curve for sure. If I can get pics from my phone to this old laptop I will post some. till next time... :P
Geez Louise - I guess I think that any mill or mill parts should come with instructions on setup, operation and maintenance.
I know it seems easier said than done, but maybe a phone call asking about a manual? Maybe the shipper lost it.
My Cooks sharpener came with the book just zip tied onto it. Could be easily lost.
I have no idea how to help you set up a Sequoia mill. I need to bow out on this one.
There are others who have one - maybe they have a manual they'd be willing to photo copy and send to you?
guess the pics are in my gallery
the blade and blade guides needs to be parallel to the tracks and the band wheels needs to be perpendicular to the tracks and inline with one another, right? whats more to know? lmao! as far as a phone call... lol Hey I will be happy with a text!
As per FF rules, the Gallery is for posted pictures only.
Quote from: LumberDan on June 15, 2015, 09:43:07 PM
the blade and blade guides needs to be parallel to the tracks and the band wheels needs to be perpendicular to the tracks and inline with one another, right? whats more to know?
Pretty much that's it in a nutshell. Everything straight, parallel and true. If you have guides that push down on the blade for control, 1/4" deflection is the norm. If you have the sandwich type guides (top bottom and back bearings) there should be no deflection.
Got the push down type, thanks Ox. Majicman, did i do something I wasn't supposed to loading pics? got to say, I'm not impressed with the winch and cable set up for the raising and lowering. lots of weight with the 23hp motor, battery, fuel tank plus the saw-head its self. looks like it would be next to impossible to consistently mill the same thickness of boards. its not smooth but that could be the frame being racked?
My home made mill binds a bit going up and down. It does losen with use. It still binds a bit and I find myself giving the whole thing a shake side to side to make sure it is moving in all places. I have a two post head not a four post and expect some of this. It is also very rickity but seems to cut consistantly. I don't have $3000 in it and don't know what to expect from a mill like yours but you might find it losens quite well after a few uses. I did lubercate the post.
Good luck
gww
Option 1 - Force it to move dry a few times until it loosens up some, then lube it and all will be well.
Option 2 - would be to watch where the paint scrapes off and lightly file or sand in those places.
If no paint there, spray a light coat and watch for where it scrapes off.
But the first option will work.
I'm sure there's smarter fellers here with better ideas but I'm just sharing what I know works for me. :)
Quote from: LumberDan on June 16, 2015, 10:26:25 AMMajicman, did i do something I wasn't supposed to loading pics?
I was pointing out Jeff's instructions as per here: How to Post Pictures (https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php/topic,61788.0.html) Check out the first paragraph written in
BOLD. This board is found at the very bottom of the FF index page.
Update on my claim for a new mill from Sequoia Mills due to damage in shipment... NO UPDATE! I ordered it March 23rd, received the "twisted up" damaged mill finally on June 3rd, Sequoia Mills didn't file the claim till June 24th, Estes Express has up to 45 days (August 8th) to respond... really?? If successful in getting a claim check it goes to Sequoia Mills, then up to them to build me another one and ship it. Going by the first turn around time it took 10 weeks to get, lets see..., I should finally get my mill around October 17th... beautiful! At least I won't be sweating rolling logs around. Summery, horrible place to do business with!
Maybe, just maybe it might be better than you're expecting. I can feel your frustration clear over here on the hill.
We do a lot of shipping and receiving palletized orders, so taking 3 weeks to initiate a claim is very poor business. Instructions are immediately if damaged in transit. Good luck.
My, what as saga! Being lysdexic, I timed out before I could read through this. I know Murphy's Laws are for engineering, but there must be a Murphy's Laws of Commerce as well. I'm so glad to be out of business and retarred.
Dan, are they just going to build you a new carriage frame and you put the components from the one you have on it, or do you get an entirely new mill? If you get a whole new mill is there a chance that you can fix the one that was already sent to you? From your pics it doesn't look like it would take much at all to be up and running, granted pictures don't always tell the whole story.
I'll say this for darned sure, if your getting an entire carriage assembly with wheels and engine included, I'd be happier than a dog in the cat box! I'd fix the one you have and use it, then sell the new one in October. ;D
Better yet, sell the "Twisted up damaged mill" to me and I'll fix it up and sell it.
I do feel your pain on the shipping woes though. A couple months ago I sent someone a crate of burls worth right at $2,500 and it got lost for a month and a half. He'd lined up the shipping through a broker and sent me the bill of lading. I sent it off and it just flat disappeared somewhere between Billings Montana and Michigan. The broker used every last trick he could to prove it was our fault and offered to give us $50 for my loss, OUCH! I had to force myself to finally just call the buyer and tell him, "Well, the time I'd spent finding, sawing, processing and building a shipping crate was that much more time that I was sober." That was, at that time, the only possible thing that I could do. About a week later my crate was found in a warehouse, IN DALLAS TEXAS!
Have a great, Dan. It will somehow all work out for you.
Take what left of the second mill and make your self an extension...
To answer some of the questions, I had Sequoia Mills build me the carriage and head only, I installed all of the extras such as motor, winch/cable lift system, battery, fuel tank and mounting supports, clutch, blade etc... Had to also do all of the setup of the band wheels/blade guides as it was just thrown together to ship it. It did take me a little while to get it all figured out being the first time I did this and no instructions. I have done all this setup and dialing in to learn so when I get a good one I can get going pretty quick. lol maybe! I did get a call last week from someone at the shippers saying they are going to send an investigator to my house here in Ohio to look at the mill. at least that's progress but my only fear at this point is if they deem it repairable, who repairs it and the check still goes to Neil Akers not me. does he forward the check to me? :D Meanwhile I have begun building my sawmill trailer for this thing. The main tracks are 4"x 7" 3/16" tubing 20' long. caped with 2"x2" angle turned over for the v-rollers to ride on. The cross members are 3"x 8.5" semi truck frame. I got a deal on some new truck frame at the steel yard. It looks great and now I'm working on building 8 jack stands. If I start a new post about the build will you guys see it? many of you have showed interest and have actually help me in my plight with this whole mess. I don't know how it works :) I still am not sure on the upload picture thing. I can upload to my gallery but i guess i'm not allowed to invite anyone to view my gallery? hmm? Then if I use the link below "Click here to add Photos to post" it takes me to my gallery and then I select one then... nothing, it doesn't give me any options at that point. lol Will update you all later lmao
After you select the pic, scroll down. You will see a button labeled "Insert Image In Post". Click it and a link to the pic will be inserted into your post. Click "Preview" to see what it looks like.
Your mill frame sounds like a very sturdy and rugged design. I wish I had gone with box tube but the large angle iron is holding up fine. Just isn't as stiff as I would like to see it. When it's properly supported it doesn't flex at all, which is what really counts.
hay! it works! Now maybe I can show what I'm working on, cool
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/39831/20150601_145555~0.jpg)
Sooooo....this ancient thread just died with no resolution of the issue or what?? I'm looking at buying a used Sequoia mill and trying to learn if they are decent or not.