Measuring cords from loggers

[james_a95]

Hello

So I own a firewood business, and recently we purchased 34 cords of wood (so they said) from a logging company, we processed it and sold almost all of it, have a little pile left. But we ran the report for the amount of wood sold and we are coming up about 7 cords short of wood. We accounted for waste, even on the generous side of it and still showing missing wood.

We ordered more wood from that same company last week and just now are finding this out, so we are going to call him and have his guys do their measurements infront of us. Just wondering what is the best way to measure the logs that come in 8ft lengths from a logging company on a truck? So we can check ourselves so we know we are getting the right amount.

Thanks

[RHP Logging]

Measure it on the truck. That way it's all squared up. It can be difficult to measure a pile. Also account for air space etc. Did you bring up the fact you thought you were shorted? Sometimes it can be the trucker that gets it wrong. But it can also be the logger claiming there is more.  If the guy is reasonable you should be able to find a common ground. If not find a different supplier because they will try to get away with something every time.  I usually sent 10.5-11 cords and call it 10 to account for air. I purposely have my big cut n split operators run my loads through early on so I know we are on the same page. I probably give more out then I need to but I'd rather have loyal customers then a couple extra bucks.

[Corley5]

Ten cords of pulp will not cut up to ten 128 cubic foot cords of firewood.  I figure on 25 16" 4'X8' face cords from 10 pulp cord. 

[47sawdust]

If you can scale the logs,there is roughly 500bf in a cord.Might be hard to do
depending on what you are getting for logs.

[ahlkey]

A lot of variables exist but as a general rule a Full Loggers cord will only give you 85% to 90% of a stacked full cord of firewood (three face cords).     

[Bill_G.]

10 cords of round log length wood will not yield 10 cords of cut stove length split wood.
 

[GAB]

Based on the above posts:
james_a95 said "we purchased 34 cords of wood (so they said) from a logging company, we processed it and sold almost all of it, have a little pile left. But we ran the report for the amount of wood sold and we are coming up about 7 cords short of wood."
If you call the little pile .2 of a cord then you got 27.2 from 34 cords or 80%.
Corley5 said "I figure on 25 16" 4'X8' face cords from 10 pulp cord."
25/3=8.333 or 83.33%
ahlkey said "as a general rule a Full Loggers cord will only give you 85% to 90% of a stacked full cord of firewood"
Since firewood is often very knarly and crooked material and hard to measure to me those numbers are in the same ball park.  Also if the wood is split on the small size and the cords are on the large size then the % might be on the lower side. 
Gerald

[drobertson]

Weight may be the closest measurement, seems a cord weighs close to a cord? Only variable would be moisture content,

[Jamie_C]

If you bought 34 cords of wood in 8ft lengths and after processing into stove length firewood it yielded 27 cords then your results are normal. Between the waste generated and the fact that shorter pieces of wood pile tighter together a loss or shrinkage of 20% to 25% is normal.

[Gearbox]

When the law for MN was written . A 4 X4X 8 was 4 foot wood = 128 cubic ft. Cut and split stacked 16 in. 110 cubic ft. . So I would say 8 ft. would put you at 100 cubic ft..

[james_a95]

I understand there will be shrinkage from processing the wood. But what is a good method to measure the wood ourselves while on the truck?

[Gearbox]

Stick scale 4 times on each side of truck and trailer or 4 times on each side of front and back if it is a trailer with a center mount . Add all readings together and divide by the number of mesurements in inches . devide by 12 . now you have average in feet . Times the length in feet . devided by 128 . will give you the number of cords . Or just let the trucker scale it for you while you watch . Most drivers can show you how to scale . If I didn't do this right somebody jump in here .

[logging pete]

Take the average height  in feet to the nearest tenth of a foot times length in feet divide by 16 will get you cords. I sorted my own pulp to what my processor liked, 12 cords would yield  not much more than 8 full cord when stacked to allow for shrinking.

[Logger RK]

We do it the same way logging Pete does :P

[TeaW]

I have been getting my wood from the same logger/trucker for years, it comes in the same truck loaded by the same man.I buy it by the load,I know that every load will vary in what it yields. Each load might look the same,each to the top of the stakes but every load is different.I don't think measuring it would tell me much. IT is firewood up to 20 foot lengths different sizes with crooks,sweep,crouches ,etc.Dont get me wrong I am not complaining he brings wood that will go through the processor and that is what I want.
I know when I process how much was in each load and it is what they average that I go by not the best or worst load.

[leeroyjd]

With straight poles I've been multiplying length x height x width divide by 140

[Mountaynman]

my guys take the first three loads n split it up for an average then we rock and roll got one guy been buyin for 4 yrs couple others for 3 no bitches some loads r better than others bub processor wood gets sorted on the landing homeowner loads in another pile

[RHP Logging]

That's funny cuz my guys nearly always get ten out of mine when I say it's ten give or take a face. Sounds like guys are getting screwed. I make sure to check in with my guys. I have 5-6 cut n split guys that make 300-1000 cords per year. They know their bottom line and I know mine. I'm know for an honest load.  I get 2.25 cord in a bunk and I know 4 bunks go on the truck unless crooked wood then 4.5 or 5.  I used to count every stick. Roughly 25-30 8 ftrs to a cord (average size "6-8"). Measure it on the truck. Or listen to these guys who seem OK with getting screwed. Measure the bunks, eye up the air. Pick a number. If they won't budge tell em to take a hike. Rarely will a truck leave with a load on if you're being fair. I'm sure you have other options. Where are you located?

[NWP]

Weigh a cord of split wood then weigh each load of logs and buy it by the ton or you could buy it per load since you'll know pretty close how much it will yield

[RHP Logging]

I don't know of any firewood companies that own a scale. That's just silly talk now. Maybe the d.o.t. will let you run up on their scales for fun! Ha.

7 cords of shrinkage in 34 is not acceptable.   At 250-300 per cord cut n split no one would stay in buisness with that loss. I'm charging around 100 per cord. That's 700 down the tubes from shrinkage? Come on.

[OntarioAl]

x1 what RPH Logging says
I did firewood when I was logging and found lots of shady characters peddling firewood.
One client was processing and selling and they closely monitored the input output and never had issues with the scale.
One example of a shady deal:
I got a call from a Baptist Pastor saying his regular (for several years) supplier was out of business an could I deliver 5 cords of 8 ft birch. I took his information and delivered the load the next day. I backed in his drive way and dumped the load. The first words out of his mouth was "that's a lot of wood for 5 cords worth, it will not all fit in my wood shed" He showed me his shed and I knew then that he had been getting rolled for years. The dimensions of the shed were such that you could not neatly pile 16" split wood and get 3 cords of processed 8ft to fit in it. 
Al

[Brandon1986]

Running the whole gambit from falling to logging to trucking on my self loading log truck to going through the processor and finally stacking, I usually have a pretty good idea within 1 or 2 logs what a cord looks like on my truck.  That said weight is the only real good way to know how much is on a truck.. I see other local guys running around with 8 or 9 cords on and calling them 10's because they measure it and say "ok it meets these measurements". Well that's all well and good if you're hauling straight saw logs and putting butts and tails alternating between the front and back so you end up with a true tight squared load.  When you have any logs that don't meet those requirements you end up with a lot (I've seen up to 20%est) of air space inside your load.. When I load my truck with local birch (which is mostly straight) I have to stack it a bit above the height of the loader and do my best to smash it in down in the bunks with the grapple to make a true 10 cord load.. Also (which most people do) you have to know approximately how much your product weighs.. Here in Alaska our local stand and best firewood is birch which weighs 5000# per cord green, and as little as 3500# if it is very well seasoned (which it won't be in log form)..

I don't know how much wood you're moving but if it's any large volume at all a set of used portable scales are in the $6000 range.. That MIGHT keep your suppliers honest.. I would do it, but being as I am my own supplier and I ALWAYS err on the side of giving the customer wood (you can always get more wood you can't easily recoup a good name) it would be a bit silly for me too.. 

I don't know if that helps at all, but that's all I got....

[Brandon1986]

I was just clicking about craigslist and as it happens I found a set of scales for $2500.. if memory serves admin won't allow craigslist links to be posted, but they are out there for not a lot of coin if you look hard enough...

[NWP]

I don't know of any firewood companies that own a scale. That's just silly talk now. Maybe the d.o.t. will let you run up on their scales for fun! Ha.

I don't know any firewood companies that have scales either but I buy firewood logs by the ton sometimes so it's not really just silly talk.  There is a truck stop within a couple of miles of my place that has a set of scales.  A lot of towns have places such as grain elevators or other businesses that have scales that they will weigh trucks for a small fee.

[Jamie_C]

I don't know of any firewood companies that own a scale. That's just silly talk now. Maybe the d.o.t. will let you run up on their scales for fun! Ha.

7 cords of shrinkage in 34 is not acceptable.   At 250-300 per cord cut n split no one would stay in buisness with that loss. I'm charging around 100 per cord. That's 700 down the tubes from shrinkage? Come on.

What would i know ... only a licensed scaler and the company I work for does well north of 2000 cord of firewood a year and has for more years than i can count. We harvest the wood, truck it to our yard, process it ourselves, and truck it to our customers. A 7 cd loss on 34 cd is right on target. I will look up the conversion factors that our Province uses in a bit and post them here .

Also, here in NS the only legal cord is a 128 cubic foot cord, no short cords, processed cords, face cords or any other terms meaning less than 128 cubic feet.

[rjwoelk]

Jamie what would you call a short box level full?
Just wondering, we sell it by the bulk bag which is pretty much a 1/3 but dont advertise it as such.

[Jamie_C]

What is your definition of a short box ? I assume you mean a pickup truck box but again there are so many different box lengths. Our fleet of pickups has 3 different box lengths. You should be somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 a cord piled level in the back of a truck ... so many variables to take into consideration.

[RHP Logging]

I don't know of any firewood companies that own a scale. That's just silly talk now. Maybe the d.o.t. will let you run up on their scales for fun! Ha.

I don't know any firewood companies that have scales either but I buy firewood logs by the ton sometimes so it's not really just silly talk.  There is a truck stop within a couple of miles of my place that has a set of scales.  A lot of towns have places such as grain elevators or other businesses that have scales that they will weigh trucks for a small fee.

I pay for trucking by the hour. If my trucker had to run out of the way to some scales I'd send my wood elsewhere. Profits are thin enough as it is. I have a good reputation so I don't worry about where my wood is going or how much is on the truck and my regular customers don't either.  Also what about mixed hardwood loads? How are you going to quantify that for sure? Seems a slippery slope.

[RHP Logging]

I don't know of any firewood companies that own a scale. That's just silly talk now. Maybe the d.o.t. will let you run up on their scales for fun! Ha.

7 cords of shrinkage in 34 is not acceptable.   At 250-300 per cord cut n split no one would stay in buisness with that loss. I'm charging around 100 per cord. That's 700 down the tubes from shrinkage? Come on.

What would i know ... only a licensed scaler and the company I work for does well north of 2000 cord of firewood a year and has for more years than i can count. We harvest the wood, truck it to our yard, process it ourselves, and truck it to our customers. A 7 cd loss on 34 cd is right on target. I will look up the conversion factors that our Province uses in a bit and post them here .

Also, here in NS the only legal cord is a 128 cubic foot cord, no short cords, processed cords, face cords or any other terms meaning less than 128 cubic feet.

So your company buys 2400 cords a year to be able to make 2000 cords? At 100 bucks a cord they are pissing away 40,000 dollars to shrinkage? I highly doubt it. Seems like someone else should steer that ship. When I send 30 cords to a customer they get thirty cords give or take a cord.  I wouldn't stay in buisness long otherwise.

[Corley5]

  When we sell and buy 100" hardwood firewood around here we're dealing with  2X8X8 cords of 100" mixed hardwood pulp.  It's scaled on the truck as such.  One of those cords doesn't cut up to a 4X4X8 cord of processed wood unless it's exceptionally nice.  I bought some stained sugar maple flooring bolts from a mill one summer that processed almost equally.  That was one time.  If you're selling pulp so that a load processes to 10 4X4X8 cords you're selling a 12 cord load of pulp.  That's how it works around here. 

[RHP Logging]

2x8x8=4x4x8=128

[Corley5]

Exactly, but the 2X8X8 cut into 4X4X8 will be less than 128 cubic feet.  Try it.

[Jamie_C]

RHP ... you should build a box with the dimensions of a cord 4x4x8 ... fill it with 8 foot wood ... now take all of that wood out, cut it into firewood lengths, split it and pile it back into that same box ... you're eyes will be opened.

If you're getting a true cord of finished firewood out of what you're logger claims is a cord of 8' I'm some glad I'm not the logger, the trucker or the landowner he's cutting on.

You cannot fill a square box with round products, remanufacture that round product into smaller pieces split into what is effectively triangles and put it back into the box expecting it to equate to the same full box. The triangular pieces will pack in tighter than all of the round ones did previously.

Sawmills don't buy 8ft saw material by the cord or tonne, process it into a finish product and expect the finished lumber to still be a cord or tonne ... neither should you

[RHP Logging]

RHP ... you should build a box with the dimensions of a cord 4x4x8 ... fill it with 8 foot wood ... now take all of that wood out, cut it into firewood lengths, split it and pile it back into that same box ... you're eyes will be opened.

If you're getting a true cord of finished firewood out of what you're logger claims is a cord of 8' I'm some glad I'm not the logger, the trucker or the landowner he's cutting on.

You cannot fill a square box with round products, remanufacture that round product into smaller pieces split into what is effectively triangles and put it back into the box expecting it to equate to the same full box. The triangular pieces will pack in tighter than all of the round ones did previously.

Sawmills don't buy 8ft saw material by the cord or tonne, process it into a finish product and expect the finished lumber to still be a cord or tonne ... neither should you

I don't buy 8' lengths. I sell them. I'm a logger not a firewood guy.  You're right if you put 8' logs in a box and split logs in a box it will be different. Like I said earlier I send what measures up to be about 11 cords on the truck as 10 cords to the customer. I'd rather have loyal customers.  It's not OK for you guys to be getting screwed that bad and you should not accept that.  7 cords lost in 34 is ridiculous.

[Pclem]

I also own a firewood business. We kiln dry everything, and packaging [bundles] make up about 75% of our business. We have to figure a 25% loss from logs to packaged wood, due to waste and shrinkage. So for an 11 cord load, we're yielding 8.25 cords of split. Yeah, it hurts bad, especially with the markets the last few years for bolts. We can't just run your average pulp load of logs through our processor and be efficient. I bought a cable skidder a couple years ago, and am logging my land and going to look for smaller jobs to log. I think buying our own timber is the only solution for controlling what we run through the processor and package.

[Mountaynman]

round here and in maine the loose dropped on truck cord measurement is 180 cu ft and if you have decent processor wood I don't believe that you will dump the logs off the truck run them thru the processor and fit them back on the same truck have done it many times when I ran a firewood business got out of it due to lack of decent help and the fact that most customers felt they were getting screwed been shorted so many times by others they were actually amazed when my 3 cord load was actually what they got other than the ones that think there is such a thing as a 20" face cord that's another story 

[Jamie_C]

RHP ... it's not getting screwed, it's what happens when you take a raw product and manufacture it into something else. There are always "losses" in a manufacturing process, everything gets priced accordingly.

Again, you wouldn't sell 8' saw material to a sawmill and expect them to be able to get a full cord of lumber out of a cord of wood, firewood is no different.

[SwampDonkey]

We have no oak (very sparse and rare to none in most areas) or hickory here, just hard maple, beech and yellow birch as firewood for long burns.  If you look at green weights of those 3, they are all very close. Lots lighter than oaks, less water off the stump. That being said, green wood, that is around a 34-35 metric tonne (37-39 US ton) load usually gets you 12 to 12-1/2 cord of 24" furnace wood. I've cut it by hand and stacked it many times. It was always sold to me as 12 cords to. I've worked with scales and scale slips in a past life, far more than you can carry in a tote box. Loggers in my area, cutting on woodlots only understand cords. Quoting metric, board feet and tonnes is a foreign language. They pay their cutter and trucker by the cord. The company loggers are in a different boat, they have to deal with metric volumes and weights. But I bet some of their cutters still want to know cords to. We also have chain of custody log books here to.

[Jamie_C]

Swamp ... down here Northern Pulp uses 2.05 tonnes per cord for hardwood pulp or firewood, keep in mind that we have a lot of Red Maple in our mix which lightens things up a lot. Hardwood sawlogs are about 2.4 tonne per cord.

Every load of wood we touch also has the same chain of custody style book.

[SwampDonkey]

Yeah we always used 2.5 metric tonne on hard maple, beech, yellow birch. But I never seen 14 cord of wood stacked from 24" firewood off them loads. A cord of wood is a lot of wood when your cutting and stacking by hand.  ;D

That conversion is based on 8 foot pulp wood, not processed firewood.

[RHP Logging]

RHP ... it's not getting screwed, it's what happens when you take a raw product and manufacture it into something else. There are always "losses" in a manufacturing process, everything gets priced accordingly.

Again, you wouldn't sell 8' saw material to a sawmill and expect them to be able to get a full cord of lumber out of a cord of wood, firewood is no different.

More then 20% is getting screwed. Find another supplier. I'm not questioning the loss of material when it's broken down. That was never the scenario. Only a moron would think a cord of round wood equals a cord of split wood.  I'm questioning the size of the loads in the first place.  I'm trying to tell you not to accept that and you seem to be OK with loosing money. Well not you personally.  Your employer. So I guess you probably don't mind.

[chevytaHOE5674]

RHP if you buy 10 cord of logs and your pile of logs scales out to 10 cord of logs then nobody is getting screwed. Your buying raw logs so you pay based on that you aren't buying or selling logs based on the volume after post processing.

Weather you get 9.5 cord or 6 cord of cut split firewood from the 10 cord is irrelivant at that point.

[chevytaHOE5674]

I'm questioning the size of the loads in the first place

You can't dispute the size of the original load of logs based on what the output after processing was. That will change depending of firewood length, split size, etc.

[SwampDonkey]

This why a lot of loggers charge more if it's to be processed for firewood. The logger can get paid for say 14 cord of pulp at the mill based on 8 foot conversion, he's not too happy to be short 2 cord of pay if he sells firewood unless the price balances out the difference.

[Mountaynman]

round here that's why most guys don't sell much for firewood hassle of collecting the money and all the bitchin about rot or being short at the pulp mill its 2.77 ton to the cord and a ton is a ton over the scale the money is in your account next week on wednesday

[deerguy]

Wow gents,

Glad ol' Beatrice my 330 TJ is laid up with a sore leg ( planetary and now locker ) cause she would have spasms trying to figure out how much wood we pulled in a day !! Since the goal is to sell it, doesn't the final pile dictate the numbers ?? Assume waste and cutting etc...if a 10 cord load turns into " X " percent less....we are either doing great or we have an issue with supply ??
And on that note I'll bow out, although I have learned a lot about firewood calculations and for that a big thank you to all who took the time !!

Deerguy

[RHP Logging]

I guess I really don't care that much as long as I'm getting paid what I need for a semi load and my firewood customer is happy. You guys do what you want.  Hey maybe you could figure that cordage loss into tax losses.

[Jamie_C]

RHP ... it's not getting screwed, it's what happens when you take a raw product and manufacture it into something else. There are always "losses" in a manufacturing process, everything gets priced accordingly.

Again, you wouldn't sell 8' saw material to a sawmill and expect them to be able to get a full cord of lumber out of a cord of wood, firewood is no different.

More then 20% is getting screwed. Find another supplier. I'm not questioning the loss of material when it's broken down. That was never the scenario. Only a moron would think a cord of round wood equals a cord of split wood.  I'm questioning the size of the loads in the first place.  I'm trying to tell you not to accept that and you seem to be OK with loosing money. Well not you personally.  Your employer. So I guess you probably don't mind.

RHP ... we control everything from the stump right to the point of dropping off the firewood in the customers yard. Our harvesters cut it, our forwarders put it to roadside, our trucks haul it, it even crosses our own scales in our woodyard a lot of the time. Our wood is scaled for what is actually there, we don't put on 11 cords and call it 10, that would be cheating the landowner out of stumpage money. We know what our conversion factor is from raw product to finished product and it's priced accordingly.

We know when we put X amount of wood in our yard what it will yield in finished product. We don't try to put extra wood on our trucks and call it less than actual volume just to make our yield falsely look better.

[RHP Logging]

How do you know what numbers I'm giving the landowner? Falsely making my loads look better by selling the customer more wood then what I'm getting paid for? What the hell? The discussion started out with a good way to measure a load of firewood. I said on the truck. No, he should spend more money because he already feels he is out on scales so he can weigh the wood, guess at a conversion factor and then what?  Honestly maybe he should just bend over when he sees the log truck coming and get ready to take it.  I don't really care how much wood turns into how much wood. That was never the issue. Not really sure why I had to be taught wood conversion factors. You guys are missing the point and I could care less. I'm trying to tell the OP not to take that crap.  20% loss is crap and I don't think the OP should just stand there and take it.

[Jamie_C]

RHP ... you do seem to care quite deeply about how many cords of wood will equal x amount of firewood or you wouldn't continually say that a 20% loss is crap. If you're in business and don't know the conversion factors used in your business then you are doomed to failure. Our numbers come from about 20 years of selling firewood and we know exactly what our numbers are.

Our equipment cuts, forwards and trucks about 200,000 tonnes of wood a year and our records are kept right down to 0.001 tonne on every truck load of wood.

[RHP Logging]

Do you have your own personal money at stake?

[Mooseherder]

Moving this here for now.

[Jeff]

This was moved temporarily because of the complaints about the attitude being extruded. I can see it too now that I have read the topic.
K N O C K   I T  O F F.  No need for it.

The way I see this, is what is the original poster ordering? Does he understand what he is ordering?  If he is ordering 8 full cords or face cords? If he ordered 24 face cords and they bring him 8 full cord, then he has an issue with the logger. If he ordered 8 full cords expecting to get 24 cord, then he has an issue on understanding what he is going to get as a finished product out of a raw product.

When I worked at the mill, I did almost all the scaling of the trucks. You just DO NOT allow trucks to come in and give you a scale slip. You make sure. They may have measured it themselves at the woods, but you can betcha we are going to measure again at the mill.  Trust but verify.

Back to the attitude issue. This is the Forestry Forum. We don't do that here. Capisce?

[1270d]

You also said you give an extra cord on every load RHP.   

[jwilly3879]

Our trucker loads the triaxle with hardwood pulp that scales out at 7+ cord by weight at the mill. We sell 8' firewood as a 7 cord load on the truck that is stacked upon delivery and have never had any complaints.

[David-L]

Whatever happened to the if you take round wood and split it 5 ways and try to get it back together you can;t meaning you have more volume. I always thought the homeowner made out better if they bought a tri-axle load of round wood and worked it themselves in that case. So is 180Cu/Ft a cord thrown in loose, split?

[SwampDonkey]

Our trucker loads the triaxle with hardwood pulp that scales out at 7+ cord by weight at the mill. We sell 8' firewood as a 7 cord load on the truck that is stacked upon delivery and have never had any complaints.

You shouldn't, 7 cord in 8 ft should be 7 cord in 8 ft anywhere you unload it.   ;D

[Jamie_C]

Whatever happened to the if you take round wood and split it 5 ways and try to get it back together you can;t meaning you have more volume. I always thought the homeowner made out better if they bought a tri-axle load of round wood and worked it themselves in that case. So is 180Cu/Ft a cord thrown in loose, split?

Depending on the quality of your round wood, after it's split and piled neatly you would have around 100 cu/ft (sometimes called a processed cord) ... the thrown cord measure is used when the wood is just tossed haphazardly into a pile on the ground and will be somewhere close. Here in NS neither one is a legal unit for selling firewood.

[coxy]

jmop but you can have 8 people load and unload the same load and come up more or less on the truck or the ground  same thing with split wood my neighbor which is my cuzin sells wood when he brings it to me I pile it so hes always short just to  him off     but I don't pay for it we barter our services  some times it will take me an hour or more to pile it but that's what we do to each other  8)

[Ed_K]

Yrs ago the University of Mass took a cord of round wood measured on the ground at 4'x4'x8' =128 cu ft. Then split it and stacked it and got around 100 cu ft. The students then got their measuring sticks and math calculations going and figured the best they could, to get all the air pockets out and that came out at 90 cu ft. That gets the brain going  :D .

[OH logger]

is my head the only one that's hurtin ??  :(

[SwampDonkey]

Then there is the cunit, 100 ft3 of solid wood. Some mills paid on the cunit here. Near as I can tell from figures I have, a cord was 0.77 cunits.

[coxy]

Then there is the cunit, 100 ft3 of solid wood. Some mills paid on the cunit here. Near as I can tell from figures I have, a cord was 0.77 cunits.

??? ???

[wannaergo]

I think the cunit is what the Forest service uses on their paperwork. It's quite a pain in the nuts converting everything from cc to cords and board feet.

[SwampDonkey]

Pulp mills want weight or solid volume units because they don't throw away slab wood. Air (voids in a wood pile) has no value (buying or selling) in the volume when the paper comes out the end.  They want to know how much volume of pulp is going to be in the digester from that stack of wood. ;D

[jcplowboy01]

So now i am really confused. I live in Michigan and have seen logging trucks with tandem trailers all up and down the roads. They all claim 10 and 20 cord loads, front trailer = 10 and rear trailer = 10.  So knowing weight restrictions exist how do they legally haul 20 cords of green oak daily with out getting ticketed for being over weight?

[thecfarm]

Lots of tires.  ;D

[chevytaHOE5674]

So now i am really confused. I live in Michigan and have seen logging trucks with tandem trailers all up and down the roads. They all claim 10 and 20 cord loads, front trailer = 10 and rear trailer = 10.  So knowing weight restrictions exist how do they legally haul 20 cords of green oak daily with out getting ticketed for being over weight?

A Michigan truck is legal for 158-164K lbs total the truck itself usually weights 50-60kl bs. Meaning they can legally haul ~100k lbs of payload. 20 cord of oak at 2.5 tons/cord is 100k lbs.

Having said that our trucker routinely hauls 110-120K lbs of pulp to the mill. 

[Gearbox]

The more I read this The more I know what and why I went broke buying and processing firewood and selling it .

[SwampDonkey]

 :D :D :D It can bite ya if you don't adjust prices.

[RHP Logging]

You also said you give an extra cord on every load RHP.

I've never had complaints on volume. It's hard enough retaining. Customers right now. With propane so cheap and the pulp mills on serious quotas, the big operators are practically giving the wood away. I think it's foolish because I can still get the prices I got several years ago. Maybe because I've built a loyal customer base. Idk. How's the pulp market up there?

[1270d]

You also said you give an extra cord on every load RHP.

I've never had complaints on volume. It's hard enough retaining. Customers right now. With propane so cheap and the pulp mills on serious quotas, the big operators are practically giving the wood away. I think it's foolish because I can still get the prices I got several years ago. Maybe because I've built a loyal customer base. Idk. How's the pulp market up there?

One day softwood is tight, the next it's wide open.  Everything is tightening up in general.  So far hardwood pulp has been steady.  Can't ship pine bolts till may.   We can't ship hardly anything anywhere, can't seem to find truckers. 

[Caseybow123]

The most accurate way to measure round  wood to processed is to multiple your round wood by .7854. This will give you a fairly accurate cut, split and piled wood amount. By multiplying it with this variable it will eliminate your typical volume lost due to air space. Ex. 8 cords on the truck of round wood  times .7854 would yield approximately 6.28 cords processed.

[SwampDonkey]

I don't think the loss is that high. A cord of 8 foot is 0.77 cunits (1 solid cunit is 1.3 cords - 166 cu feet), which is solid wood (cunit), not with air.

[Grandpa]

SD, don't you have that backwards, I thought a cord was 128 cubic feet and a cunit was 100 cubic feet, making a cord bigger than a cunit. One of us is confused.

[SwampDonkey]

Not back wards, it's from 1 cunit to cords needed to make the cunit. Takes more cords to make a cunit. Solid cubic feet of wood is not the same as stacked cubic feet of wood with air.

[RHP Logging]

You also said you give an extra cord on every load RHP.

I've never had complaints on volume. It's hard enough retaining. Customers right now. With propane so cheap and the pulp mills on serious quotas, the big operators are practically giving the wood away. I think it's foolish because I can still get the prices I got several years ago. Maybe because I've built a loyal customer base. Idk. How's the pulp market up there?

One day softwood is tight, the next it's wide open.  Everything is tightening up in general.  So far hardwood pulp has been steady.  Can't ship pine bolts till may.   We can't ship hardly anything anywhere, can't seem to find truckers.

. 

You guys need actual drivers or trucks to go with them?

[Grandpa]

Not back wards, it's from 1 cunit to cords needed to make the cunit. Takes more cords to make a cunit. Solid cubic feet of wood is not the same as stacked cubic feet of wood with air.

SD, my mistake. I should have had more coffee or something. stupid_smiley

[chevytaHOE5674]

You guys need actual drivers or trucks to go with them?

Can't speak specifically for 1270 but I'm sure its like it is over here we need a truck and driver to go with. With the cost of keeping a Michigan truck on the road it seems more and more guys are selling their trucks and getting out of the biz.

[RHP Logging]

Yep. Nearly impossible to find independent haulers here too. The few I have known have either gotten out or are always thinking about it.

[SwampDonkey]

A lot of trucking fleets here depend on hauling wood off Freehold (mill ground) and crown land (public land) for operators cutting wood. The rate is quite pour though hauling for mills, but the work is there. I know some guys who have worked 80 hrs, you can't keep that up before the health issues show up. I also know a lot of truckers here that have moved their trucking out west, way more money in it hauling out there. Don't know why, but if your not on a union in these parts your working for the minimum for some reason.  :