My new client and Quarry update

[teakwood]

Men, what a month, probably doing 400 working hours this month, very tired but dang the income is nice. best month ever, sold 16k of lumber and i won't even tell how much in the quarry, would take a month like that anytime.  :D

to bill, every piece is one truck load  ;D


they bring the fuel like the big boys. and the trucks waiting to get loaded, 6am


You can not sell alot of wood without restocking the storage. no time for sawing? find some!  

18years old premium teak from the small clearcut where the quarry gets expanded.



look at the size of these suckers, thats how teak should look like after 18 years. Me being in the fotos is not because of my beauty, it's just for size comparing  :D





I wanna say special thanks to the FF and all the members who have helped me out big time over all the years and did a little long distance suffering with me in the early years when things weren't that bright. THANKS!! 

[barbender]

Good for you Teak, it's good to see someone has put in a ton of hard work reaping the benefits!

[tacks Y]

YES, Good for you. It is always good to see people that are willing to work.

Are you thinking about them getting done? Maybe have them crush some for your own use or can you make your own?

[reride82]

I would suspect that it's a lot cheaper per ton to blast the material that it would be to hammer it apart.

But he did say that it was so soft and fractured that blasting wasn't necessary, and intimated that it was too expensive doing so - so if a dozer with a bar can pull it apart with some effort - I'm sure that a decent sized plugger on any reasonably sized excavator with a seasoned operator could not only knock of a large portion of a quarry face quickly, but also do it much deeper and better than multiple passes a couple of feet deep at best with a dozer and bar..
Not only that, a plugger can break up many of the boulders he claims are often embedded within the structure itself - saving a lot of time and effort jaw crushing many of them as well - which is mainly the reason they are used so much around here in the hard rock quarries.
I mean if a plugger is extremely useful in breaking up large chunks of very hard rock sometimes the size of small cars, blasted off of a quarry face here to make manageable pieces that can be more easily fed in a crusher - I'm certain it could easily and quickly handle anything that little quarry with basically just a compacted sedimentary type of rock structure, can offer - and 20 or 30 feet up and down a quarry face in the process!

A plugger would work in that situation, but you also forget he is in Costa Rica. Equipment costs are much higher there due to import costs, parts availabilty, and finding the right operator. Plus, it might be sitting a fair amount of the time and still having to pay for the machine. They have a dozer there and an operator to run it and it looks like they run it well. When I visited Costa Rica 8 or so years ago I noticed their work force was labor intensive and not as well vested in equipment and operators due to the previously stated reasons. It's hard to pay for an excavator when there are hundreds of guys willing to shovel for $5/hr. I'm guessing the dozer is not the bottleneck in that crusher scenerio, so we're trying to solve a problem he doesn't have. It reminds me of a hutterite colony that bought a farm and its fleet of machinery, they used everything but the rock picker because they had the labor to hand pick the rocks and could do it faster/better/cheaper by hand because of their labor force.
Levi

[mudfarmer]

Very nice! Now take that GF for a vacation for a week that you both deserve to escape the dust and get some weight out of your wallet ;D

[realzed]

I would suspect that it's a lot cheaper per ton to blast the material that it would be to hammer it apart.

But he did say that it was so soft and fractured that blasting wasn't necessary, and intimated that it was too expensive doing so - so if a dozer with a bar can pull it apart with some effort - I'm sure that a decent sized plugger on any reasonably sized excavator with a seasoned operator could not only knock of a large portion of a quarry face quickly, but also do it much deeper and better than multiple passes a couple of feet deep at best with a dozer and bar..
Not only that, a plugger can break up many of the boulders he claims are often embedded within the structure itself - saving a lot of time and effort jaw crushing many of them as well - which is mainly the reason they are used so much around here in the hard rock quarries.
I mean if a plugger is extremely useful in breaking up large chunks of very hard rock sometimes the size of small cars, blasted off of a quarry face here to make manageable pieces that can be more easily fed in a crusher - I'm certain it could easily and quickly handle anything that little quarry with basically just a compacted sedimentary type of rock structure, can offer - and 20 or 30 feet up and down a quarry face in the process!

A plugger would work in that situation, but you also forget he is in Costa Rica. Equipment costs are much higher there due to import costs, parts availabilty, and finding the right operator. Plus, it might be sitting a fair amount of the time and still having to pay for the machine. They have a dozer there and an operator to run it and it looks like they run it well. When I visited Costa Rica 8 or so years ago I noticed their work force was labor intensive and not as well vested in equipment and operators due to the previously stated reasons. It's hard to pay for an excavator when there are hundreds of guys willing to shovel for $5/hr. I'm guessing the dozer is not the bottleneck in that crusher scenerio, so we're trying to solve a problem he doesn't have. It reminds me of a hutterite colony that bought a farm and its fleet of machinery, they used everything but the rock picker because they had the labor to hand pick the rocks and could do it faster/better/cheaper by hand because of their labor force.
Levi

Yep - I get that - but my comment passed a point, was if he decided to keep operating the quarry past the point where his present client signed off and he was left with possible orders past that and still wanted an efficient way to cope with the rock structure his quarry presents presently.
At that point he wouldn't have a dozer available - nor necessarily a larger crusher either as well - so I figured it as a suggestion that would enable him to continue minus those big pieces in a small enterprise situation mainly on his own. A plugger set up - in addition to already having an excavator of his own that looks capable of handing one and along with a quick disconnect, would make it a dual purpose machine!

[customsawyer]

Teak good on ya. Nothing better than getting to enjoy the rewards of years of hard work.

[teakwood]

YES, Good for you. It is always good to see people that are willing to work.

Are you thinking about them getting done? Maybe have them crush some for your own use or can you make your own?

You're a smart men, that's exactly what i will do. Waiting on the cost per m3 they will charge me

[teakwood]

Very nice! Now take that GF for a vacation for a week that you both deserve to escape the dust and get some weight out of your wallet ;D

:laugh: :laugh: lol. We will definitively take some days off after all the work. My entire Family visits in july so we will travel around for about 14days, if the quarry stalls by then! 
The quarry is already paying to get her hair done every friday, lol. 

[Bruno of NH]

Hard work and persistence pays of 
I'm glad you are doing well Sir
Will you process the logs yourself or sell them ?

[teakwood]

Yes sir, i do everything in house. Saw, sticker, dry, process, sell. it would be a shame to sell such logs as roundwood, the yield is amazing compared to the normally smaller logs i saw. lots of high quality 1x6" (furnitures) and 1.125x5" (decks) boards per log.
Average is 0.65m3 (log/roundwood volume) per tree, that's pretty good for 18years.

I did a donation to the FF, time to give something back, and i encourage others to do so. we wouldn't enjoy the Forum if it wouldn't be for Jeffs and the other administrators endless efforts

[alco424]

I'm really surprised that they don't use hydraulic 'pluggers' or hammers mounted on excavators in your pit situation verses trying to rip everything up with bars on dozers..
Even up here in the hard rock quarries we have - pluggers work quite well when the rocks show any amount of fracturing - especially to break up larger chunks of rock and where any dozer even as big as what are shown, certainly wouldn't ever work!!

One thing to keep in mind, a ripper is way faster, and far cheaper than a hammer in ground like this.  
In solid fractured rock, a hammer can pick away at it, but in conglomerate material like he has, the ground actually absorbs the impact of the hammer and it does very little.  
This comes from my 33 years of excavation, dirt moving and mining experience.

[realzed]

So you're suggesting that if he wants to continue to operate in his quarry as I suggested he may after his contractor has departed - then he should spring for a half million or more $$ big Dozer with a bar as his contractor is now using to rip stuff apart verses what I suggested he should do - and that was get a hydraulic plugger fitted on a quick disconnect for the Volvo excavator he already has - which might cost $20 thousand at best..?
I know which I would choose given the associated costs.. 

[Southside]

Pretty sure Teak has demonstrated that he is very capable of successfully running his business the way he sees fit. 

[teakwood]

I have the quick coupler and the ripper since 15 years and have lots of hours of experience with it, and believe me when i tell you i know how to use it and know whats best for my quarry! When it gets to the point that the ripper isn't going to brake rocks out at a 5-6m high face then the explosives will come into play. Hammer is way too slow and expensive, you talking 40k $ for a good hammer for a 30to excavator and the renting  hour of such a equipment would be 180$ even here. so you brake out max 30m3 of rock/h and this gives you 150$ of material you loose money big time.
the other quarry tried hammers on a 45to excavator and are using explosives now. 
and the firm who is working here owns 8 quarries so they know how to handle rock.
for making small boulders out of big ones the hammer would be king.

This was my first ripper job in 2008

[alco424]

So you're suggesting that if he wants to continue to operate in his quarry as I suggested he may after his contractor has departed - then he should spring for a half million or more $$ big Dozer with a bar as his contractor is now using to rip stuff apart verses what I suggested he should do - and that was get a hydraulic plugger fitted on a quick disconnect for the Volvo excavator he already has - which might cost $20 thousand at best..?
I know which I would choose given the associated costs..

Where exactly did I say that?  
I said a ripper is cheaper, and more productive in that kind of ground.  
I'm sure he has the knowledge of his own needs to make the decisions needed to run his business.

[Firewoodjoe]

What I've found there isn't always right and wrong. More than one way to skin a cat. I usually do it wrong according to most. But I'm happy 😊 

[Bruno of NH]

I think Teak hit it right
Let to contractor dig it out and let them worry about it while he counts the load ticket and goes to the bank 
And stayes out of it when his girlfriend wants to go get her hair done.
I found the world stops when the lady needs her hair done. Don't ask how I know  :D

[teakwood]

And stayes out of it when his girlfriend wants to go get her hair done.

She puts me in charge of the load ticket making while she goes to the hair dresser :D :

No no, it's all good, most of the time she is in the quarry and that give me time to work in the sawmill.

Sunday 1pm, 37 degrees, was kinda loco by then
 


but what nice logs!

pretty enormous for my little manual mill
 

[teakwood]

Went to visit my number 1 client, an american house developer in a touristy area.

the sealing is from another company, the rest is my wood

The guy has 7 houses under construction right now!

[WhitePineJunky]

Looks really good, I like the hallway ceiling and lanterns hanging 

[Ron Scott]

Great pictures!

[Resonator]

That open tread stairway looks neat, guessing there is a steel beam hidden inside the center stringer? ???

[Stephen1]

Great pictures of the wood. 

[teakwood]

That open tread stairway looks neat, guessing there is a steel beam hidden inside the center stringer? ???

Yes, its all wrapped steel structure, even  the handrails. The only solid teak pieces are the steps. underneath the steps in the unfinished black holes there will go some led lights