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Tree service logs

Started by firefighter ontheside, February 19, 2018, 06:17:17 PM

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Darrel

I'm working on getting my ducks in a row then I'll be contacting one tree service in Klamath Falls. He's already told me that he'd save good saw logs for me. Right now my trailer needs some serious work to get it ready to hall logs. 
1992 LT40HD

If I don't pick myself up by my own bootstraps, nobody else will.

firefighter ontheside

Good deal Darrel.

I talked to another service that was recommended to me by one of our firefighters who used to work for a tree service.  This might be the best one yet.  He's much closer and said I should come and look at what they have and will let me know about stuff in the future.  Also may set up with me ahead of time to come to job site and be loaded there.
Woodmizer LT15
Kubota Grand L4200
Stihl 025, MS261 and MS362
2017 F350 Diesel 4WD
Kawasaki Mule 4010
1998 Dodge 3500 Flatbed

YellowHammer

I did that too, pre staging with the tree service.  I had a big dump trailer with a crane for these jobs.  I thought it was a goldmine but it was a nightmare.

Some of my most memorable negative experiences caused me to stop doing it. Most times I would drop off the dump trailer in the morning on the way to work and pick it up on the way home.  Unfortunately this was a very bad scenario as the tree guys were usually long gone doing another job or done for the day. Either way I was mostly alone when I went to retrieve the loaded trailer.

The problem is that the customers thought I was part of the tree service team and I caught all the flak from the total job as if was my fault or something. They also figured I was supposed to haul off everything, even the miscellaneous branches and twigs the tree guys invariably left in the yard. That's why I was last there and had a trailer, right?  Of course they'd get mad when I didn't pick the garbage up and tried to explain the situation to them.

Then customers would also get really mad when they learned I wasn't employed by the tree guy who was getting the logs hauled off for free or worse yet I was going to saw them up and make money off logs that they, the customer, had already paid the tree service a dump and hauling fee.

I've had customers tell me I needed to reimburse them for the logs.

I've had customers get mad at the tree service and take it out on me.

I've had customers tell me I needed to fix the ground up root ball and stump shavings in their yard.

I had a guy tell me I needed to fix a damaged gutter on his house.

Another accused me of damaging his plumbing.

The one that finally did me in was a big pecan log job where I parked the trailer on the driveway at the direction of the tree service, unhooked and went to work. Sometime during the day they moved the trailer into the man's front yard and loaded it to the gills.  Then they left and it started raining. When I went to pick the trailer up it was sunk in the soggy ground with about 16,000 lbs of dead weight and rain forecast for the next day. I had to get it out then, before the rain got worse.  When I pulled it out with my diesel 4WD it left some moderate tire ruts in his front yard, not from spinning, just soggy ground.  The customer literally freaked.

So I calmed him down, went home, unhooked the trailer, went to Home Depot, bought a few bags of topsoil, some seeds and hay. I went back the the yard, fixed the ruts in the rain, at night, went home sopping wet, mad as a hornet, fired up the computer, logged into Craigslist and posted for sale, one big dump trailer with or without a crane attached. I sold both within a week and swore off tree services.

I hope your experiences are better than mine.
YellowHammerisms:

Take steps to save steps.

If it won't roll, its not a log; it's still a tree.  Sawmills cut logs, not trees.

Kiln drying wood: When the cookies are burned, they're burned, and you can't fix them.

Sawing is fun for the first couple million boards.

Be smarter than the sawdust

Andries

Robert - well said/written. 
My son runs a tree service in the summer.
There's a reason people call his tree service.

The tree is dead or diseased or dying.

That poor tree has seen abuse in the city for a hundred years. Nails, signs, metal fence parts, clothes lines, birdhouses, tree forts, target practice, go ahead name it!
The poor thing is on it's last legs and then I show up. The guy with the sawmill. 
Even if I can work with the guys removing the tree (see YellowHammer's post above), a forester would have a hard time not breaking down and crying when they saw the poor thing.

So, now I'm the genius that can turn the corpse into a highly valuable veneer log? 
I think not.
I'm SO glad that I found a niche market in milling for timber frame and log homes. 
Tree service logs are: small branches = chips, big branches = firewood, trunks = firewood, maybe one out of 50 is worth taking to the mill.
Lots of the folks on the FF make a good living selling firewood. 
Let's just be reasonable about what a mill log should be.

LT40G25
Ford 545D loader
Stihl chainsaws

firefighter ontheside

Thanks guys.  I'll be careful.
Woodmizer LT15
Kubota Grand L4200
Stihl 025, MS261 and MS362
2017 F350 Diesel 4WD
Kawasaki Mule 4010
1998 Dodge 3500 Flatbed

Darrel

As soon as YellowHammer said that he dropped of the trailer off on his way to work I knew how the story would end.  Not because I'm so smart but because I've helped out a bit on cleanup and if there's a place to throw crap, that's where it all gets thrown.  Fortunately, I won't be dropping off my trailer. I'll be there to say what I want and don't want. The way the tree service guy talked, he will be glad for every thing I hall off because he won't have to deal with it. 

We shall see if it really is as good as he makes it sound. Won't know until I go pick up a load or two. 
1992 LT40HD

If I don't pick myself up by my own bootstraps, nobody else will.

Crossroads

Good luck Darrel! Oh, and in your free time since your in the area, can you tie an antelope to a tree for my daughter near gerber res. She should be drawing the youth tag this year :)
With the right fulcrum and enough leverage, you can move the world!

2017 LT40 wide, BMS250 and BMT250,036 stihl, 2001 Dodge 3500 5.9 Cummins, l8000 Ford dump truck, hr16 Terex excavator, Valley je 2x24 edger, Gehl ctl65 skid steer, JD350c dozer

moodnacreek

Yellow hammer, for 13 years I kept a picker truck on the road so I could get logs. What a mistake.  At that time every bum was a tree removable expert. I would charge to pick up junk and take nice logs for free. I had the same problems you did especially with the home owners. Also if it was windy or rained they would cancel.  I tried to show so many guys how to buck logs but they already knew everything. Most of them could not file a saw. I could go on but I think you covered it.

YellowHammer

Boy, the tree service topic brings back fond memories.  

One was a home owner guy who said he'd give me all the logs the tree service cut down.  The place was a mini farm, and there were going to be a dozen or so good logs, some cherry and oak.  Good stuff, probably no nails. This time I was going to play it smart, stay out of everyones way, not drop my trailer off, but come back and use the crane to load them the next day.  I had a plan.  

However, when I went to get them the next afternoon, the logs were already gone!  So there I am, standing next to an empty trailer, bed full of chainsaws, gas, oil, other tools, looking around, wondering were all the DanG logs went, and lo and behold, I see a flatbed trailer with a Kubota tractor loaded on it, coming down the driveway, leaving.  I flagged thy driver down, and he stopped to chat.  He said he knew the landowner, who had called him to come get the good logs, because I had agreed to take the rest. Whaaa???

On the door of his truck was a large magnetic sign that said "Sawmill Service".  I had been scooped.  I laughed   and went home empty.  What fun.  

   
YellowHammerisms:

Take steps to save steps.

If it won't roll, its not a log; it's still a tree.  Sawmills cut logs, not trees.

Kiln drying wood: When the cookies are burned, they're burned, and you can't fix them.

Sawing is fun for the first couple million boards.

Be smarter than the sawdust

firefighter ontheside

I will not be leaving my trailer either.  I have no need for a large volume of logs.  Mostly I'm sawing for myself and I can only use so much lumber, but I do need to get some cut and drying.  If it ends up where the tree service won't bother with me because I'm not taking enough from them so be it.  I've got two who have said I can come to their lot and pick what I want.  That may be my best bet.
Woodmizer LT15
Kubota Grand L4200
Stihl 025, MS261 and MS362
2017 F350 Diesel 4WD
Kawasaki Mule 4010
1998 Dodge 3500 Flatbed

YellowHammer

Going to their lot is the best option.  Cherry pick and get the good stuff. 
YellowHammerisms:

Take steps to save steps.

If it won't roll, its not a log; it's still a tree.  Sawmills cut logs, not trees.

Kiln drying wood: When the cookies are burned, they're burned, and you can't fix them.

Sawing is fun for the first couple million boards.

Be smarter than the sawdust

firefighter ontheside

Woodmizer LT15
Kubota Grand L4200
Stihl 025, MS261 and MS362
2017 F350 Diesel 4WD
Kawasaki Mule 4010
1998 Dodge 3500 Flatbed

wkf94025

Wow, there are some GREAT stories in this thread.  Thus far I've been lucky to avoid any of the nightmares recounted here.  I've snatched claro walnut (10,000#), eucalyptus sideroxylon (15,000#) redwood (3,000#) and white oak (13,000#) with my 14' dump trailer, and the only near-nightmare was the white oak load, which put me about a Prius over my legal weight limit, too tongue-heavy on the load, and was quite the pucker-factor drive for 90 minutes, but a GREAT test of my '97 F350 dually Powerstroke.  And every legal load since then has been fairly relaxing.  I have always gone to the tree yard, and been there for the load.  I've left my trailer empty at the yards a few nights, pre-loading, but dodged any nightmare bullets you all experienced.  I haven't done the homeowner circuit yet.  Note sure I will, though I may knock on the door three houses down about the towering redwoods in their back yard, should there ever be occasion to take those down some day.  My favorite tree service has two superintendents and one crane operator that have all received multiple Benjamins from me for holding a tree for me, cutting it long, and loading it for me.  They are liking this cash economy.  They say there is a 90' tall red oak and a 48" diameter redwood in the queue this month or next, so I think the Benjamins are working.  They suggested I simply park my F350+dump trailer right next to the crane on game day.  Works for me!  Of course I'm not taking slash or stumps or any cleanup obligations.  I don't need a LOT of logs for my new hobby, but being selective, building relationships and carrying ample Benjamins seem to be the keys to my growing supply chain.  Independent of the above, I scored what is likely a once-in-a-lifetime ~80 log redwood haul, for which I paid log trucks for extract from the mountain down to an LZ on the flats, then a tree service with their beefy box truck with crane to run multiple laps the 2.5 miles from the LZ to my mill site.  All-in costs (land owner + fallers + haul truck + box truck) about $1/BF (Doyle).  The white oak was free (excluding my diesel), the claro walnut was 20 cents / BF, and the eucalyptus sideroxylon pennies per BF  (too twisted and gnarled for any reasonable log scale).  I do plan to reach out to other tree service companies in the area, and maybe a few coastal [redwood] land owners, but will likely only do the quality-logs-only-in-my-dump-trailer business model.  Though dropping, bucking, chipping and complete site cleanup is in my wheelhouse for the right opportunity.  All this has me thinking I need a beefier transport trailer, as my 10,000# skidsteer is ~500# over the legal limit of my dump trailer, and due to its wide tracks has 1/4" to spare on either side of my dump trailer walls.  A longer, heavier flat transport trailer, whether deck above wheels or between wheels, *could* pay for itself in a couple strategic loads.
Lucas 7-23 swing arm mill, DIY solar kilns (5k BF), Skidsteer T76 w/ log grapple, F350 Powerstroke CCSB 4x4, Big Tex 14LP and Diamond C LPX20 trailers, Stihl saws, Minimax CU300, various Powermatic, Laguna, Oneida, DeWalt, etc.  Focused on Doug Fir, Redwood, white and red oak, Claro walnut.

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