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opportunity?

Started by boatman, July 15, 2011, 10:20:18 AM

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boatman

I have found a person who has 10, 6'Hx6'Dx10-14' Long piles of cants.  6 years old, Weathered, 25% Black Walnut, 50% White oak, 25% Hickory.

He had it all rough saw to required dimensions for a large timber frame home.  So there are cants from 14"x14" to 1x8 boards.  60% are from 4x6 8x8.

It may be cheap.  But what could it be worth?  Re sawn? 

kderby

I'll jump on this and say "not much."  By the time you have resawn the material your recovery due to the checks, sweep, twist, etc. will be poor.  They are likely with centered pith (boxed heart) so you will get very little free of heart lumber.  Not much of what you do recover will be top dollar so you had better have a good value or utility for low grade lumber.

I tend to throw the nasty logs into timbers on three accounts.  First, I hope they will hold themselves together.  There is less contortion in a 8x10 than in 1x8's.  Second, it gets them off the mill faster.  Don't spend time/effort milling junk lumber from junk logs.  Third, they may be marketable as timbers.  As junk lumber they are ....junk.

Mill them for fun.  Build a nice rustic yard fence with the lumber.  Don't spend money on these.  "So sorry" about the guys investment into the timber frame stock.  Dreams die hard, but it is not your problem.

How is that, for a start to your cheery day!?!

Kderby

beenthere

Weathered.  What does that mean?  Outside and unprotected from rain/sun?

I'd be suspect of the soundness of the hickory if outside in the weather for 6 years. Walnut should be ok.

Its worth would be limited to what you might do with it. Anything in mind?

Some pics would be very helpful.
south central Wisconsin
It may be that my sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others

Meadows Miller

Gday

If you can afford to buy low and resaw it to order and charge a fair rate you could make money on it the bloke I am re sawing warf piles for now dose that gets it for about .50 cents a bft and sells it for around the $3 a bft mark  ;) and he is sitting on about 1.5 million bft atm so I have plenty to keep me busy  ;) :D ;D 8)

another thing ill add about 80% of what im sawing is large sections 6x6 to 10x10" some 2&3"x8-10&12" and I cut 2500bft yesterday of 8x8"s  ;) so it may pay just to clean them up alittle and sell them in their current section sizes  ;)

you are talking roughly 40000bf of timber

Regards Chris
4TH Generation Timbergetter

red

just make sure it is an opportunitv for you   i like asking if anyone ever sold their hess trucks or are they still waiting for the right time
Honor the Fallen Thank the Living

terrifictimbersllc

I wouldn't hold any hope for the hickory as boards, believe you'll find it discolored.
DJ Hoover, Terrific Timbers LLC,  Mystic CT Woodmizer Million Board Foot Club member. 2019 LT70 Super Wide 55 Yanmar,  LogRite fetching arch, WM BMS250 sharpener/BMT250 setter.  2001 F350 7.3L PSD 6 spd manual ZF 4x4 Crew Cab Long Bed

Brad_bb

Can it be resold for timberframing?  It's not totally clear what the condition is.  How much work would it be to just skim/ recut beams to sell as beams.  Do they need to be recut?  If they've been sitting in the sun, as a timberframer I'd want to inspect them to make sure there isn't excessive checking or structural problems that would cause me to cull/reject.  It's almost like selling reclaimed beams.  That's basically what you have here, provided they are good.  There may be a customer that would like a weathered look, and some that don't.  I have a barn full of reclaimed beams.  I am planning on getting a 2 rail saw mill with the logosol log/beam planer attachment and plane some of twisted ones to see how they come out.
Anything someone can design, I can sure figure out how to fix!
If I say it\\\\\\\'s going to take so long, multiply that by at least 3!

boatman

I put 6 picture in the gallery.  I don't recall how to post pictures.













kderby

I have seen this twice already in my short "career."  Mill the lumber, sticker it, tarp it and then time and nature takes its course.  The original effort to sticker and tarp is respectable.  I am sure there is some decent lumber in there. 

I like the "patina."  The whole idea with patina is that there is no way to get that weathered look without putting lumber out in the weather for years (think "barn board" picture frames and "silver cedar" shingles on an old cape). I also like the idea of skimming them to freshen the surface.  They would make a good
shed/barn.  I still would not pay much for them.

I would be interested in other members throwing a number at this.  We have seen pictures.  I will place a valuation of $350/mbf and perhaps would pay $500/mbf.  Am I low or high for a mixed lot of aging timbers???  I am clueless about this materials market value.  I do not deal with hardwoods...ever.

Boatman, thanks for the pictures and question.  As I have personally seen this situation twice already, I am sure I will see it again.  Lots of work headed for the firewood pile.  Dreams die hard!

kderby   

boatman

I was told tonight that the wood was stored in a Tobacco barn for five years before being shipped up North.  Wood under the top layer is still bright.

beenthere

Quote from: boatman on July 16, 2011, 12:08:28 AM
I was told tonight that the wood was stored in a Tobacco barn for five years before being shipped up North.  Wood under the top layer is still bright.


Where is "up North" ?

And if stored in tobacco barn for five years, does that add to the 6 years outside, or has it just been one year outside as seen in the pics?

If you purchased the wood, where would you be storing it, how would you be handling it, what would you plan to do with the timbers, and what would be the time table? These things might influence what you might recover from the timbers, thus affect a price to pay.

As seen in the pics, the piles don't look very inviting for recovery, but others may see it differently.
south central Wisconsin
It may be that my sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others

Brad_bb

I would tend to agree that there isn't room for a middle man. I'm speaking from a non-professional timberframer perspective. Sell directly to the end user.  The bigger the cross section the better(for reuse as beams).  They could be power washed too to alter the look. They would also have to be inspected by the framer for quality.   

To the end user, between .25/bf and .90/bf for what is still good stock.  I only say that because .90/bf is what I paid (delivered) for my old beech reclaim.  I'd be most interested in the Black Walnut. I'd definitely want to plane the Walnut to see it's color.   It has to be priced to make it worth while for me to deal with the weathering.  I wouldn't want to deal with any stock less than 4X6(brace stock). 
Anything someone can design, I can sure figure out how to fix!
If I say it\\\\\\\'s going to take so long, multiply that by at least 3!

Brucer

My timber framing customer bought some "never-used" Douglas-Fir timbers a couple of years ago. His intention was that I would resaw them into smaller stuff for interior projects. These, too, had been "stored inside", but when were outside when he saw them.

The piles looked very similar to the ones you show. Stickered between layers, but no spacers between the pieces in any layer. They were the same colour as well - "well aged grey".

My first concern was that the lack of spacers in each row would prevent rainwater from drying out quickly. This turned out to be the case. There was heavy mold and the decay penetrated 1/2" or more into the wood.

My second concern was the natural cracking that occurs in a boxed-heart timber when it dries. As I feared, the cracks made it hard break down the timbers into smaller pieces. There was an enormous amount of waste.

The most serious problem was one I hadn't foreseen. When they were exposed to the weather (after the natural cracks had occurred), rain water entered the cracks but did not evaporate quickly enough to prevent decay. As a result, 90% of the timbers were decaying from the inside out.

Once I had sawed away the exterior mold I started to see some decay along the edges of the crack. Still thinking it came from the outside, I sawed a little deeper and the decay got worse instead of fading. Finally one of the foreman grabbed a chainsaw and cut one of the timbers off two feet from the end. What we saw was heartbreaking.

The timbers  (10"x10") had a 5" diameter core that was completely rotten. The rot extended up the vertical seasoning cracks almost to the surface. The side faces that were tight against adjoining timbers were decayed for up to 1" into the timber. Only the bottom face had any recoverable wood and most of that had a heavy seasoning crack up the center. From a typical timber we were lucky to get a couple of 2x2's.

Note that Douglas-Fir has a fairly decay-resistant heartwood -- not as good as Redwood or Western Red Cedar, but much better than most of the other softwoods. But heavy surface cracks followed by exposure to the weather were enough to do it in.

The wood looked OK from the outside, just weathered a bit. But it was basically useless; not even good for timbers.

I would not buy "old" used timbers again without first putting a chainsaw through one at least 2' from the end. I'd want the piece to be from the top of the pile, and with heavy checking.
Bruce    LT40HDG28 bandsaw
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand wrong answers."

Banjo picker

I can't see the stack of 1 in  stuff very well for the other flora in the pic...but if they didn't use any more stickers in it than they did in the timbers, its probably not much good at all...You can see some deflection in some of the timbers were they have sagged due to not having a couple more stickers in the middle of the stack....Tim
Never explain, your friends don't need it, and your enemies won't believe you any way.

Meadows Miller

Gday

Tim & Bruce are spot on  ;) another thing i noticed was the fact that due to all the undergrowth there would be issues with air flow so some of them will have the same rot issue theat Bruce talked about they would hev just been there sweating away with all the excess moisture  ;)  :( :(

ther would be some good timber in it but if it was Me i would make an offer on only paying for anything that is good and going through the piles and turfing whats no good  ;)

Regards Chris

4TH Generation Timbergetter

ljmathias

I actually have several piles just like that, and about the same age from Katrina downed trees- worthless for the most part.  Nature has a beautiful way of recycling wood, actually a whole bunch of ways from fungus and moss to bacteria, termites and oxygen-induced decay.  What I would pay for that bunch of lumber is absolutely nothing- chances of getting good lumber out are small and you'd spend hours and hours loading, unloading, and then throwing away or burning the garbage wood that isn't fit for anything with no structural strength at all.  My time is too precious to waste on other people's mistakes- I make plenty of my own to deal with.   >:(  Just my opinion, and you may be really surprised and find some beautiful boards buried somewhere in there.  How's that old saying go about silk purses and sow's ears?   :D

Lj
LT40, Long tractor with FEL and backhoe, lots of TF tools, beautiful wife of 50 years plus 4 kids, 5 grandsons AND TWO GRANDDAUGHTERS all healthy plus too many ideas and plans and not enough time and energy

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