On average, what to pay for having flooring made?

[Kelvin]

Howdy all,
I'm thinking about getting a molder so i can finally sell some wood.  If i rip to width, plane, and have all set for the molder, how much would you think i'd have to pay to run it somewhere?  I found a guy who charges .37 a linial foot, which on 2 1/2" wide flooring material is about $million dollars a square foot for my flooring.  What do you think i should be able to find?  Whats reasonable, what do you charge?  The guy above has a great big 6 head moulder that should shoot out a lot of wood a minute.  Don't know why he chages sooo much.  Too bad.  I'll have to ask around locally.  Don't really know of anyone near by, but that might be good for me?
Thanks
kelvin

[Captain]

Kelvin, I ran into the same difficulty when shopping for the service out here.  Their charge as going to exceed the market value of the product.  :

Captain

[Cedarman]

My little moulder runs at about 25 LF per minute.  That figures to $555.00 per hour.  T&G tooling is a dime a dozen for most places that do moulding.  They already have it in most cases.  Also those big moulders run at 100 feet a minute, so that is $2220.00 per hour.  10 to 15 cents per LF is a much more reasonable rate for longer runs. 
I can set my old moulder up in an hour or so changing out all knives, changing out all hold downs and push overs and doing the final tweaking.  And I am a rank amatuer at running a moulder.

The first quote I ever got about 7 years ago was 7 cents per LF to run blanks to make a rectangular piece of flat stock.

Kelvin, keep shopping

[wesdor]

Kelvin,
I've been reading this thread (and the related one) with great interest.  I don't have any easy answers but want to add my voice to the hang in there crowd. 

A couple of years ago a ran into the timbergreenforestry web site.  They are in Spring  Green, Wisconsin and have a lot of information on their web site.  Here is a link to the actual discussion of taking wood and turning it into flooring.

timber to flooring

Good luck and keep us posted.

[Brad_S.]

Even though I own a Logosol, I haven't had time to get it properly set up to run custom orders for others, so I send my moulding/flooring jobs to a tenant who rents in the same complex as me. He charges 40¢ a lineal foot and while I often feel uncomfortable giving my clients his rate structure, he is plenty busy so it must not scare too many off. He encourages customers to use 3 and 4 inch plus flooring not only because it gives them a better value for their buck through his machine, but also because they can buy 2+ inch flooring anywhere as a commodity, while wider material announces itself as custom to visitors.
IMO, 10-15¢ is too low. Most retail shops around here charge 30¢ a bdft. to S2S, so if I ever get around to doing flooring myself, I plan to charge in the 25-30¢ a lineal foot. I know comparing a bdft rate to a lineal foot rate is apples to oranges, but many (most) customers don't know the difference, they just hear "30 cents" and "foot".

[fireman05]

Kelvin,
I charge $.35 per square foot for 2,3 and 4" flooring.  This includes straight line ripping the material to ensure a precisely finished product.  I initially charged $.35 per lineal foot as welll and didn't feel comfortable with the amount of profit I was obtaining.  Not that it wasn't nice, ;D but I also didn't want customers feeling as though they were getting ripped either!  I stay as busy as I want to be with my operation.

My Logosol PH260 single phase isn't a high production machine by any means but it does produce a quality product that customers compliment me on regularly!

[Kelvin]

Boy, .35 a square foot would be great!  In 2 1/2" wood, that woiuld be about....  a nickel a linial foot?  How far are you from me?  I would use someone like that, so if you are making money, you should attract customers.  I too would like to get a moulder for flooring jobs, but one thing that seems more difficult is the difference in width on my lumber.  When i made my flooring in my own home we had 2", 3", 4" and 5" to use the most of my lumber.  If you take random width boards and rip them all down to say 2 3/4" irregardless of the lumber size, you may have lots of 2" strips left over.  I know that changing sizes on some molders takes some time, but i guess the bigger machines make it easier?  I'm looking at some of those smaller 3 head machines that are imports, i think Sunhill and General have one.  Look beefy, and could actually run one on smaller electric, not to mention it wouldn't fall through the floor like these monsters i am looking at auctions for.  5k lbs!
I do like the linial price schedule though, that way i get paid if they decide to go with 1" flooring as opposed to 3".  I did actually see 1" cherry flooring in my friends victorian era house.  Really interesting.  Hate to have lais it, but i guess it would bend arround easily.  though, that might make it harder to keep straight.  Sure looked interesting.
I guess i'll keep shopping around locally to see what i can find.
THanks,
Kelvin

[footer]

Kelvin,
I charge $.35 per square foot for 2,3 and 4" flooring.  This includes straight line ripping the material to ensure a precisely finished product.  I initially charged $.35 per lineal foot as welll and didn't feel comfortable with the amount of profit I was obtaining.  Not that it wasn't nice, ;D but I also didn't want customers feeling as though they were getting ripped either!  I stay as busy as I want to be with my operation.

My Logosol PH260 single phase isn't a high production machine by any means but it does produce a quality product that customers compliment me on regularly!

Gee fireman, I wish you were closer. I had a coustomer that wanted flooring made from his wood. The only place I could find that would make it charged him by the HR, and it ended up costing him something like $3000 to make 1350 sq feet of 3" and 4".  I could have almost hauled it to you for that price!