Pine milling business idea (review please).

[TBrown99]

After 4 years of messing with my LT-35H (almost 600 hours), mostly "at home" milling with some road experience, the idea is to keep it as simple as possible and highly specialized.

Description: 4 acres of mostly flat land in a highway village area in Vermont with 1500 sq ft. woodworking shop plus some outbuilding space. Nyle l-53 chamber. I'm starting to feel that I should try a business selling top grade white pine. It dries fast and is easier to handle than hardwoods and at the top quality categories it fetches close to what higher level hardwoods do. ($5/bf or higher.) Would go higher than "D select & better" and aim for virtually clear boards as the target market. Target formats would be:

Wide (12"-20") 5/4
Less wide 4/4.
Knotty 16/4 (This would result from log sections that don't yield high grades).

The aim would be to buy larger logs clear four sides but to utilize entire logs regardless of what the knot situation is with each log. So, secondary byproducts would include,

The array of 4/4 grades.
4x4 from the 16/4 that may get overstocked.

Buyers could take an array of dressing options to the limit of my sophistication level (Jointing, planing, edge routing).

I have 13 sample sections that I've started on... First log yielded almost 200 bf clear and 5-8' lower grade 4/4. This only took me a couple of hours including stickering and end selling. They still need to go into kiln but not much involved there.

Any feedback would be highly welcomed. Especially curious about the prospects of finding a steady supply of desired logs. Spoke with a long-time trucker locally and he said he'd pass the word to some people he knows. But it's seasonal so there's no logging at this moment. I got these logs from a landscapers dump at a nearby far which uses it for boiler firewood. Farmer let me cut out clear sections.

Best,
Toby

[TBrown99]

After 4 years of messing with my LT-35H (almost 600 hours), mostly "at home" milling with some road experience, I've started thinking about making a go of it with clear pine milling. The idea is to keep it as simple as possible and highly specialized.

Description: 4 acres of mostly flat land in a highway village area in Vermont with 1500 sq ft. woodworking shop plus some outbuilding space. Nyle l-53 chamber. I'm starting to feel that I should try a business selling top grade white pine. It dries fast and is easier to handle than hardwoods and at the top quality categories it fetches close to what higher level hardwoods do. ($5/bf or higher.) Would go higher than "D select & better" and aim for virtually clear boards as the target market. Target formats would be:

Wide (12"-20") 5/4
Less wide 4/4.
Knotty 16/4 (This would result from log sections that don't yield high grades).

The aim would be to buy larger logs clear four sides but to utilize entire logs regardless of what the knot situation is with each log. So, secondary byproducts would include,

The array of 4/4 grades.
4x4 from the 16/4 that may get overstocked.

Buyers could take an array of dressing options to the limit of my sophistication level (Jointing, planing, edge routing).

I have 13 sample sections that I've started on... First log yielded almost 200 bf clear and 5-8' lower grade 4/4. This only took me a couple of hours including stickering and end sealing. They still need to go into kiln but not much involved there.

Any feedback would be highly welcomed. Especially curious about the prospects of finding a steady supply of desired logs. Spoke with a long-time trucker locally and he said he'd pass the word to some people he knows. But it's seasonal so there's no logging at this moment. I got these logs from a landscapers dump at a nearby farm which uses it for boiler firewood. Farmer let me cut out clear sections.

Best,
Toby

[Ron Wenrich]

To have a business, you would need a source of logs, and a source of sales.  You're just the middleman bringing it all together.  That's the value added.

How large do you think the market is for your end product?  Can you get enough logs of that quality to supply the market?  At what price?  When people find out you're paying for logs, the free ones will disappear. 

I didn't cut very much pine.  We only got into one tract that had some pine like you're talking about.  We cut the good stuff at random width and stickered it.  But, when we got to where the knots started to come up, I cut 1x4,1x6, 2x8, and 6x8.  I also cut 4x6, 8x10, and other large sizes for a local timber frame contractor.  He built a carousel for a local camp ground.

The 6x8s were for log cabin stock.  We had a couple of markets for those.  The 1x6s and 2x8s were air dried, then taken to a place to make tongue and groove on them.  The 2x8s can be used for subfloors in log cabins or any place that has an exposed ceiling.  The 1x6s can be used anywhere you want paneling.  I've used them on my ceiling and used them to make my bathroom vanity.  The smaller 1x4s I've used as window and floor trim. 

My understanding is that the white pine is pretty nice in New England.  I wouldn't limit myself to a small market niche.  Its nice to have a high end market, but you have to take advantage of the lower end markets for better utilization. 

[chep]

It's not the high end lumber that's hard to move, it's the low end. Knotty pallet grade. That's where your biz needs development. 

Also, had sold lots and lots of wood to the local woodmizer guy who cuts timberframes. He only wants the good wood. Which means we then have 2 sorts of pine logs on the landing. 
You either need to pay really high prices to get just the cream, or you need to pay more then the big mill to get the straight run of wood. 
As a logger I'd rather just send the straight run to the mill. Having 2 sorts costs us money. Also the big mill notices when all the butts are missing and says hey whats up with that? 
What should we buy from you if you are creaming the loads for someone else, we want the cream too!
 Be prepared to pay to play. And that includes sawing the pallet and #2 logs. 
 

[78NHTFY]

For sources of large diameter WP logs (clear), you might check with log yards/mills.  Many of them are rejected as too difficult to handle/saw.  Of course, that means you would need the equipment to deal with them....
I know of a 100', 3 ft diameter WP sitting in a guys' yard that an arborist cut down but couldn't move....All the best, Rob.
(BTW, this is my 1st comment in a long time--with a new 34" screen, all the pop up ads that previously blocked the text areas are now at the edges so I can ignore and actually see the FF info.)

[240b]

im not far from Chep and if your in the conn river valley he pretty much nailed.  I sell my butt logs and only saw the #2 thur pulp. Ive pursued the industrial market.  And what common pine boards i get are sold in 700bd ft lots. ( a pick up load).  The timber frame thing works well if they will take the side lumber too,  otherwise 
 your sitting on that. 
    if you wanted to specifically sell high grade pine mill work id recommend buying packs of graded kd lumber and running a molder/planner.   
    ive also given up sawing dimensional framing lumber.  i just tell people to go to lumber yard.  
      trying to produce anything which is a commodity type product here is 
difficult.   i dont mean to be a debbie downer its just the reality of the situation.  

[barbender]

You have way more of a plan than I ever have. 

Whether yours is a good plan or not, I can't say. 

If the sales don't materialize to justify what investment you have, where will you be? I tend to try to envision the worst case scenario, and whether I I could get through it or have a backup. Knowing that I can be a bit of a dreamer, I really try to restrain myself from jumping on big opportunities- right, wrong, or otherwise🤷

[TBrown99]

I will proceed incrementally and see how it goes.

I have a dozen wide, clear, & straight saw logs -- beautiful white pine (all fresh!) -- to put up and yesterday I found four large, tall C4S specimens .25 of a mile nearby on neighbor's property who is open to taking cut offs for his boiler. We'll see.

A friend works at the nearby Lamell Lumber Corporation -- which mostly produces hemlock and pine lumber -- running the mulch machine among other tasks... I expect that he has a lot of knowledge of how those prime logs "come and go..."

In the end, I'll probably be better off saving it all for projects that we have planned at the homestead.

Thanks for the feedback.