Log home building & portable saw mills

[mhiles]

Gearing up to take the class! :D

One thing that I have been discussing with my wife is the prospects of buying a used portable saw mill that a family member has for sale. We're fortunate to be in an area where there is a lot of timber (mostly yellow poplar) and there are a lot of loggers, etc...

I don't necessarily have the desire to get into the transport business, but it's my understanding that a lot of farmers and land owners in the area are keen to hire a portable sawyer to come and mill a timber stand for a 50/50 split of the wood.

That sounds like a very do-able proposition, but was wondering if any other LHBA members have gone a similar route buying or building a mill?

What's the time vs. cost saving trade-off?

BTW... the mill we're thinking about buying is a woodmizer with a bandsaw and he only wants $2K for it. I don't presently have a model #.

[WalkingHorseLady]

mhiles,

Welcome! If you will go to search and type in woodmizer you should pull up some past threads on this topic to help you. When you take the class then you can get into the members section and find WAY more information on every topic imagineable. Hurry and take the class, and take your spouse if you can swing it. Don't forget to taste the secret cookies!!!!!

WalkingHorseLady

[ponyboy]

Everything you wanted to know about portable saw mills and more. 8)

http://www.forestryforum.com/board/index.php?PHPSESSID=d5c9780a8183e7de5786bd978b8c7f b6&board=7.0

[ChainsawGrandpa]

$2,000 for a Woodmizer? Unless it is totally wasted
you may want to jump on that. I was kicking myself
for missing one at about $4,500.

-Rick

[ChainsawGrandpa]

Should have mentioned my good news.
Went and looked at a sawmill last week.
Yesterday I told the owner I would take
it. Pretty excited. Of course I no longer
need my Procut plans....

-Rick

[rreidnauer]

Congrats on your find Rick!

Yea, $2000 sounds pretty hard to pass up mhiles, though, what size is it? I think their smallest one sells for $4000, right? If it's the next size up, then by all means grab it and run! Even if you got to put in another $500 in replacement parts, you remain well ahead of the game.

I've always been a bit partial to Hud-Son bandmills for affordability, and inexpensive add-on extensions, though, they may not be as good as a Woodmizer. In any case, I'll be building my own from the Procut plans, unless I run into a deal myself.

[kyle]

Rod,

I'm with you on the Hud-Son. If I decide to go the portable mill route it will probably be a Hud-Son. i've looked at several in operation and hud-son definitely is at the top of my list.

[desdawg]

I just ordered a Norwood Lumberlite. It is pretty much a homowners model with a 6.5 hp engine. I ordered it through Northern Tool and actually saved a couple of hundred over ordering it direct from Norwood. Go figure? Anyway, Norwood has a forum and you can get lots of good answers from people who own their mills. My bare bones mill will run about $3300 delivered to my door and will be spanking new so I will be starting out without adopting anyone elses problems.
Here is the link to the Norwood forum. You can click around from there to view their products.
www.norwoodindustries.com/townhall/index.php

[rreidnauer]

That's a good deal. It actually beats Hud-son, dollars to capacity. Looks like extending the track would be easy too. I didn't even know Northern Tool carried those. Nice find.

[WalkingHorseLady]

There is a reason Norwood (and most other companies) charge more than their distributors. A distributor is not going to try and sell a product that its manufacturer will sell cheaper. The distributor would go out of business. Manufacturers sell more product when they can have multiple distributors, hence, if they sell at all to the public, they keep their price higher to encourage buyers to shop with their distributors.

WalkingHorseLady