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Pricing green timber for milling.


kennett
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Evening all, bit of a random question but im sure someone on here will know!! How is green timber priced? I have a contact who has just started milling timber into table tops, mantle pieces etc, but inherited all his current timber. 

We felled a large Elm at work today, and he is interested in buying it but neither of us know how to price it. The sections are 2-3ft across and 5-6ft long.

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It's not easy to clarify without seeing the logs.

Traditionally single logs were lucky to get firewood price. But bouyant firewood prices has forced the log price up.

Its also really variable depending on species. Hardwood or soft wood and quality and what the buyer wants .

Anything with character adds value , so old gnarly twisted logs can be rubbish or worth a fortune , pippy oak , spalted beech , burred elm all add to the price. 

Hardwood logs are measured and valued still on the the Hoppas scale.

Rare things like Yew cost even more.

But until you take the first slab off you won't know if it's sound (no rot) got good character , colour etc etc.

That where traditionally the mark up is , buy for next to nothing , mill it into slabs and cash in.

Elm can be worth a fortune if it has burrs , best advice is take loads of pictures and send them to a few a few reputable hardwood sawmillers / hard wood furniture makers/ wood workers etc etc as different woodworkers want different things.

If it's good they will bite your hand off. 

 

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9 minutes ago, greenshank1 said:

It's not easy to clarify without seeing the logs.

Traditionally single logs were lucky to get firewood price. But bouyant firewood prices has forced the log price up.

Its also really variable depending on species. Hardwood or soft wood and quality and what the buyer wants .

Anything with character adds value , so old gnarly twisted logs can be rubbish or worth a fortune , pippy oak , spalted beech , burred elm all add to the price. 

Hardwood logs are measured and valued still on the the Hoppas scale.

Rare things like Yew cost even more.

But until you take the first slab off you won't know if it's sound (no rot) got good character , colour etc etc.

That where traditionally the mark up is , buy for next to nothing , mill it into slabs and cash in.

Elm can be worth a fortune if it has burrs , best advice is take loads of pictures and send them to a few a few reputable hardwood sawmillers / hard wood furniture makers/ wood workers etc etc as different woodworkers want different things.

If it's good they will bite your hand off. 

 

Thanks for that, unfortunately it's probably not going to have a huge amount of character, it was a fairly tall straight tree but starting to die back in the crown and it was too near horses, people and a house to stay. I'll send a few pics out and see what response I get.

 

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I know of a neighbour of my aunt who had a large oak to be trimmed and contacted "somebody" who came from miles away and trimmed the branches as complete boughs and gave her a reasonable amount of money for them. Story goes he was a Cornish traditional boat builder but its all just hearsay from my aunt.

 

update - woodnet.org.uk apparantly

Edited by Vince Green
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