arboriculturist

Same as you, every penny is invested in timber and as we air dry, we need a lot of lead time / stock. I have been unable to find a 0% finance deal, several seem to be around 9%, I am not sure if that is reasonable? Isuzu Dmax with 5 year warranty and load capacity with air suspension looks like the only viable option. Weight with 4m3 dry firewood on, combined with tipper and bodywork puts you right on the very limit of legality - wood needs to be really dry, which yours is of course. Having 2 delivery vehicles reduces risks dramatically of course should you be running older / second hand vehicles. All our equipment is older but as it is well maintained and regularly serviced we get little downtime. Certainly don't get the exotic holidays overseas, but offset that with good shoot days. Thanks for the insight into how you operate. Finally, as we plan to carry 4m3 - what ISUZU model, spec and engine size is best to go for?

I've always bought vehicles outright, but maybe finance is a more tax efficient way forward. Also a rolling 5 year replacement keeps you with a smart looking vehicle and low maintenance costs. All our vehicles are kept until they are well over 10 years old which may not be so beneficial on reflection. What do others think ?

That is certainly the ultimate delivery vehicle, but at close to 30K new with the 4m3 bodywork and air suspension I am not sure firewood sales could justify the outlay. There again 30K over 10 years @ 3K / year - say 2000m3 / year delivered = £1.50 / m3. Is that how you see things if you don't mind me asking?

Is this the truck with the 4m3 back? Air suspension I have not had dealings with - what is the principle, benefits and additional cost if you don't mind me asking?

Not always, I have seen them just plucked off the ground and headed straight to a nearby open area of ground or fence post to be ripped apart. Don't rule out Pine Martin depending on location.

A fox would have killed the lot at 1 hit at night - daytime usually just 1 or 2. Badger, Mink, Stoat, Weasel, Ferret, Peregrine, Buzzard or other Raptor depending on your national location. Invest in electric fencer as mentioned and an auto - shut sliding door for the henhouse. Good luck.

How about the approach of cutting now, leave outside somewhere shaded for 2 days to dry surface, coat with couple coats EVA /PVA 24 hrs apart to allow drying between coat. Run the belt sander over the visible top surface a day or 2 before the wedding. A woodturner I know gives the many different species of timber he picks up this sealing treatment. Senth will know for sure.

"Luck penny" is what the Irish call it. I had a very well educated Irishman carry out some work which came to 1.5K and he gave me a £1 back. At the time is felt like just a pleasant gesture regardless of the amount.

Fair comments. We used to do the same, but then paused to do the maths and suddenly realised that over a 12 month period we were actually spending days throwing logs and as knowone loved the job we stopped. I spent the money saved on more IBC's. Everyone was happier ! What works for one doesn't always apply to another of course. The whole setup has to work like a well oiled machine, which takes a large investment in time, effort and cash. Things have definitely got harder, especially the timber price rises much of which we have had to absorb even more reason to work on your business.

The demand is just not there for them to treat that as a priority. Wont the tractor hydraulics be up to running a decent splitter or possibly fit a pto pump - this topic has been covered in detail on previous threads. Or fit you own 3 phase motor, it's not rocket science as they say 😃

Always fill to 1m3 and never had a complaint after 1000's of m3. The shrinkage in reality is negligible. We are not keen to handle split logs once in the crates, everyone to their own of course. We used to line with mesh but the labour and materials cost made it uneconomic, so yes we do pick a few up off the ground when we change processing length that have slipped through the cage sides, but that's about the only time we lay a finger on a log now. It's getting harder all the time to run a profitable setup so efficiency is more important than ever I think. All the time I am thinking how can we become even more efficient, still have a few ideas to make loading the delivery vehicle but that will cost iro 2K so pausing on that one for now.

Ah, fair enough. It looked like you did a few 100t a year. In that case the fastest is the Ryetec CV16 followed by the Kerpan. No a major issue to fit 3ph motor to run the PTO driv, a decent Ag. engineer will be capable of that.

Surely you would be far better off changing to a larger capacity processor. The cost of labour to have someone stand at a splitter for days on end in no longer financially viable.

Why are you filling the IBC's with about 1.3m3 of logs? Perhaps that is how you sell them - 1.3m3 for £ ???

I am amazed at that - it must be regional price fluctuation as Euroforest and Tillhill etc. further South have definitely not reflected the Ash dieback in their prices.