wills-mill

That's very close to the Wild Service down here. I'll dig out some photos later. W

Much as it pains me to quote Woodlands for Sale, this is quite useful- http://www.woods4sale.co.uk/information-pages/woodland-planning-permission/woodlands-and-planning-legislation.htm The 5 hectare restrictions are based on an agricultural smallholding, not a forestry or woodland block which has no such restrictions about activities and building size. The National Park side of things may be more relevant, but the planning legislation is much more relaxed for forestry.

and a bit of farm grade

Sounds good, nothing vital left out there. Maybe the occasional bit of rage when you find a bit of old fence wire with a fresh band, but your sums are good. £130 for Oak 8x8's (£36.50 per cubic ft) just seems bonkers. I know the exchange rate has nailed a lot of firms who bring in Euro Oak, but that seems crazy. The one thing we've increasingly found is that Oak just becomes more and more of a luxury lifestyle product, and people want 'fencing' that is flawless and basically joinery quality for electric gates and the like- usually just call it WAG grade. I just try to let people know that they'll be getting a straightforward bit of farm grade fencing that is tidily sawn and crosscut and is going to be affordable and usable but not of great beauty. Hopefully an image is attached of a bit of tidy Chestnut that we use as a show display.

Might be worth seeing if you can get a sample of their roundwood and establish a piecework cost per post. Then if you get really up to speed and put more kit or people in you'd see a better return. It can be a bit fairer on bread and butter stuff like fencing, when things can turn sour if a day rate is charged and the produce being sawn out ends up costing more than buying posts in. I usually run on £45 per hour on site with a diesel lt40 with setworks, and a mileage charge if distant and a £15 band charge if we hit nasties.

Would skip chain make much difference with the 3/8ths setup, just to help keep the revs up and the kerf clean of excess dust?

Have you had experience of any differences between summer and winter cut Syc, Steve?

I shall keep ears peeled

And to actually answer the question, they wouldn't need any treatment as such, but an oil finish to bounce water off and keep the UV off the timber would be useful.

It's really stable and durable ( definitely needs fixing with stainless fixings for a long lasting job) For shingles you'd have to be fairly careful about excluding sapwood and big knots, which might be quite wasteful in Welly, as they are usually knobbly open grown beasties.

The cars are pretty cool, but it really will need enormous changes to the entire power distribution setup across the whole country to work (even before you look at battery technology and on street charging). Most home circuits can only supply about 2.5 kilowatts, and a Tesla fast charge is knocking out about 50 kilowatts (enough to run a massive static bandmill). Extension leads just don't cover it... The cabling costs to do an entire motorway services car park would be bonkers, with a phenomenal carbon footprint. If you're gambling on an investment, I would be looking at copper cables or people ripping the heart out of the tropics to drag lithium out of the ground for batteries. Have a play with this cable calculator, even to run a 20kw three phase supply 100 metres you'd need 16mm2 4 core armoured at a cost of £350+ for the bare cable before switchgear. So there's at least 2.5 times that involved to get 50kw to the Tesla for a quick top up. https://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Technical/Charts/VoltageDrop.html If that was powered by solar photovoltaic at 100 watts per square metre production (in absolutely perfect conditions) there's an absolute sh*tload of acreage needed to charge the 31.7 million vehicles on UK roads. Fun fun fun.

On mains drills, I've gone back to old school rather than SDS for big augers in Oak. After popping a very dear Metabo SDS I don't have faith in them. Not very helpful for cordless I realise, but I would think you'd get better life out of something standard with 3 gears and real low down grunt. I'm not sure if there's a twin battery Makita or DeWalt flexvolt that would give you more electrical power?

I think I'd like a bit more than that central disc as an anti kickback measure. I've briefly had the misfortune to use one and they take no prisoners. Phenomenally power hungry (at least 6x single bandsaw), and slab and sawdust management is the big headache.

Was speaking this last weekend to someone who has milled and dried some succesfully. He said that most people who have sweated to work out a sensible method don't readily tell how they did it (neither die he ). As Stomp says, start very oversized, the figures given were something like milled at 52mm, dried to 44mm, planed to 32mm after removing wonkiness.

Imagine the fun of getting a ground saw jammed up during felling, and being stuck to it with your battery umbilical

Cherry can be a right cheeky bugger, especially the grafted/flowering varieties much more than woodland species. They can have crazy spiral growth, and the boards are then just a nightmare.

I like milling it, preferably from sawlogs not too recently cut or too old and gnarly. I'll always chainsaw a ring off any really dry ends, they are hard on the bands and the sap can pick up a lot of grit and dust. Weirdly, my lungs aren't keen and my breathing capacity takes a bit of a hit when near too much Larch.

A lot of things won't be brilliant outside (unless specifically for exterior use), and you might end up using loads of very expensive finish on a big board. A clear decking oil is very good on large outside jobs and you can afford to be pretty generous with the stuff.

You'd be best to talk to Ifor Williams. I doubt that they've started to make trailers specifically to take a rear hitch, anyone that's nailed one on probably needs to head for an IVA test. A little TW chipper isn't physically too bad, but it could all get out of hand on the road very quickly. A chap locally used to take an empty Ifor to site behind his Wood Mizer, it was quite a rig Link worth reading- Towing Two Trailers - Legal???

Eee, that's a fine looking device. If a potential buyer drops out I'll definitely do the conversion and would be very pleased to send some beer tokens. And probably some proper cider, I seem to have become the national repository. The bandsaw is a 70's Wadkin with 800mm wheels, either 5hp or 7.5hp three phase so not too juicy. Signore Comer's gearboxes come up on Kramp's catalogue too. The internet is very impressive sometimes- https://www.kramp.com/shop-ch/en/365054/632280/0/Comer+gearboxes+L-25A+1%3A1

I'm pondering taking the 3 phase motor off a big workshop bandsaw and 3pt linkage mounting it. I want to have the saw sat across the back of the tractor, so that any timber fed through won't just poke the back of the cab. I can't make much headway into the world of 90 degree gearboxes to bring 540rpm up to something like 1750rpm for the band wheel. Any ideas of suppliers of new kit, or a suitable donor machines that would have a 1 to 3 (or higher) ratio?

The only saw I've ever sold as a running concern. A nice enough engine but quite rubbery and bulky, just generally a bit of a clumsy thing to chuck around.

Willy Twigg. Legends.

It's often worth checking for 'hoists' rather than just 'winches'