Rob D

Here's some follow up pics of the furniture I made. It's all green and wet right now but come the end of Summer these can all be sanded and treated to bring out the grain.

Cedar is a lovely timber and of course also very decay resistant.... Great work!

Make sure you stick a few pics of the bench you make on this thread!

Apologies Kev - I missed this one! A 24" Alaskan is all you need - £170-00 (-£17-00 10% arbtalk discount) leaves £153-00 + £10 p&p leaves £163-00 + vat gives £191.53 If yo'd like to go ahead just call Andy on 07766304644 with your card details and he'll get one out to you. If you want ripping chain just speak to him and he'll sort you out. But remember to say you're an Arbtalk member, Cheers, Rob

I think if you do it more as a hobby that'll make you a bit of money rather than like I did it as a larger business then you'll have no worrys. Wasn't deliberately trying to put a crimp on the idea earlier but I'd hate anyone to waste as much energy and time as I did ! And in a lot of ways seeing your various plants grow and go through the seasons is really satisfying.

Alright Dean, About 5 years ago I had the same idea. I'd just planted £2,000 worth of hedging and the customer had specified large plants. I couldn't believe the prices and so thought 'this gives me an idea.....' Next door is a nursery and so I rented a polytunnel and started growing a mixture of mainly hedging plants i.e. aleagneus, escallonia, pittosporom, acuba, laurel, forsythia..... etc etc My plan was to grow it big so that people could have an instant hedge and I could have lots of money! However several things that I didn't take into consideration: The market - what were people really after and was I growing the right things? The job of potting plants from a smaller pot into a bigger pot gets tedious after the first 500. The hire of polytunnels and cost of water adds a lot onto your plants after a few years. There is a lot of maintenance to do i.e. weeding of pots and tidying up. If doing it in any sort of numbers to make an income you'll have to employ people and this makes serious dents in your cash flow. But hang on a sec!? When we want a large tree or shrub we go into a garden center and we say 'how much?' - my word they're making some money out of this! The trouble is unless you have access to a market e.g. you are a landscaper and use a lot of plants, or you can produce enough to go down the wholesale route where are you to sell them? People only pay high prices for plants at a nursery. When they come over to you they expect to pay half the price they would at a nursery. People love nurserys, they love the coffee shop, the browsing, the pushing round of those little two wheeled trolleys, buying gloves for £10 that would cost £1 at a market, the pleasurable wasting of a Sunday afternoon....! So sell them to a nursery? Most of the big ones grow their plants themsleves or import from Holland (where they really do cost peanuts). Why sell yours when they need to sell their own? If they do buy them it will be for around 40% of what they sell them for. And loading and delivering the things takes an age... To get 10 large plants out the field and onto the truck, take them to the customer unload and have a chat - you could have made the same money doing a tree job (NOT includig the growing!). And the best thing is no matter what you grow they'll come round and say 'have you got any such and such'. Which of course you haven't. I think I made my money back just (I tell myself that anyway) but the huge amount of time and energy that I put into it never returned! I sold the remaining off cheap last year for £5-00 a plant (some were 8 foot tall) and have been breathing out a sigh of relief ever since!! That was my experience anyway but please don't let it put you off!

That's exactly what I thought and did! Also worked out that if you put in a pot, put on the gound and surround by chippings the plant will root through the pot, anchor feed and water itself. Saves a lot of time and money.

That made me chuckle !

Thanks for the endorsement Reg and no worrys Mozza I expect I'll see you at the FR Jones show this year if they're doing it again. But already booked in to the APF.

Ho Ho! Yes where indeed...

Hope he didn't take advantage of you... ....mind you looks like you were both enjoying yourselves. Who cares what animal rights say as long as both parties consent

Nice one Mozza.... ..... hmmm a mill would fit that saw rather nicely

I was out there not 3 weeks ago! The missus is from New Zealand... She said have a look on trademe Trade Me ? New Zealand online auctions and classifieds. Browse, buy and sell online on trademe.co.nz And no it's not how I used to earn myself a bit of pin money! They don't really use ebay out there but this site instead and it has jobs there. I'd ring round the tree firms and pester as well.

That was my first reaction as well re spelling ... but fairs fair and give the lad a chance. Maybe that's why he never did his certs perhaps?! But having said that Jamie is it worth you doing some education courses as you'll prob be able to do for free if your signing on? It'll take guts to do it but it will serve you well later in life. And as has already been said get your qualifications. Because to be honest you will not find work if you're not qualified. You need to put your energy into getting the basic certs (even if just maintenance and cross cut) for a chance of any sort of job. Start off as a groundie, work hard, save and then go for the other climbing certs.

I went straight through an asbestos roof on this row of garages... entirely my fault. I was balancing on the edge of it using the pole pruner when one second I was there the next minute gone! I laugh now but luckily there was nothing in the garage and I just landed on my arse and started laughing.... more from the shock than because I thought it was funny Had to replace the panel which the property manager arranged and it wasn't too expensive.... You live and learn

That's excellent... But surely now you need the carriages and track

It almost sounds like you've done this before Mark

If it's clear to the customer that damage you cause is not going to be paid for by you and they agree then that seems fair I suppose. The trouble is that if you put you're not responsible for minor damage what constitutes minor damage? They may have a different opinion when it comes to the crunch

If you break something in the course of a job you have to pay for it! I'm sorry but you can't say on the one hand a quote is a fixed price and there's no changing it once you've given it... .... but if you break something it's the customers problem

As on a previous thread I think the re negotiating of quotes seems to be a personal one as there are some that think one way and some the other. At the end of the day you make the decision that you feel is right and stand by whatever consequences that then come as a result of that. I think how you've gone about this job is a good compromise and if the job gets done safely, nothing gets broken and the customer is happy with everything then the jobs a good 'un.

Come on Stevie you know you can get tighter than that!

Is a good question that! I don't know but what I've heard is that skip tooth is better for 3 foot bars + as it gives better chip clearance and faster cutting. But correct chain sharpening is crucial. I have a reel of Oregon ripping chain full skip on order which I'll be trying soon.

Xman I'm giving my own bush a trim tonight - I'll get it on camera for you as I'll warrant your the kinda guy who'd find that pretty exciting! :001_tt2: