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If I was buying it for pleasure in use, and not worried about price, I would buy the Gransfors large splitting axe (which I did, only I got mine secondhand but unused on Ebay for less than the above Fiskars). Alec

No, these are plated bores. You need to get the aluminium off chemically, check whether the plating is intact (if not it's scrap) and then lightly rub down (I would go finer than 200grit, more like 400) around the cylinder, not up and down. Alec

It depends a bit on what you want. If you want a lettered stamp then you really want it engraved - google 'engraving' and you will be amazed at how many there are. If you want a proper forged branding iron, two people to try would be Bruce Wilcock on Shetland and Nigel Barnett at Fransham forge. I know both of them and they are really good. Bruce once made me a pair of hammers from a sketch drawing (and I've spent a week at his place) and Nigel's stuff is top quality. Both of them are best approached by phone. Alec

OK, firstly make - Oregon or Stihl, doesn't make much difference. Windsor is reckoned not to hold its edge so well. Tooth form - depends on what you are doing. Semi-chisel will hold and edge longer and cope with dirtier wood whereas full chisel will cut faster when fresh but will dull more easily, and doesn't cope so well with dust and grit as the corner tends to chip off. Have you looked at the options on chainsawbars.co.uk (Rob D's site)? Go to the Custom/Bulk Chain tab and click the 'Custom Loops' option - if you then select .404" .063" then it will give you the options to browse through. Click on the individual options and you will get a short description. Alec

Yes, this is sadly quite normal. There comes a point where people assume that whatever you offer it must be worth more. Trouble is, they have no other frame of reference to compare with, and anything you provide them with they assume is biased. At this point, the only thing to do is wait for the next one (which usually comes along a lot sooner than you think in my experience). Alec

Coming at it from the milling perspective - there is nothing above I disagree with in the slightest Put more work into something and you should get more money out of it, so if you take a butt, ring it and split it, you have put your time and fuel into it, and once it has seasoned you will get more from it than selling it as a butt. However, if you have other things to do that pay more per hour than the above, and if you have no particular need for the firewood or desire for the exercise, and either the site allows for extraction or milling on site is acceptable, it may pay to advertise it on here (with some photos) and just see if you get any takers. If not, you can always ring it up anyway. Alec

I agree with Eddy's list for pots - for pistons I would add Golf (probably between Meteor and Hyway). Alec

Firstly, you want 1.6mm (0.063") gauge, which is standard for .404" chain. The really old Oregon bars don't have any references available, and the number of drive links will depend on the distance from drive sprocket to bar, as well as bar width, so can't assume number of drive links. This means you have to measure up. The best bet is to put the bar on the saw, with the chain adjuster wound as far in towards the drive sprocket as you can go. You then wedge it there (or stick one of the clutch cover nuts on with some big washers to hold it) and measure round the sprocket and bar with a tape measure (in inches). This gives you the chain length. Divide through by 2, then divide by .404" and this gives you the number of drive links you need on your chain. Round up, not down, and if it is -very- close to a whole number add another 1 or it will be really awkward to get the chain on. Note to anyone else trying this - the above works on saws with an inboard clutch. If you have an outboard clutch you always need to add an extra 1, otherwise you can't get the chain over the bar nose. Guess how I know this... Alec

To work out Hoppus feet, measure the mid-quarter girth in inches (ie go halfway along the log and measure the circumference, and divide the total by four); square this and divide by 144; then multiply by length in feet. Alec

My original post said non-OEM, ie cheap Chinese. OEM will cost a -lot- more. There is an intermediate position of trying to recover the pot and using a good quality non-OEM piston such as Meteor. If you can get away with this it will be even cheaper than £50 in parts. Don't automatically write off the cheap Chinese ones. They are variable, rather than consistently bad. If you get a good one they will work fine - I have them on my 066 and 044 and they have both seen some serious work but others have had bad experiences. 044 had failed due to a broken piston ring so it was obvious what was wrong. 066 failed due to a poorly inserted crank seal (done by a dealer) which resulted in an air leak and the wrecking of a second OEM pot and piston inside 10 tanks of fuel. Some companies can be better than others about taking returns on sub-standard pots and pistons as supplied. Alec

The key thing is not just to get it fixed, but to understand why it failed, and hence to be confident that it won't do it again. The possible causes of failure include those you have had quoted, including stale fuel, which either means using fuel left in the tank after a week or two, or fuel left in the can for more than about 4-6weeks (time depends on things like original quality and storage conditions. If it's a fuel issue then you could buy a generic non-OEM pot and piston and stick them on, and it will then work fine. Doing this will cost you about £50 and take less than an hour, however.... ...there are other causes, such as air leaks, which need to be diagnosed by a pressure/vacuum test. This is where you need specialist kit to do it. There are three people on here who are regularly recommended - Spud, Rich2484 and Gardenkit (if you happen to have occasion to be in Devon). Alec

No, not angry, just trying to hold it there for the photo Yes, it's an 090 (another AV one like the one you were weightlifting). There are a few around although they are pretty uncommon. Alec

Interesting choice of firewooding saw. Either he's cutting big rings, or avoiding getting a bad back by not having to bend over Here's mine out for a play:

Very very nice! So what is he doing with it, or is it becoming yours? Alec

Not wishing to add to the complexity of your decision (OK, that may not be true) but have you seen the Oscar 230CE mill from Hudson and rejected it? Alec

The saw will cope, but the current version won't clear full depth (max cut 66mm and you need 75mm). This either means flipping it and re-sawing from the other side, or hand-ripping the remaining 10mm. I have done either, probably finish up with a preference for hand ripping, but don't like either. It may be worth keeping an eye out for a secondhand 235mm saw on ebay, eg: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/9-25in-makita-skill-saw-/121252426770?pt=UK_Home_Garden_PowerTools_SM&hash=item1c3b353412 http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Makita-5903R-240V-Circular-Saw-/261372689684?pt=UK_Home_Garden_PowerTools_SM&hash=item3cdb06bd14 They don't make much and they don't usually seem to have had much use, maybe because they are big, heavy and awkward. I have one and use my 190mm blade saw for preference where possible, but the big one comes out to play for ripping through 3" or 4" stock. Iroko is pretty abrasive - any TCT tipped blade will be the best bet, just reckon on it being sacrificial. Alec

The original of this thread was over 2yrs ago, so I suspect the OP may not reply (haven't seen him around recently) but an attempt at answers to your questions: £800/m3 would be in the normal range for green English oak, which is roughly £700-875/m3 depending on quality, location etc. Seasoned would be more like £900-1050/m3. Seasoning time depends on thickness and whether air-dried or kiln dried. Beech is usually cheaper - more like £525/m3. It is normal to mill freshly felled timber - it's softer, less likely to have started to rot or split from the ends, and there is no benefit to waiting, however you can mill trees which have been felled for an indefinite period, and re-saw fully seasoned timber if necessary, just expect it to be slower and possibly have reduced yield. Sales - tricky. Length, thickness, sales location all depend on target market, which depends a bit on what you have. Absolutely stunning quality grain will sell easily wherever. Plain ordinary beech or ash can be slower to sell. Anything durable such as oak will sell fairly easily in larger section for outdoor use. Hope this helps Alec

I use chaps - have got 15yrs out of the current pair and the zip has now gone but the protection is still intact. Their big advantage is if you are working on the same site all day, but only using a chainsaw for a very small proportion of the work. You can put them on for 10mins, then take them off. Try that with trousers and it's probably frowned upon! They are also OK when kneeling on the ground all the way down a log for milling, or for other static jobs like standing at a sawhorse. Haven't decided whether to get a new set or a new zip and sew it in. I prefer the sort which are waist-height and just use a separate belt (army type with a clip so it's quick to take on and off and always the right length). Mine are Stihl, which I think are still available. Alec

Phew! Had me worried there for a moment. Really beats me though how anyone wouldn't be rushing over the next day to pick up such a generous prize. Alec

Is the above an answer? Have I missed out on my chance of such fantastic prizes? If so, I am bitterly disappointed since I didn't win anything in the Arbtalk raffle. If not, I'm going for 16.7 tons, with fingers crossed on that bent bar. Alec

I agree that the use of home-grown timber is only to be encouraged, however I think there are a number of variables which come into play, the ones which spring to mind being target market (supply/demand), sawlog prices, labour rates and, external costs and capital investment. The balancing of these factors is too complex to put in a post (it's basically a business plan with a set of sweet spot options) but the relationship between them is probably simple enough to try to explore. I'll have a first stab below (but it won't fit on a postcard!). Numbers below are all crude approximations, subject to debate - some are deliberately provocative. For simplicity, all of the above can be reduced to financial terms, which at least allows them to be compared. Starting from the easy ones - how much do you want to take out of the business annually (gross), taking into account a living wage and protection against a rainy day/retirement fund? I'll stick a figure up - £50k. This could be considered high, but I'm taking it as aspirational, and as a reward for taking the up-front financial risk in capital investment. Also, think about the real hours worked (factor in doing the books, marketing, dealing with customers, suppliers etc and any unpaid effort from partners etc). Factor in the above indirect costs and it won't work out as a particularly high hourly rate in real terms. Also, it is challenging to increase in line with inflation - it only improves when you put your prices up which is lumpy, so you either always undershoot, always overshoot or swing between the two. You can take the coarseness out of the number by more frequent small increases, but most businesses prefer to do occasional more significant rises, so I'm assuming multiples of either £3/cu.ft or £5/cu.ft are required, on a 3yr or 5yr basis, so you need to aim high. For simplicity, I'm going to ignore any financial sweet spots which may arise based on very high investment/high productivity models, and assume it's a one man band operation with a bit of ad-hoc labour, or perhaps one p/t labourer employee. I'm guessing capital costs of £60k (mill+vehicle+trailer+milling shed+kiln+some on-processing kit such as a planer/thicknesser to add value), depreciating over 5yrs. I'm going to assume annual external costs (site rent+services+consumables+accountant+some labour) to be £30k. This could be a conservative estimate by the time you've factored in phone costs and legitimate vehicle fuel, or haulage on some lots, plus stickers etc. So, this says you need to be looking at a way to generate £86k annual turnover (more if you make capital investment against loans and need to cover the interest). Assume you are paying an average of £4/Hoppus, getting a 75% yield against cu.ft product and selling at £20/cu.ft. This gives you a gross return of £14.66/cu.ft Based on the above, you would need be selling about 5,900cu.ft/year. Your figures suggest you could mill this in around 40 days effort so yes, you could increase the number of working days, decrease the price per cu.ft and make more overall profit. However, this is where supply and demand comes in. Is there more supply of the type of material you are milling available (at the same price), and is there more demand than you are satisfying? Moving to other proven markets, eg construction or cheap and nasty shed/pallet stuff, you would be competing with the big mills. You would still make a profit but the margin would go down - you would probably not be able to buy as cheaply as they can (smaller parcels with higher extraction costs) and you would not be able to price higher than them, probably having to slightly undercut them without the benefit of economy of scale. That pretty much leaves, as you have identified, the lower value hardwoods. If you consider the difference between, say, oak and beech. Typically similar sizes, typically similar yield, so you would hope to make the same margin. The difference in price in the sawlog is probably about £1-2/Hoppus, so if you are selling oak at £25/cu.ft seasoned you want to be selling beech at £23/cu.ft but you can't. This is consistent with the general view that these are less popular options, which inherently calls demand into question. Don't forget, the timber is not the end product. Just as the sawmill adds value to the tree (for which it is renumerated), the same is true of whoever is using the timber. OK, there is the odd hobby craftsman buying timber for their own use which suits their personal taste, but for anyone making product to sell, they will reduce their margin too by using a less popular timber, and just as the sawlog is a minor component of the cost of milled timber, the milled timber is a minor component of the cost of the finished article. This doesn't even take into account fitness for purpose (eg species for exterior durability/structural strength etc). At the lower price end, you also have to take into account competing demand. A tree surgeon with fluctuating workload can fill in slack periods by taking that nice beech/ash sawlog and converting it into high quality firewood, which will leave them significantly better off than selling it to you and spending the day sat on their hands. A related point, if you grow an acre of standard oak you will make a gross return averaged over the 120year cycle of about £60 per annum if you are lucky! Not much incentive there and rising fuel costs/increased use of biomass will only cause this to become more challenging. Conclusion, I think sawlogs are probably underpriced if you want access to greater quantities, and if prices rise, you really don't want to have decreased the margin from the sale price end! On the flip side, there is always value in increasing the utilisation of fixed assets - it increases operational efficiency since you are dividing your fixed costs by a greater total. So, what does this summarise as? 1. To improve profitability, it makes sense to increase the total throughput of a milling operation (make better use of the fixed costs). 2. Different products have different margins, but also different levels of supply/demand. 3. Competing demands for timber are likely to have an impact on the supply price, which will have a knock-on influence on timber price through decreasing the margin. 4. Consequently, if considering profitability, the most effective operation will consider the associated factors for each product, and produce a portfolio of products ranked in decreasing order of yield, with the proportionate volumes of each product being based on projections for the supply/demand position, based on confidence intervals for the above to determine risk. Sorry, epic post and there's more I could say. For what it's worth, I have spent the past 7yrs building up something which is effectively a small business (not arb) from a position of 4 people making a big loss to 30 people making a big profit and a lot of it has been done through very careful analysis of factors directly equivalent to the above. Alec

That one always struck me as genuine, and I'm glad it worked out to be. Not everything on ebay is a scam and value is a matter of perception. They're happy, you're happy, everyone is happy (well, not me, as the only things to fall over in the recent winds round my way were a load of willow and a large turkey oak - maybe I'll be lucky next time!) Alec

Not going to help with the current lot, but are you aware of J S Wright & Sons Limited of Great Leighs (contact Nick Wright)? You must be down near Dunmow? In which case you're about the same distance from them as we are and I know they are keen on having more riverbank sites in the area. We have an arrangement with them over cricket bat willow on our river bank. Basically, they supply the trees, plant them, do the maintenance and then harvest after 15-20yrs, paying market price for the timber. Since it would appear that you may now have a relatively clear riverbank, this might be relevant Alec

But David, it's an ash, think of the extra firewood..... Rather more seriously, thanks for the comment - the timing of intervention is as much an art as the intervention itself. Relatively easy to see an objective and a potential future form, but developing the patience to wait for it to happen by itself, rather than leaping in to accelerate the process, is a different skill. Alec

Thankyou for the picture. My 2yr old daughter is not worried about it being sideways - she has just been lying sideways on my lap to see it, which occasioned a discussion about the difference between 'orange' chainsaws and 'orange and white' chainsaws... Alec