gdh
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Everything posted by gdh
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It's a tajfun xe 10. It worked well for the half hour I tried it but I haven't had a day with it yet.
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Will do.
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It is. I'm tempted to sell but I want to give it a go in the summer, I know if sold it I would end up wanting it.
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We bought an extractor with the intention of selling sawdust - even if it just covered the cost it's better than dumping it. Unfortunately for most of the year sawdust is slightly damp so you can't bag it without it setting in the bag within a week or 2 and it was more hassle than it was worth when moving the machine.
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My dad started off with silage then we switched to big square baling and wrapping and a bit of spraying but we're no where near the scale we used to be. We used to replace machinery regularly but now all the baling equipment is around 10 years old and we'll just keep it going. You can find old balers pretty cheap but there's a lot of wearable parts and knotters in particular are always breaking no matter how old the machine.
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It's beef and sheep but not many cattle left now because they lose money and we planted a fair bit of our land with trees. We also do a bit of contracting which is why we have decent tractors and loaders that the firewood business can rent. The two businesses work pretty well together because they're in opposite halves of the year, only problems are we don't have time to do fencing this time of year anymore and lambing from mid February onwards is a real struggle but we normally have just enough stockpiles to see us to the end of the firewood season.
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Bit of both. My dad does the deliveries and I do the cutting with someone else helping me between 2 and 5 days a week in the winter. That's in addition to normal farm work which is why we need help.
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Sales are getting ridiculous now, been quiet for a few weeks then we did over a hundred cube last week and it looks like the same this week. On top of that we've got 2 people looking to buy wholesale, one of which will take 30 cube a time and woodchip to do. We've got empty boxes and piles of wood everywhere and are drying anyhow we can. It's brilliant but very tiring.
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Countryfile - the new front line in pollution
gdh replied to kevinjohnsonmbe's topic in General chat
It makes me laugh that countryfile always describes a story as something new. Like planting trees and fencing off rivers which farmers have been doing for years, I know we fenced off all our streams at least 15 years ago. I've also yet to meet a countryfile from the countryside who doesn't complain about it. -
If I was selling I would say £65 a cube or around £100 a ton going on the safe side with cube to ton conversion. That's roadside in Wales.
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Not sure about historical ones but the blacklist and person of interest are very good action shows and have a few series each. If you've got amazon prime then man in the high castle and the walking dead are good and free. Other shows I like are breaking bad and I could list any amount of sci-fi but I won't get started on that.
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The ones we get in are 14tons and make around 24 cube of firewood. If you're using the same lorry as normal then just divide the cubic amount by the tons to see if it's a good deal. It's going to be the same volume of wood so I would say it's the total price per load that matters.
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investment against return scale for wood processing
gdh replied to flatyre's topic in Firewood forum
I don't think it helps when people have their wood in a 90x90x90 bag and assume it's close enough to a cube whereas it's actually. 73cube (unless it's a stretched, really heaped bag). -
investment against return scale for wood processing
gdh replied to flatyre's topic in Firewood forum
I think you'll find a lot of shops work on less than that. Either way if all your costs are paid for and include labour your 'profit margin ' only needs to be tiny. -
Anything will burn if it's dry but it's best to give ash six months before burning.
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investment against return scale for wood processing
gdh replied to flatyre's topic in Firewood forum
There is some money in it, just depends on the competition, we average £65 a cube and get by on that whereas some people get upwards of a £100 a cube so if you don't mind travelling you can get a good price. Unfortunately that means other costs. Best of luck, if you ever want to buy some decent priced firewood let me know. -
There's a lot of threads on here about it but basically you need a biomass boiler (chip ones are more efficient but cost more to install), a heat exchanger /radiator with a fan blowing through it (or multiple ones) and an insulated shed or container. You'll also need crates of some sort to the move your firewood around. A lot of people using shipping containers with the boiler and radiator in one end but we use a shed with a few smaller fans and radiators. Where abouts are you based?
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investment against return scale for wood processing
gdh replied to flatyre's topic in Firewood forum
That sums it up for me. It's the step from small scale to large scale that's hardest. If you have to buy your wood in the margins are very tight regardless of scale. If you want to go into firewood and enjoy the work I would start off processing waste with a chainsaw and splitter and buy in any extra to keep customers happy. I would also try and buy from a nearby supplier instead of importing but that's just me. -
Looks like really nice stuff, bet you're getting some fast production. Are you unloading off a lorry or is that a long trailer?
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We're doing around 50-60cube a week which is our aim. Would like to do slightly more but we're not pushing it became we're at drying capacity.
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With the 560 I don't use the primer to start and I've run it dry a couple of times without problems. If you've got another saw it's probably worth swapping the spark plugs to test.
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We're paying £57 a ton + vat delivered in. That's up to 18inch mostly ash and oak.
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Yes, I think that's the main reason they're cheap. They're for sale on Northern arb supplies.
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We've got a few stihls as well, they always seem consistent and read around what I would expect. As others have said nearly anything will work if you're using it to get a comparison rather than an exact reading.
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Yes, I mean I've done 38 cube with a new chain before any sharpening, normally I would change around 30cube but there hasn't been much of a drop off in speed and I want to see how long it lasts. I tend to sharpen heavily to get them good as new but I would expect to get 5-10 sharpens out of any chain depending what it hits. It was 21tons of nice ash I cut by the way.
