peakbagger said:
I havent see a lot of portable sawmill businesses succeeding. Generally its someone who bought one and is trying to cover some of the purchase price. It usually requires a minimum of two people and a significant investment. I was talking to one person who has a portable milling business and he was going to invest in a kiln and make hardwood trim as it was a relatively high value product. ( I dont know if he succeeded).
Sounds like a great idea, but...
There are several guys in my area who have Wood Misers. They mostly end up donating air-dried hardwood planks to the local Northeast Woodworking chapter's annual auction. Even there - for a worthy cause - a choice lot of cherry or black walnut can be had for around $2/bd.ft. by the time the hammer falls. When I worked at Woodcraft, we brought in lots of local hardwood. This stuff was air-dried and run through a planer. We paid very little for it, and very little sold. In fact, for a store that sold hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of tools while it was open, we sold very little of any kind of wood the tools were actually designed to be used on. Figure it out.
Everyone tells me that logging has never been as bad as it is now. Mills are shutting down right and left. We have two left in my area, but they are cutting rough-sawn pine and hemlock and selling it cheap to the local farmers and such. If a huge operation with decades of experience and contacts can't make it buying logs by the tandem load and using big, fast circular saws for milling, how can a small independent with a band mill survive?
My advice? Get a band mill if you want one. Get some logs and learn to cut and dry planks properly. Try to sell some through Craig's List or the local Pennysaver. Then, when it doesn't work out, donate the wood to your local woodworker's association and put the saw up on eBay.
And don't quit yer day job in the meantime. JM2C