Good deal on logs....would you?

[Mark Bolton]

That is not true.John

Concede to your point absolutely that its possible. The conversation then moves to is it "profitable" (which undoubtedly includes a rough calculation for the cost of your time).

As you know, I come from a past of owning a large lot of timber (115 acres with miles more adjacent to pull from as if it were my own) and owning a small manual mill and kiln.

"Profitability" in these context's are tough to land on. Sounds like the OP is looking at processing far more material than they would personally use which means the viability of the endeavor is left to the local demand on the open market which was my point of quantify the true cost. If you have access to a local bunch that will pay the rate of the small production thats a no brainer which was why I said focus on the prime grade. Flat sawn material is a market your never going to hold water in.

I cant turn the key on a 4wd tractor, chains, chainsaw, skidding out a saw log at a time, sawing, cleaning up slabs, stickering, moving to a small kiln, edging, planing, for what I can buy material for UNLESS its primo/oddball material.

That was the point.

[John TenEyck]

From a commercial standpoint you are right. Volume almost always wins. But I interpreted the OP's questions to relate to being a hobbiest, as am I, mostly, and when you don't put a $ value on your time sawing and drying your own wood is a huge cost savings (basically don't buy lumber anymore) and can even pay off your investment in mill and kiln if you sell some. Paradoxically, slabs with knots and defects easily sell for more than all but the best cuts/species of domestic lumber, and those logs are easy to come by. What I used to think of as firewood now has value. I still get some near veneer quality logs now and then, and I mill those for me and my friends.

John

[Alex Zeller]

My neighbor who does woodworking for a living buys wood by the truckload, I don't. He has more than a 1000 bf of hardwood just laying around from jobs that he's finished. Most of my spare wood is stuff that came from my property (cherry and maple) that has only seen air drying. It's probably 10 years since it was milled and the moisture is right about 10%. For the first year it was outside where I had to make sure to kill anything that wanted to bore holes into it. After that I moved it into a barn out of the way. At $.12 a board foot it's by far and away the cheapest wood (other than free stuff given to me) I have ever bought. Of course I had to cut the trees down, move them down to a landing where the mill was, get them into a position where the mill could load them, take the boards off the mill, stack them onto a trailer so I could move them to where they would dry, stack and sticker them, move them a second time, and stack them again. If I added up all my time, I probably came out ahead. But I'm not trying to make money, I'm trying to enjoy a hobby. Part of that enjoyment is going from a tree to lumber to a finished project. It's much easier to just walk into a store, pick out a board that meets your requirement, and plunk down the cash.

[Jim Matthews]

Late to the party, forgive me if I repeat something mentioned above.

Getting stash from the local slash pile keeps usable lumber out of the landfill (or open burn).

Getting a local sawyer to cut your lumber means you may specify Quartersawn, for greatest stability and maximize potential figure in Oak.

Quartersawn lumber tolerates mishandling from the inexperienced. It still needs proper support and stickering to avoid twist.

Your real challenge will be keeping the pile low enough to shift by hand. Anything higher than your chest, you should have assistance. No sense trading hospital bills for lumberyard fees.

Who cares if it's cost effective?

That's the lowest motivation most of us have for pursuit of this hobby. Have at it, keep us posted and send us pictures.