price per hour?

[paka]

Just worndering what the charge is for cutting say 20" fir. Hourly? ,b.f.? . and what 'wood' you charge for your tractor to move things around? ??? paka

[DR Buck]

I' d base my hourly rate on my operating costs and what I valued my time at.  I normally saw at the board foot rate.   In either case I'd say go with what the market will  allow.     Some things to consider besides the value of your time are:

Are you the only sawyer available?

Is the customer supplying any labor?

You mentioned 20" fir.   Is that 20" diameter or 20" boards"   Wide boards take more time to saw.

How long are the logs?  Short logs slow you down.

How many logs?  For few logs, I'd set a minimum charge.

[Brad_S.]

I charge hourly. For that price, you get any piece of equipment I own plus an operator. There is also a mileage fee to bring each piece to the job site. Once everything is there, it doesn't matter what machine I'm using, the clock is running. This works for me because all my machines (sawmill, Bobcat, truck or log trailer) are roughly of equal value. If you have a machine that is of substantially greater or lesser value, this wouldn't be an equitable solution.

[fencerowphil (Phil L.)]

On the FF and in real life I have seen board ft. rates from $185 per thousand ft.
to double that.  Hourly rates can range from $40 to $75.  Why, you might ask?

The big factors are productivity and competition.  I have quoted on jobs where
my price was significantly higher than nearby competition. In some of those
cases, I was not even interested in doing the work for any less because of the
nature of the situation.

You used 20" fir as an example.  That happens to be what some would call "optimum
cutting."   Of course, if you were cutting all 2" thick lumber, then that would be even
better.  My upcoming job is a similar one:  Yellow pine logs 16" to 24" diameter, 22' long
They want 2X8s.  Side wood is to be cut into 1X6s and 1X8s.  The job
was priced at $245 per thousand, plus the actual hourly cost of one off-bearer to be
provided by me.   The customer is new - a referral from a previous customer.  The customer
will be staging the logs, so that we simply roll them into place.  The job will involve several
thousand board feet of sawing.

The reason I went into these details, is that they do affect what is reasonable to charge.
If the same customer had said that they wanted all 1X4s,  I may have quoted an hourly
fee, rather than a bd. ft. fee.  If the amount of sawing was to be less,  I would have charged
a set-up fee.  You get the idea.  Sometimes the nature of the job will affect one's decision
as to how to price the job.

Phil L.

[MikeH]

 I charge $75 hr. or .30 bdft. on nice logs  I can go through a $28 blade in less than 2hours and sometimes on  occasions go over 1000 bdft. in less than 2 hours when they are helping. Guy down the road charges $40 hr. or .30 bdft. on nice logs. Most people dont know the differences in bandmills and only know this guy charges $75 that one $40. Who do you think they will go to?

[ErikC]

  I seldom charge by the hour for sawing, but it's $60 when I do. That's because My bd ft charge is .30 and I average 200 bf per hour. Running the backhoe cost's $75. You can get a lot of work done in an hour around the mill site, so it's one hour a day minimum charge. I don't keep track of tractor time for loading logs in the mill once they are at the milling site. If they are around the corner and I have to move them more than a few yards, then I keep track of loading time as well. Also I charge for hauling in the equipment unless it's a pretty big job(over a week).


Erik