Timber Hauling

[b.cole60]

Ok I am interested in getting a log truck and hauling the logs to the saw mill for the lumber jacks, what do you guys think of the idea and will it pay well??

[Jeff]

If you was in Michigan I'd slap ya and try to wake you up. Your talking about a job that has a high overhead, long hours, hard work, and few rewards in this economy. A low customer base that you have to be very competitive to reach due to lots of trucks sitting waiting for work. If your a newbie to the work, I'd say something else has to be a better idea.

[b.cole60]

ok that is what I kinda thought well thanks

[Dave Shepard]

Are you in the logging or lumber business already?


Dave

[Ironwood]

Welcome, slap slap, good to have you here. If nothing else we are brutally honest. : Hang around, you'll learn a bunch.

Most of us hauling local logs are for our own use, value added and such. There is always an angle, but remember the guy with the market is king. Start from there, you an always get capital if you need it, you goota' have customers, everything else will fall into place.

          Ironwood

[Woodchuck53]

Before you go to far price your insurance to get on someones wood lot. It will scare you into investing your free time into somethine else. CV

[woodmills1]

or try a log trailer(low insurance) and get the tree service guys. :P

[Ironwood]

Trailer? No economy of scale there, and usually mills don't want those logs, or pay less for them. Unless you are milling and marketing to end (or near end) users, there would little or no profit there.  For those of us doing the "urban thing" you need to own the means to production and take advantage of the value added throught the process. Most of us in this line it is likely that we back tracked, and vertically integrated as we grew into the position to handle the salvage stuff. The man with the market is king. If you can find a home for product, you can always find the capital to put all the right pieces in place.

Ironwood

[Woodchuck53]

That's true ironwood. I got lucky and found a couple tree service guys that needed to get rid of there waste. That led to more contacts and now I have a pretty good supply with out cutting any more of my own. You have to take it all the good the bad and the ugly but that works for me. Some trash with metal but have a fair detector and will get around to getting a better one when I finish the rebuild. CV

[Kansas]

Let me present another side to this. Out here in kansas, there are no log trucks for hire that I am aware of. I would gladly give business to one. I have been needing to get some good eastern red cedar in, and the closest place I can find is Oklahoma-we have good cedar around here, but no loggers. Many times I have passed up opportunities to buy logs because of no trucking available. I have considered putting a truck on the road, but we arent big enough to keep it running all the time, and with the cost of tags and insurance, it pretty well has to be kept on the road.

[Woodhog]

Well you best do a lot of research before you lay any money, yours or the banks down for any kind of a trucking venture.

You will work from dawn (or earlier) to dusk (or later) at least 6 days a week.

Any off the road time will be spent beating and pounding on the truck to get it ready for the next break even or worse load that someone wants hauled for nothing.

Study up on all the regulations that will be laid on you, environmental concerns included for when, diesel and hydraulic spills when the loader line break.

Work out all your costs, here fuel cost alone is at least $1.00 per mile run plus loader running.

Your new shiny truck if you buy one will be a piece of junk in 5-6 years that is worth nothing in a used truck market as exists now.

You should spent as much time on figuring how to get out of the truck as getting into trucking, it is more important.

If you really like truck driving, drive for someone else who is crazy enough to own one, call him when the engine blows up, the turbo grinds itself to pieces, the rear ends come out in a mud hole, the loader needs 5000.00 for repairs or when the truck is seized at the scales somewhere and you are stranded on the side of road with no food and 10.00 in your pocket and it needs to go on the hook for 700.00...

Dont do it....

[deeker]

You guys scared him away.  But it always is best to learn all of the ups and downs BEFORE your up to your butt in aligators. 

I had a lot of info before I bought a sawmill, but not a lot of milling experience.  More experience on the logging end of the buisiness.  Learn as you go can be very rough.  To say the least.

Kevin Davis
Ruff Cutts

[Sawyerfortyish]

Well I own a Autocar triaxel and without it I would lose out on a lot of timber. They are costly to run and maintain I just put a rear in mine. I don't hire out I only truck for my mill. I'm hauling off of 4 diferant log or clearing jobs now. Without that truck I would have to pass up these jobs. My last truck I ran 15 yrs before retiring it. I just switched the picker over to this truck. The picker is a prentice 120 and still in good shape. I don't go to far to haul logs maybe 30 miles from home at most. Before I had a truck I had to depend on someone else with a log truck to do my trucking. That never worked out they were either late or just didn't show up or stole the timber out from under me. If you have a fair sized sawmill and need the timber you almost have to have a truck to move it.

[AlexHart]

Well I haul logs as my main source of income and there are so many factors its hard to say if its a good idea for you or not but I would lean towards not doing it unless your really confident you'll have enough work to keep from getting your head taken off.   

I would definately tell you to not even bother unless you can repair and maintain the truck yourself.   You or a close friend, family member ect should know how to weld, change tires, pins/bushings, brakes, replace hydraulic hoses ect otherwise any money you will make will go down the tubes and you'll have big downtime problems waiting for a "real" garage to fix your truck.   Log trucking is a rough service and even if your careful on your equipment like I am stuff just gets torn up.

The other thing I would stress is to be mindful of how much it costs just to have the truck sitting in your yard.   It costs me over ten thousand bucks between 6K for insurance, 1500 registration, 800 property tax, 500 heavy use tax, 900 for a Mass overweight sticker, 500 CT overweight sticker, and some other crap that I can't think of off the top of my head.   Thats before you even get to any kind of payment or repair or fuel so you better be sure it'll be a big part of what you do to generate revenue weekly if not daily. 

You also need to be a guy who can tolerate a little bookwork and stay on top of things like all those registrations, stickers, court dates for bull@#$t violations the DOT gives you, quarterly IFTA fuel audits, daily log or hours and fuel, inspections, driver files and so on and so forth. 

All that said if you are someone who's flexible enough to roll in the grease AND keep track of the paperwork.  And if you have the work in your area it can be a pretty fun job.   I put in WAY more than 40 hours a week for not all that much money when you come right down to it but I do enjoy what I do.   Of course pretty much all of us who do forestry/logging type work I think end up in that boat.    Harder than average work but I think most of us genuinely enjoy what we do so in that sense we are better off than many I guess. 

[AlexHart]

And Woodhog I just have to tell you I laughed at the end of your post because in 4 short years of log trucking I've had almost all of those things happen to me (or at least reasonable facsimiles thereof) and a bunch more besides.   

Its not just a job its an adventure. 

Every time I leave the yard my truck is laden with survival gear.  I always bring food, water, raincoat, tools, extra hoses, straps, chainsaw, chains, air hose ect. ect. ect.     And when all else fails the cell phone so mom can come get me and give me a ride home  !