It would be easy to say just one answer but that would be misleading. I started out making/selling furniture as well as my first youtube channel showing projects, that led to buying rough houses, which lead to making videos of renovations. Renovated several houses featured in a series of videos. My videos became relatively popular, attracted sponsors as well as did pretty good with the google ads. My reason for the long winded answer is that while the easiest thing to say is KZfaq, I made my first videos about 15 years ago (no longer available). It took several years before I made more than a few dollars a day. My early days of furniture making involved a lot of waiting for the next order. My rentals were the same and still have not profited that much. So in short it was bought with several sources of income, mainly youtube but made possible from about an 5-8 year period of working making almost no profit. I think it was 7-8 years ago my gross income was about $8,000 for the entire year. That same year I rented one of my houses to a tenant, I was going over some rent related stuff with them, and a comment was made to me that they didn’t make enough money and as a landlord I didn’t understand, I knew her income as part of the application so I told her she made over 4 times what i made. She responded in shock with a very memorable “D@*n!” One of my funny memories was standing outside that same house a few years before, I was enthusiastically working on it while talking to a friend that stopped by, I was telling him how my KZfaq channel was making $1 a day and that It was paying for my phone bill (flip phone on a $30 a month prepaid plan). The goal of our conversation was me trying to convince him to do it too. Forgive the long answer, I just don’t want to sling an answer out there that gives the wrong impression. There’s a lot of people who can see another persons “success” and get bummed out, thinking that they have some secret answer, or some rare skill, etc even the real answer is they have invested huge amounts of time and money and failed more than they have succeeded. Thank you for watching.

@@thehomesteadcraftsman8975 So essentially, you can "afford it" ... because of sacrifice and working your tail off! :-) Love your philosophy of rather than working for today with a 9-5 job, all of your hard work efforts will pay off most in the future. That's such a smart outlook. Too late for me though. lol

Geez, thanks for the details! I completely overlooked your KZfaq income. I bought your ebook on making money buying distressed real estate. I’m a real estate agent in Brazil, currently on year 3 of a journey making next to nothing - but building something bigger than myself. Nothing resists to hard work. Thanks for answering in such detail - it was a good reminder about my own goals and my own journey.

Your welcome, here in the U.S. a lot of people think being a real estate agent means you are going to make a lot of money and don’t consider that like most things, it takes time to develop and even once you have built it up, it takes even more effort, you just fortunately have some money at that point to use to advertise and do other marketing. I hope it goes well for you.

I was going to do music but this was a film one day, edit and post the next day kind of video. Music a long time, choosing it, editing video to fit, etc.

@@thehomesteadcraftsman8975 Thanks for taking time to respond. Most don't.

Thank you Mr. Sheffield, I too would like a building for the lumber….. and a kiln. You may be doing this but if you put a rope or sling around your log then wrap it a few times then use your forks to pull up on the strap it will rotate the log/cant. Just do it so it rotates toward your log stops.

@The Homestead Craftsman I'll have to give this a try, I've seen people mount a winch above the mill as well and do the same. I have a idea of mounting a harbor freight dust collector under my shed and hooking up my mill to it.

Id like to do something like that as well to collect the dust. I’ve seen people do it where the hose is above the mill running on a cable and pulleys to allow the mill to travel back and forth.

Occasionally making furniture but not regularly but I am currently working on a furniture project video. Cabin is on hold.

I’m a sucker for watching woods be milled too. I love doing it, I’ve had my mill for almost 3 years and still so pleased at seeing lumber come off it. I’m looking forward to future projects where I can mills up some large beams.

There is no single answer as the variables are too numerous with trees. Two trees that seem identical can produce different quality lumber. When cutting building lumber, i just saw for maximum yield. With that said I am making decisions as i go based on experience that im not really thinking about that will increase the chance that the lumber will be suitable. To your question, best case scenario, sure, but it’s not necessary. With a lot of trees the pith is no where near the center and you would waste a lot of wood chasing diminishing returns.

I’ll answer better in a video but in general I like the design, it’s simple. Woodmizer makes a great mill, I just like the 4 post design. I like that the Timberking is all hydraulic where the Woodmizer has more electronics. I believe the comparable Woodmizer was more expensive but they had little to do with it. I think the Timberking or similar design is more easily repaired in a pinch. Where I think woodmizer is “better” is there mills look faster to set up and they appear to mill faster, this is due to the mono rail design and i think the mill cuts faster because of the motor that drives the head back and forth is electric vs the Timberking is hydraulic. There’s a few things about the Timberking that are blatant design issues, small in some cases but if not to fix. One is the location of the tail lights, the get broken easily if using the board return, Also the guage of the steel used in the red sheet metal that goes around the wheels and blade, it should be twice what it is. When blades break or come off it takes a hit. There are other small things but overall it’s a great mill but I have no experience with other mills to compare it. Another brand I liked was Cooks but their wait time was much longer and they don’t have a computer set works standard. With that said, I think the Cooks mill is one of the heaviest duty mills and nicely designed. They have great prices and offer packages as well that offer big savings. I own their cats claw sharpener and dual setter. I’ll make a video with details on the mill and my decision.

At some point i’m going to do a solar kiln, then maybe an electric kiln at some point.

We are probably in the hardest but best stage right now.

I’m not sure, my wife bought it for me years ago, maybe before we even got married. I don’t think i wore it a single time for a year or two because i thought vest were goofy and i didn’t want to get it dirty. I was telling her i was cold working but there a coat was in the way working and she said to wear the vest. That’s where i discovered how nice a vest is. Keeps you warm while your arms are free. They also keep your shirt cleaner.

My mill is ready to see any time since it’s under the roof. If it has a sharp blade i tension the blade, fill up the water tank and let the engine warm up. Assuming no issues exist, I can be sawing in 5 minutes. How long it takes to mill a log depends on what i’m cutting and size of log but anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour. I can do it faster but i’m not in a hurry. Logs that take a while are ones that are big or high value and i’m being careful making decisions. With that said, if you run into problems all this can take a lot longer.

The sun is the biggest problem, covering the stack or having it in the shade makes the most difference. In the summer I stack my lumber under big trees. You just want good air flow.

Yes, almost everyday unless it is completely over cast. But this one was particularly nice looking due to the timing of a few clouds that came by. It was all much more impressive in person.

@@thehomesteadcraftsman8975 I like sunsets too, I would go to the beach to watch the sky turn yellow or orange and then dark..there was one time the sky turned red purpleish colour and I took a nice picture

I could use them right now if I wanted but i’ll let them sit fit at least a few weeks. Optimally i’d let them dry for a month or two in the summer and they would be pretty dry for outside. Pine dry very fast at warm temps. Building with green wood is fine as king as you build appropriately and don’t use it when you should have used dry wood, basically you have to be aware of how it will shrink. As far as cost, the more you mill on a sawmill the more the price of the mill is distributed amongst the lumber. For example, the first board i milled cost me $60,000. Is probably cheaper to buy lumber in my case as I’ll spend a couple days cutting trees and getting them to the mill, then a couple days milling. For me it’s about using all lumber off my land, milling it all myself, using rough sawn lumber vs commercial and in the end i’m just doing what i want.

To answer your question better, ive milled 20 2x4s, 7 2x10s, about 20 2x6, the 6 or 7 long 2x8s, still have one more log to go… i’ve used maybe 1/2 gallon of chainsaw mix and about 4 gallons of diesel. Spent about 4 days working and over $100,000 of equipment. so ignoring time and investment, about $16.

$60,000 at the time I placed my order, the current price is $78,000 a few years later. They do cash or financing or you can get a bank/private loan which is what I would suggest. My suggestion to any reading this is, unless you are going to use it professionally and have a solid plan that includes all the necessary variables in place to succeed, wait till you have the money to buy it.

Yes, the company that builds them is Timberking.

Enjoy your projects, making lumber looks like a real job, but with great results!