Wood and Boards as a Starting Resource

[Silent_Shadow]

Having seen the plans to lock mineral/oil deposits and industries behind research, I was curious if the lumber industry was viable enough to be a starting source of money (one I hope will have little prerequisite research, if any), and I found that it was, if you can transport it efficiently.

I managed to make boards profitable enough to be self supporting and then some on the hardest difficulty settings:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2958840734
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2958840784
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2958840822/

I found that boards were a worse investment than pretty much every other initial resource exploitation (not to mention the clothes factory start), but it was decently profitable, especially considering the extra fuel expense I incurred thanks to the bad idea of spreading out my initial town, which required me to run a bus to provide the rest of the town with access to the hospital.

The main issues with wood/boards is the low price per ton and the large amount of vehicles you need to buy up front compared to other initial options, while the main advantages are the relatively stable prices (no random market forces to crash the price), how quick it is to set up (build a gravel road, a cheap woodcutting post with two construction phases, and a substation and you're done), and that you can employ foreign workers and still make a profit.

My setup has 3 woodcutting posts with 5 job slots each and a sawmill with 5 job slots. I also used a heavy cableway to move wood to a sawmill and boards back to near the customs house, which helped cut down transportation costs a lot, even when the electricity cost exceeded a ruble per MWh.

I found that the V3S trucks were the most fuel efficient wood gathering trucks, as they had the best load to fuel usage ratio of all the trucks. This is because most wood gathering trucks do not bother bringing in a full load; instead usually they would stop at about half of their capacity and come in. For some reason, the V3S tends to bring in a full load (4.5 tons), which makes it the most fuel efficient truck for gathering wood (other trucks still have better collection speeds though).


Because of the low staffing requirements and the relatively low barrier to entry, I would say that lumber works better as a supplement to the republic's income, but it could serve as a decent main industry in a pinch (you could definitely pay the interest on a large loan with just board exports).

[MrKrabs]

Thank you very much for your explanation.
I will keep that in mind for future republics.

[fjorkar]

Thanks for the info & your effort, the info comes at the right time, I'm just starting a new republic.
one question: is the export of boards still attractive if you initially transport them to the border by truck?

[Silent_Shadow]

Generally yes, but you will be increasing your capital costs a lot to maintain the same throughput (you need more trucks to cover more distance) and not all profitable implementations are worth it.

I talked about the factors that made boards profitable (theoretically) in another thread if you are interested, but here is a 'little' snippet.

Opprinnelig skrevet av Me, in another thread:

Are Wood and Boards Profitable or Not?

A woodcutting post with 3 job slots available and three V3S trucks (I find these to be the most fuel efficient for wood gathering, especially since most other trucks typically only haul in only about 5 tons, even if they have room for more) can haul in about 9 tons of wood per day, which is about 64 rubles a day in 1960. Each 4.5 ton load of wood uses about 12 liters of fuel to haul, which costs about 1.57 rubles in 1960 (1 liter of fuel = 1/1000 of a ton of fuel. In real life it is closer to 1300 liters to 1 ton). Each ton of wood thus costs about 0.35 rubles to transport to the woodcutting post.

If you use foreign labor at a cost of 9 rubles per day (in 1960), every ton of wood the woodcutter makes would sell for ~7.11 rubles, cost ~0.35 ruble of fuel and ~3 rubles of wages for a total of ~3.35 rubles per ton of wood, and so generates about 3.76 rubles of profit per ton of wood before transportation costs to the customs/border or for workers are included.

If you use your own workers to generate wood, it would cost less than a ruble per workday to supply citizens needs (for food, meat, water, heating coal, etc.). Assuming a cost per workday of 1 ruble (probably overestimating it a lot), the cost to make a ton of wood would be closer to about 0.68 ruble (0.33 rubles for citizen supplies, and 0.35 rubles for fuel) for a profit of about 6.43 rubles per ton before the cost of transportation to the customs/border or for workers is included.

I found that it is possible to make money with wood, but while the investment is cheap, so are the returns. In 1960, it would take 20 to 22 months (11 to 12 months with own workers) to pay off the initial costs (~20,800 to ~22,400 rubles) and then you are only generating about 33.84 rubles per day (~57.87 rubles per day with own workers).


The sawmill increases the profit of the wood by a decent amount. In 1960, boards sell for ~11.29 rubles, and the sawmill converts wood into boards at a rate of 9 tons of wood to 7 tons of boards using 1.6 MWh of energy a day. Energy costs are about 1 ruble per MWh to import, and it takes one workday to process 7 tons of boards. How do the numbers work out?

• With foreign workers and importing wood at 7.86 ₽ per ton:
  = [7 tons × 11.29 ₽/ton - 9 ₽ - 9 tons × 7.86 ₽/ton - 1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = -0.33 ₽ per ton of boards → not worth selling.
  
  What about to just replace imports?
  = [7 tons × 12.48 ₽/ton - 9 ₽ - 9 tons × 7.86 ₽/ton - 1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 0.86 ₽ per ton of boards → Better, but not by much. Would have to use over 20,000 tons of boards to pay off the cost of the sawmill → Not worth it.
  
  
• With foreign workers at the sawmill and woodcutting post:
  = [7 tons × 11.29 ₽/ton - 9 ₽ - 9 tons × 3.35 ₽/ton -1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 5.469 ₽ per ton of boards → Not bad. With one woodcutting post, the sawmill can be paid off in 15 to 16 months with a daily profit of 38.28 ₽. With 5 wood cutting posts, the sawmill can be paid off in ~3 months with a daily profit of 191.4 ₽. Decent, but there are better investments. May be worth it if there are no other resources to exploit near the border.
  
  What about to just replace imports?
  = [7 tons × 12.48 ₽/ton - 9 ₽ - 9 tons × 3.35 ₽/ton - 1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 6.659 ₽ per ton of boards → Not bad. Would only have to use around 2,700 tons of boards to pay off the cost of the sawmill → May be worth it over time, especially if you transition to using your own workforce.
  
  
• With republic's workers and importing wood at 7.86 ₽ per ton, the profit is:
  = [7 tons × 11.29 ₽/ton - 1 ₽ - 9 tons × 7.86 ₽/ton -1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 0.813 ₽ per ton of boards → With full staffing that's 113.8 ₽ a day; the sawmill would be payed off in 5 to 6 months, assuming prices hold (importing wood may stabilize the wood prices). Not terrible, but not really good either.
  
  What about to just replace imports?
  = [7 tons × 12.48 ₽/ton - 1 ₽ - 9 tons × 7.86 ₽/ton -1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 2.003 ₽ per ton of boards → Meh. Would need to use almost 9000 tons of boards to break even. → not worth it.
  
  
• With republic workers at the sawmill and woodcutting posts:
  = [7 tons × 11.29 ₽/ton - 1 ₽ - 9 tons × 0.68 ₽/ton -1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 10.044 ₽ per ton of boards → Now we're talking. At full staffing, that would be 1,406.2 ₽ a day, which would pay off the sawmill in only a couple weeks and generate a healthy amount of money for only 80 workers. This would require 20 woodcutting posts though, would rely on prices not crashing, and ships or Trains would definitely be required at this volume.
  
  You could also just do 3 wood cutting posts for a daily 21 tons of boards and 210.924 ₽ a day for only 12 workers.
  
  What do we save on imports?
  = [7 tons × 12.48 ₽/ton - 1 ₽ - 9 tons × 0.68 ₽/ton -1.6 ₽] ÷ 7 tons
  = 11.234 ₽ per ton of boards → Not bad, the savings mean about 1,600 tons of boards must be used to pay off the sawmill (assuming none were exported). This would be great for an early wooden tied track network early on.

Since a Skd 706 RTTN truck uses about 9.5 rubles of fuel (in 1960 start prices) to move 13 tons a km and drive back a km back, and since you'll be lucky to get 180 rubles for 13 tons of boards, you'll be paying more than 5% of the boards' value just to move them 1 km. Depending on how you set up your lumber industry, your production and transportation costs may exceed the revenue you'll get from selling the boards.


These fuel costs and the extra trucks needed are what make cableways and trains attractive, since they are both much more efficient in moving goods.

[Mudkest]

I'd like to add to the "import wood, make boards, export" bit. Don't.
I did that at some point, but after a couple of years I was running a loss on the wood industry. Import price of wood was a lot higher then the export price of boards.

[fjorkar]

Thanks again for the valuable info, I read your old post, very good info.
I intend to use the trucks initially until I'm done building my railroad network

[Zentra]

One thing a person can do is find a way to improve the actual profitability of a route by making sure you are not running empty in any one direction. So if it fits that dynamic, for sure it could possibly be a good thing. The boards could end up paying for the fuel to deliver another product, etc.
Personally, I would not recommend lumber/wood as a bread and butter industry. For me, it is so low key my prison runs it.
When you have a bunch sitting around, it can earn a little extra cash that you otherwise would not have. Ok. But its not enough to really do much with. So, depend on it? NO. I would not recommend.
However, as part of a "little bit of this and a little bit of that" routine, yeah, it helps add up. So while it may not be a primary source of revenue, it can help the numbers add up faster.
Where it all comes into play best though is within the wood/chemical production chain. For me, boards are mainly just a by-product which saves me a little on construction. Getting the chem plant(s) up to use the wood I harvest is my real goal with wood cutting.

[Nokia 3310]

I've calculated pay out duration for export trains (not infrastructure, just vehicles). It was 20 years or smth. like that.
So, extensive wood export is a cool achievement, but it requires other profitable industry to establish. More like a late game achievement.

[Bailing_Out]

Hell if they lock oil up I'm gonna have to build my own tiny college in the editor. Starting on the hard settings with no oil or coal is pretty much gonna make it impossible not to do so.

[Silent_Shadow]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Mudkest:

I'd like to add to the "import wood, make boards, export" bit. Don't.
I did that at some point, but after a couple of years I was running a loss on the wood industry. Import price of wood was a lot higher then the export price of boards.

Weird, I would have thought that the high price of wood would push prices back up for boards.

[MrKrabs]

I remember a few years ago I made good money with exporting Gravel via ship. But that was before the update. I am now at 2036. Just sent a train with water to a remote village. This water is worth a few millions.
Dunno if that is intended.

[Mudkest]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Silent_Shadow:

Opprinnelig skrevet av Mudkest:

I'd like to add to the "import wood, make boards, export" bit. Don't.
I did that at some point, but after a couple of years I was running a loss on the wood industry. Import price of wood was a lot higher then the export price of boards.

Weird, I would have thought that the high price of wood would push prices back up for boards.

might be related with the import/export mechanism and the fact that I was importing/exporting a fair amount over the limit, affecting prices. When I noticed I just stopped exporting boards and only keep production for construction.

[Mudkest]

Opprinnelig skrevet av MrKrabs:

I remember a few years ago I made good money with exporting Gravel via ship. But that was before the update. I am now at 2036. Just sent a train with water to a remote village. This water is worth a few millions.
Dunno if that is intended.

inflation is harsh after a few decades.

But seeing the way prices are skyrocketing for real the past year, I'm beginning to fear that a few millions for a train of water will be a bargain in 13 years >.<