Category: News

Bishop’s Castle timber for a Bishop’s Castle school

  Bishop’s Castle Community College is one of our home town’s most important assets and one which as a business we’ve been pleased to support over the years. Many of the team who work at the Mill attended the school, as have their children and in some cases grandchildren. We were especially pleased to help… Read more »

This is what we do…

When people new to sawmilling ask us what we do at Ransfords we have a standard answer which is perfectly demonstrated in this picture: we take round logs and turn them into rectangular-shaped lengths of timber. The trailer on the left has a nice load of 4.9m redwood logs from Savernake Forest to the south… Read more »

Many hands make light work

One of the benefits of being a family owned business is that we can be more flexible when it’s needed – especially when it comes to helping out one of the many local businesses we depend on to make our business work. Take last night when a late running wagon came into the yard with… Read more »

Ransfords is open for business

In the light of the various newly announced lockdown measures we thought it worth flagging up that we are open for business as normal*. Your usual sales contact can give further advice or information on lead times. Local sales on a cash and carry basis are also available. * we will of course be following… Read more »

Back to work…just like that!

 
Thanks to Sam Evans for this video trickery which is as neat a way as any of showing how how ready we are to get back to it: sharp’s the word and quick’s the action! Happy New Year to one and all!
 

Our Christmas Break

Our mill will be closed for the Christmas holiday from 1pm on Friday 18th December 2020 until the morning of Tuesday 5th January 2021.
We send thanks to customers and partner businesses for their support during a challenging year, and our good wishes f…

Ransfords Timber Treatment – in next to no time!

This short clip compresses an hour in our Timber Treatment Centre into a few short seconds. Treatment to User Class 3 usually takes 2 hours whilst Class 4 takes 3 hours. Our Timber Treatment Centre is one of the most advanced in the UK and dramatically improves both the service we offer customers and the… Read more »

Christmas is coming…time to think local

After a dreadful year for most and a tragic year for many there is at least the prospect of some respite from the Covid-19 restrictions over Christmas. Here in Bishop’s Castle preparations are under way. This picture shows our Alex Evans (last seen driving our brand new Volvo L90H loader) in the cherry picker helping… Read more »

Business as usual

Demand for our timber is huge at the moment and so in line with Government guidance we’ll be working on through the lockdown planned for November. If you have any queries about delivery timescales please get in touch with your usual sales contact. We can welcome cash and carry customers for logs and other supplies… Read more »

Alex and Sam get stuck in

These two drivers just happen to be members of the family which own our sawmill – and the brothers are no strangers to hard work. You’d most often find Alex (above) working at the family owned Mellington Hall Hotel and Holiday Home Park but since that’s in Wales and affected by COVID-19 restrictions, and since… Read more »

Ransfords from the air

One of things that visitors coming to the sawmill for the first time comment on is the sheer buzz of the place: there’s always something going on as the we take logs in, process them, and then send the finished timber products on their way. One important feature of that process is that nothing in… Read more »

The amazing Great British Timber maze

The keen reader of these news updates will recall that a while back we supplied Great British Timber from Ransfords to Farmer Teds’ Adventure Farm at Ormskirk in Lancashire. It’s good to learn that the timber is performing well and that despite the recent difficulties we’ve all gone through, the attraction has become a firm… Read more »

Even more (solar) power to our elbow!

Here’s a dramatic picture to start the week with. It’s taken on the roof of our Timber Treatment Centre where we are installing solar panels to add to the 2000 panels already installed on various buildings at our mill. The energy generated is used to power the mill. This means that the same solar energy… Read more »

A sight to gladden any mill worker’s heart

We joke in our sawmill that what we do is best summed up as taking round logs in and cutting them up to send square bits of timber out. Doing so efficiently and using the best equipment available lets us take huge pride in what is an essentially straightforward process. Making sure that none of… Read more »

There’s tidy for you

Many of our customers never get the chance to visit the mill (although those that do always enjoy the experience) so we like to post pictures from time to time to show how things are. These shots were taken from a cherry picker undertaking some maintenance work, Above we see the area around our Timber… Read more »

PPE storage for Llanidloes Ambulance Station

We were delighted to help out the Llanidloes Ambulance Station of the Ymddiriedolaeth GIG Gwasanaethau Ambiwlans Cymru (Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust) with this bespoke unit which is being used to store the team’s Personal Protective Equipment. According to the Trust the unit is already proving to be a vital piece of furniture within the… Read more »

A milestone for Steve!

It’s astonishing but true: it is 43 years to the very day since our Company Secretary Steve Green (pictured) joined Charles Ransford & Son Ltd. Steve came to work here in the accounts office but was very soon in charge of the whole accounts function and it was from that vantage point that he realised … Read more »

Job done!

Here’s the finished acoustic fencing panel which has been installed between our state-of-the-art Timber Treatment Centre and homes which stand a little way off. The operations in the Centre itself are far from noisy but there are associated vehicle movements the noise from which we are keen to minimise. We’ve been so busy meeting customer… Read more »

When the cobbler’s busy…

…his childrens’ shoes have holes in them. It’s the same for us with fencing: we’ve been so busy making acoustic fencing panels for customers that it has taken us literally weeks to finally get round to making and installing the final section of fencing round our new Timber Treatment Centre. The fencing is designed to… Read more »

Keeping the family busy during lockdown: Ransfords style

These two members of the Evans family (owners of the sawmill) normally work at sister business Mellington Hall Hotel and Holiday Home Park. Alex came in for a day to cover holidays helping out at an extremely busy sawmill with some fork lift driving (for which he is fully trained) whilst his younger brother Sam… Read more »