Oak planks are a staple of training the Construction skill and always in demand. Since the process of making them is rather slow and tedious, players will pay a premium to get planks in bulk rather than spending time making them.
The process is nearly identical for making any type of plank, so before you begin, check the prices of logs and planks at the Grand Exchange; depending on which has the highest spread, you may wish to try planking teak logs instead. Note that because Jagex has put a ceiling price on regular planks, it is not worth doing this with normal logs. Also, the spread between mahogany logs and planks has shrunk so much of late, that they are no longer a viable method to make money.
Be patient when selling planks, as sometimes it can take a while for them to transact. Try selling them for a few coins below average price. Note also that to do this activity for a while you need a decent amount of money to begin with.
The fastest method for making planks requires you to complete the quest Enlightened Journey and unlock the route to Varrock. This happens to drop you off right next to the sawmill, so you can make planks very quickly while using little run energy. If you use all possible weight reducing gear, 26 logs per load is generally possible; the exception is at mid levels, when you cannot wear enough weight-reducing gear to get your weight below that number with a full load of oak logs, so you have to do only 23 logs per trip. For this reason, you may be better off doing teak logs at this level even if there is less profit per plank.
At lower levels you can't use the balloons, but can still make some money using a slower method involving Varrock teleport tablets. With this method you should ideally use super energy potions, since you want to conserve space. However, recent changes in Herblore have caused the cost of super energy potions to skyrocket, so I now assume the use of regular energy potions despite this slightly reducing the number of planks made per hour.
It used to be impossible to take familiars on the balloons, but this restriction was lifted in late 2009. As it happens, though, using one to carry extra logs is of limited value -- I conducted tests and found the extra capacity is offset by the extra time spent loading, unloading and swapping logs and planks. The only place where it is worthwhile is if you have level 96 Summoning for a pack yak. Otherwise, just use a magpie for its foragings. |
All information based on Grand Exchange price data from: May 20, 2012. Note that the three-day delay in price updates is waived for RuneScoop members. 