Wood Sort and Trim
First stop today was the North Portland Tool Library. This wonderful non-profit loans tools from an astoundingly large and complete library to any resident in North Portland. Luckily that includes me. I check out a chop saw, an electric planer, and two clamps. Total cost: free.
As I unbundle my big stack of sticks, it occurs to me that my first step should be to sort the wood. Many people do not realize that since wood is organic, it moves and bends as it dries or if exposed to moisture. As a beginning woodworker this was a great source of frustration for me. But wood does not come from a factory, it is grown. It may well pass through a factory to be processed, but that's another story. Anyway, each piece is unique and may present different challenges for the woodworker. I'm concerned primarily about large knots and warped boards.
Taking a few sticks at a time on the concrete floor of the basement, I turn them over and over and assess their quality. Excellent specimens go in one stack. Damaged lumber with large knots or dangerous splits go in another. The curved and warped boards go in the last pile. Unfortunately, the last two piles get most of the boards.
Thirty minutes into the sorting, I have to start over. I realize the basement floor where I'm sorting is far from flat! It's a rather old building and it has settled. It turns out the fastest way to sort them anyway is to just compare a dozen boards to each other and the odd ones kind of jump out. Here are some of the damaged pieces:
Since the wall slats for my yurt only need to be six and a half feet tall and the boards are 8', damage on the ends can simply be cut off. Damage in the middle is a different story. The most dismal wood that can't easily be salvaged is set aside. It may have some use down the road. Fortunately, I bought 5% more wood than is required to allow for wastage just like this.
Wall slats will be made by splitting these boards in half lengthwise. Although some knots may not be so bad in the 2x2, it may weaken one of the two slats once split. These boards I reserve for use as rafter poles -- since they will not be split. The curvy and warped boards are likely to become roof rafters too because I fear they can't be evenly split on the table saw later on.
After sorting, I use the chop saw to trim the rafter poles to exactly 8'. On average each board has an extra half inch. Both ends of each stick are painted green, so I try to shave off the extra a bit from each side so the final ends are bare wood. There is a staple in one end of each stick too, so I pull these out first. The staple end of the wood destined for the wall is just trimmed off since I have so much extra length for them.
The sorting took way longer than I expected, but I feel good about my progress and call it a night.
As I unbundle my big stack of sticks, it occurs to me that my first step should be to sort the wood. Many people do not realize that since wood is organic, it moves and bends as it dries or if exposed to moisture. As a beginning woodworker this was a great source of frustration for me. But wood does not come from a factory, it is grown. It may well pass through a factory to be processed, but that's another story. Anyway, each piece is unique and may present different challenges for the woodworker. I'm concerned primarily about large knots and warped boards.
Taking a few sticks at a time on the concrete floor of the basement, I turn them over and over and assess their quality. Excellent specimens go in one stack. Damaged lumber with large knots or dangerous splits go in another. The curved and warped boards go in the last pile. Unfortunately, the last two piles get most of the boards.
Thirty minutes into the sorting, I have to start over. I realize the basement floor where I'm sorting is far from flat! It's a rather old building and it has settled. It turns out the fastest way to sort them anyway is to just compare a dozen boards to each other and the odd ones kind of jump out. Here are some of the damaged pieces:
Since the wall slats for my yurt only need to be six and a half feet tall and the boards are 8', damage on the ends can simply be cut off. Damage in the middle is a different story. The most dismal wood that can't easily be salvaged is set aside. It may have some use down the road. Fortunately, I bought 5% more wood than is required to allow for wastage just like this.
Wall slats will be made by splitting these boards in half lengthwise. Although some knots may not be so bad in the 2x2, it may weaken one of the two slats once split. These boards I reserve for use as rafter poles -- since they will not be split. The curvy and warped boards are likely to become roof rafters too because I fear they can't be evenly split on the table saw later on.
After sorting, I use the chop saw to trim the rafter poles to exactly 8'. On average each board has an extra half inch. Both ends of each stick are painted green, so I try to shave off the extra a bit from each side so the final ends are bare wood. There is a staple in one end of each stick too, so I pull these out first. The staple end of the wood destined for the wall is just trimmed off since I have so much extra length for them.
The sorting took way longer than I expected, but I feel good about my progress and call it a night.
posted by yurt boy at 7:37 PM
1 Comments:
I can still hearing the electric saw! Buzz Buzz Buzz
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