To plane it or to burn it??? That is the question...

[SnapCracklePop]

I have 53 white oak boards, 1" thick and mostly 10" to 12" wide, a tad more than 8 feet long, that are so dry they'd go into the negative on a moisture meter.

They come from trees I had cut down three or seven years ago, which were milled on the spot. I air dried them myself.

Scenario A: I have a small jointer/planer that will take boards up to 6" wide. If I were to get serious about making some nice Mission furniture or flooring or out of this wood, I'd have to spring for a real planer (DeWalts go for $500 to $600-ish). And a biscuit cutter. And a really good table saw. And on and on. I know from watching hours of The New Yankee Workshop that you just gotta have the right tools for the job. All I have right now is a good radial arm saw, a DeWalt chopsaw, a cheap router and the jointer/planer. What I don't have at the moment is much spare time.

Scenario B: This stuff burns like a house afire. Oh my, I didn't mean that. Yes I did. I know this because I used some of it this spring -- there were some boards that cupped and/or that were ugly. Nails in the wood had stained it inky black in a few spots. One board churns out super heat for an entire evening.

So, what's your take on this? Which is the better plan for this oak? Would the Ghosts of Oak Trees Past come and haunt me if I cut it up and burned it?

What would you do?

PS-- rather than start another thread, I found a firewood guy who sells what he calls a cord and a quarter cut, split and delivered for $145. He says it's seasoned because "no sap comes out of it." I liked the price, so I didn't try to educate him. I can season it myself (I prefer Emeril's Original Essence with a pinch of extra garlic). I'll be getting some of it after the Fourth.

Nancy

 

[lukem]

Don't burn it! That would be a huge waste. Sell it and buy "real" firewood. You'll get a lot more heat out of the deal.

 

[JustWood]

Sell the boards and buy the wood. Wide dry boards like that bring phat coin.

 

[Thistle]

Sell the boards & buy a bigger planer for future use.

 

[smokinj]

Sell the boards and buy the wood. Wide dry boards like that bring phat coin.

+1 one.....Pic's?????

 

[SnapCracklePop]

Hmmm. What would it go for?

Nancy

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Ya, sell the boards.

You might be surprised at the dryness. 3-7 years usually is laughed at with oaks. Shoot, we won't even think about burning it until 3 years have passed. By your 3-7 year estimate, that would should be in its prime for firewood but still, that would seem a waste. Good for you for finding a supplier for firewood.

 

[Battenkiller]

If they were well stickered and dried properly, you should get about $2/bd/ft. If some of them are choice planks you might consider sorting them and just sell the lesser quality and keep some for yourself in case your time opens up in the near future. Or try for a higher price for the best stuff.

Sounds like about 300-400 bd/ft once it'd planed. If there is more than 1/8" cupping you might need to rip them down the middle. Planing badly cupped wide planks will yield basically nothing when you are done. Even with a cup of only 1/8", the very best you will get will be 3/4" boards when you are finished.

 

[smokinj]

Hmmm. What would it go for?

Nancy

condition is every-thing.....PIG IN A POKE at this point! :coolsmirk:

 

[peakbagger]

Air dried wood in general and oak in particular isnt worth much unless someone is doing steam bending. Generally it needs to be kiln dried to get it to stabilize, air dried wood tends to warp and cup much more than kiln dried. That being said, if you list in a local "shopper" magazine. Up in northern NE there is Uncles Henry's which usually has ads for wood (they are on line)

 

[SnapCracklePop]

Even with a cup of only 1/8â€

Measured by placing a straight edge across the width and measuring the gap, I presume?

All were stickered. Some dried outdoors for a few months; those later went into the garage. The rest, the older ones, dried in the basement. There's a dehumidifier down there, but just a small one.

This'll be veddy interesting...

Nancy

 

[Thistle]

One trick to salvage cupped wide boards that are otherwise nice is to rip them in half,plane each piece,glue them back together & make one more very light pass of a 1/32" or less through the planer.When carefully done its very hard to see the joint,the grain matches almost invisibly.

 

[gzecc]

I have 53 white oak boards, 1" thick and mostly 10" to 12" wide, a tad more than 8 feet long, that are so dry they'd go into the negative on a moisture meter.

They come from trees I had cut down three or seven years ago, which were milled on the spot. I air dried them myself.

Scenario A: I have a small jointer/planer that will take boards up to 6" wide. If I were to get serious about making some nice Mission furniture or flooring or out of this wood, I'd have to spring for a real planer (DeWalts go for $500 to $600-ish). And a biscuit cutter. And a really good table saw. And on and on. I know from watching hours of The New Yankee Workshop that you just gotta have the right tools for the job. All I have right now is a good radial arm saw, a DeWalt chopsaw, a cheap router and the jointer/planer. What I don't have at the moment is much spare time.

Scenario B: This stuff burns like a house afire. Oh my, I didn't mean that. Yes I did. I know this because I used some of it this spring -- there were some boards that cupped and/or that were ugly. Nails in the wood had stained it inky black in a few spots. One board churns out super heat for an entire evening.

So, what's your take on this? Which is the better plan for this oak? Would the Ghosts of Oak Trees Past come and haunt me if I cut it up and burned it?

What would you do?

PS-- rather than start another thread, I found a firewood guy who sells what he calls a cord and a quarter cut, split and delivered for $145. He says it's seasoned because "no sap comes out of it." I liked the price, so I didn't try to educate him. I can season it myself (I prefer Emeril's Original Essence with a pinch of extra garlic). I'll be getting some of it after the Fourth.

Nancy

I would try a trade on CL. Ask for 2 cords of hardwood for the boards you have. See what you get!

 

[Battenkiller]

Air dried wood in general and oak in particular isnt worth much unless someone is doing steam bending. Generally it needs to be kiln dried to get it to stabilize, air dried wood tends to warp and cup much more than kiln dried. That being said, if you list in a local "shopper" magazine. Up in northern NE there is Uncles Henry's which usually has ads for wood (they are on line)

That's not my personal experience. Well-stickered and carefully dried wood will cup and shrink the same as kiln-dried wood at equivalent moisture contents. It all depends on how it is cut.

A lot of choice hardwood that is kiln-dried comes from mills that cut it to achieve the best ratio of rift-sawn/flat-sawn wood. In contrast, most of the air-dried stuff these days comes from chainsaw or band mill owners who just flitch-cut the whole log rather than quartering the log, or even rotating the cant to get the best wood. You can get some honking wide planks that way, but they cup and check badly, especially if they contain any of the pith.

Once wood has air-dried down to EMC you should bring it inside for several months to reach equilibrium with the relative humidity of the workshop. This is true even for kiln-dried timbers. Wood that is kiln-dried down to 8-10% MC, planed flat, and then stored in an outside shed will warp again as it picks up moisture from the air. No wood is stable to RH changes. Air-dried is just as stable as kiln-dried once it has dried completely and allowed to reach the EMC inside the workplace.

Yes, air-dried wood is generally less than half the cost of kiln-dried, but that is partly because it still needs to finish equilibrating inside for a long time, and that takes a lot of storage space. White oak is way down the list of desirable furniture woods. Traditional chair makers and boatbuilders love it, but they prefer to use it green instead of air-dried. However, properly cut and stored air-dried cherry and walnut would bring a premium if marketed to discerning buyers. I have lots of nice air-dried cherry, and to me it works way better than kiln-dried wood. You can actually hear the difference when you hand plane it, it is sweet.

 

[Battenkiller]

One trick to salvage cupped wide boards that are otherwise nice is to rip them in half,plane each piece,glue them back together & make one more very light pass of a 1/32" or less through the planer.When carefully done its very hard to see the joint,the grain matches almost invisibly.

Thistle, I know you are a very experienced woodworker, so this addition is for the masses. You should plane them and run them over the jointer to get them square if you want to get the best re-glued planks.

 

[cptoneleg]

Wish I would have had them to build my woodshed would look awsome, I had to use presure treated.

 

[Thistle]

One trick to salvage cupped wide boards that are otherwise nice is to rip them in half,plane each piece,glue them back together & make one more very light pass of a 1/32" or less through the planer.When carefully done its very hard to see the joint,the grain matches almost invisibly.

Thistle, I know you are a very experienced woodworker, so this addition is for the masses. You should plane them and run them over the jointer to get them square if you want to get the best re-glued planks.

You got it. If edges arent square from the get-go (Anymore I use a late 19th Century Scottish 21" Cast Iron Jointer Plane with Rosewood Infill,weighs about 12lbs instead of powered jointer) your faces wont be true either. :coolsmile: Only time the machine gets used is if I have a lot of linear feet to get done.So much prefer to use the proper hand tools instead of machines,its how I was taught starting around age 15.Some old masters in junior high instilled it in us that 'you have to learn to crawl before you can walk" ;-)

 

[Battenkiller]

I use a late 19th Century Scottish 21" Cast Iron Jointer Plane with Rosewood Infill,weighs about 12lbs instead of powered jointer) your faces wont be true either. :coolsmile: Only time the machine gets used is if I have a lot of linear feet to get done.So much prefer to use the proper hand tools instead of machines,its how I was taught starting around age 15.Some old masters in junior high instilled it in us that 'you have to learn to crawl before you can walk" ;-)

Right on, T! Machines are great for production work, but when's the last time you saw anyone cut off all four fingertips using a jointer plane?

Aside from that, there is the sheer joy of using a razor sharp tool to take a shaving you can see through. Then there is the sense of personal satisfaction gotten from acquiring the requisite skills, the ability to work anywhere without power, the quiet in the shop, the glassy smooth surfaces (and superior glue lines), the beautiful sound of a sharp plane as it slices through the fibers, the look and feel of the old tools, the satisfying ache in the shoulders after several hours of planing, walking on several inches of wispy shavings instead of a pile of chips, etc.

I have even taken to using my hand saws for the occasional carpentry cutoff instead of thoughtlessly grabbing for a circ saw. By the time I get the saw out, run the extension cord, adjust the depth, plug it in and make the cut, I could have made several cuts by hand with a square and my ryoba saw. And the cut will take out just the pencil line, perfectly square and with no chance of blowing out the end with a big chip.

When I was at a boatbuilding class several years ago, the teacher (Geoff Burke) did 95% of the work with a 2" slick, a block plane, some wooden battens, a compass, and his unerring eye. He builds world-class lapstrake canoes this way, a real revelation.

I just love using hand tools.