Wood pile and aging

[Ashful]

How many years should someone have at their disposal?

I try to keep 3-4 years split and stacked under cover, but no more than 1-2 years in uncovered logs. I have trouble with logs piling up quicker than I can process them, given my limited shed space for storing split wood, and having the uncovered logs start to rot.

 

[Ashful]

Is there pitch to the roof? Curious how it handles the snow load. My pallet shed is in progress. It'll take a few years as I burn through stuff and replenish on the pallets.

It's a start!

View attachment 321944

This is almost identical to my old setup. Construct it so you can replace those pallets easily, as they'll be nearly trashed after one 3 year cycle, and literally becoming part of the earth by the end of a second 3-year cycle.

I always had to debate, when using the wood stored on pallets like this, whether I wanted to chance getting a second 3-year drying cycle out of the pallets, versus replacing. This experience is part of what dictated the design of my current sheds, as I wanted the floor timbers easily-replaceable, after having rotted thru so many dozens (hundreds?) of treated or hardwood pallets, previously.

 

[brenndatomu]

I'm curious how the middle row seasons. I historically did double stacks connected with an 8" air gap but I'm moving to triple stacks to consolidate and get even more wood. I think it should be fine since I'm on a 3 year cycle and it's a primo drying location. It faces the afternoon sun and prevailing wind.

It'll be fine...advantage of being on the 3 year plan

 

[Caw]

This is almost identical to my old setup. Construct it so you can replace those pallets easily, as they'll be nearly trashed after one 3 year cycle, and literally becoming part of the earth by the end of a second 3-year cycle.

I always had to debate, when using the wood stored on pallets like this, whether I wanted to chance getting a second 3-year drying cycle out of the pallets, versus replacing. This experience is part of what dictated the design of my current sheds, as I wanted the floor timbers easily-replaceable, after having rotted thru so many dozens (hundreds?) of treated or hardwood pallets, previously.

Yeah I figured I'd be replacing these every 3 or 6 years. I'm only using pallets in good shape and they are on gravel not dirt so that will help with drainage, will be top covered, and they also get a lot of wind to keep them dry. So getting 6 years would be nice but yeah I won't be shocked if I only get 3 on some. We'll see. It's way better than using landscape timbers on cinder blocks that settle every year like I had been. I had to restack 2 racks last year and that was enough to spur me into action.

This is exactly why I'm not attaching the roof structure to the pallets. I was designing it and thinking how the heck am I going to replace a structural pallet. I'm going to make proper post and beam structure behind and in front for a roof. Proper depth footings, posts, beams, rafters, purlins, metal roofing. It's a 60 x 6 foot gravel retaining area so it'll be a big project down the road. Once it's done though it'll be a permanent roof and I'll have easy access to all my wood and pallets. I'll probably start it in 2 years once I burn thu all the wood in the way.

 

[Caw]

It'll be fine...advantage of being on the 3 year plan

The 3 year plan is the only way. 3 year wood is night and day better than 2. Especially for me burning mostly oak.

 

[Ashful]

Your gravel bed will definitely help, Caw. Mine were on dirt, in lowlands at that, and it was always the side in contact with earth that rotted way before the rest.

 

[Solarguy3500]

I'm hoping I get several years at least out of my setup because none of my pallets is in contact with the ground. I put it all up on blocks. In fact, leveling all the blocks and making sure they were level in relation to each other over a 26' span was the part of building it that took me the longest. I used mason string and a line level for the side to side leveling and a 4' aluminum level for the front to back leveling. Came out good.

My one concern since I didn't dig footings is that it might heave if we ever get a hard freeze that gets into the ground this year.

My floor is a double layer of 2X6s with each layer running 90° to each other which makes it really strong and sturdy.

 

[Caw]

I'm hoping I get several years at least out of my setup because none of my pallets is in contact with the ground. I put it all up on blocks. In fact, leveling all the blocks and making sure they were level in relation to each other over a 26' span was the part of building it that took me the longest. I used mason string and a line level for the side to side leveling and a 4' aluminum level for the front to back leveling. Came out good.

My one concern since I didn't dig footings is that it might heave if we ever get a hard freeze that gets into the ground this year.

My floor is a double layer of 2X6s with each layer running 90° to each other which makes it really strong and sturdy.
View attachment 321967

Those are some serious heavy duty pallets for the ground! I just used standard 48x40" since I have easy access to them. I had some other more heavy duty ones but they weren't uniform size and I didn't want to run into replacing issues down the road. I think they key thing we're talking about is ground contact. Keeping them off the dirt, whether gravel or blocks, and as dry as possible we should get pretty solid longevity.

RE leveling I went with a "close enough" strategy. Since I'm just throwing a few thousand pounds of wood on it and not structurally attaching a roof I went within half a bubble of it's neighboring pallet and called it good. No need for perfection. When I eventually build the roof structure that'll be a different story.

 

[Ashful]

It'll be interesting to see how that performs, Solarguy. I had mine up on blocks for several years, 9 bricks under each pallet to level them, as 3 along each edge and 1 in center. For me, it did not work out real well, between the pallets snapping under load (oak = 2500 lb. per half cord on a pallet), and the bricks sinking into the earth. If we pretend the brick is actually 4" x 8" (it's not), that's 2500/(4x8)/9 = 8.7 psi, which is apparently more than my wet topsoil can handle in winter.

edit: Just came back to this, remembering I'd "share" bricks between adjacent pallets. So, the three bricks down the edge of the pallet that abutted another were really only half under one pallet and half under the next. That changes the soil loading to 2500/(4x8)/6 = 13 psi for any pallets not at the end of a row. So, something like 1875 lb/ft2, which should still be within the supporting capacity of dry soils, but perhaps not when things get soggy, as my wood processing area tends to be. I can do basic arithmetic, but I'm no soils expert.

 

[Solarguy3500]

It'll be interesting to see how that performs, Solarguy. I had mine up on blocks for several years, 9 bricks under each pallet to level them, as 3 along each edge and 1 in center. For me, it did not work out real well, between the pallets snapping under load (oak = 2500 lb. per half cord on a pallet), and the bricks sinking into the earth. If we pretend the brick is actually 4" x 8" (it's not), that's 2500/(4x8)/9 = 8.7 psi, which is apparently more than my wet topsoil can handle in winter.

edit: Just came back to this, remembering I'd "share" bricks between adjacent pallets. So, the three bricks down the edge of the pallet that abutted another were really only half under one pallet and half under the next. That changes the soil loading to 2500/(4x8)/6 = 13 psi for any pallets not at the end of a row. So, something like 1875 lb/ft2, which should still be within the supporting capacity of dry soils, but perhaps not when things get soggy, as my wood processing area tends to be. I can do basic arithmetic, but I'm no soils expert.

I'll post updates as we go through this first winter and beyond as to how it's holding up. One advantage I have as far as loading/sinking goes is that the area I built it on is actually part of my driveway that runs down to the walkout basement door, so it's a hard-packed driveway mix gravel base rather than topsoil. Hopefully, that helps it resist sinking a bit. I did put blocks under the middle for support too.

Even if it doesn't last long, I'm only into it for the cost of a couple five pound boxes of good quality exterior screws so I won't be too heartbroken. So far, so good. I just finished filling it this past weekend and I didn't feel any flexing or sagging at all as I filled it, and I can't detect any visible sagging or deflection with the naked eye. I did sister an additional 2X4 along the whole length of the 2X4 bottom framing on both sides. That should give it some more structural rigidity.

 

[Caw]

What are the dimensions @Solarguy3500 ?

The gravel area I laid out this fall is 64 x 6 ft which will have 60 ft of pallet storage. It took forever and cost about $1k and 2 weeks of back trouble to make I had a thread about it but I'm glad I did. It's level and on gravel now. As Ashful has said building on wet top soil is troublesome and that's all I have back there. Your driveway should help a lot.

 

[Solarguy3500]

What are the dimensions @Solarguy3500 ?

The gravel area I laid out this fall is 64 x 6 ft which will have 60 ft of pallet storage. It took forever and cost about $1k and 2 weeks of back trouble to make I had a thread about it but I'm glad I did. It's level and on gravel now. As Ashful has said building on wet top soil is troublesome and that's all I have back there. Your driveway should help a lot.

It's 26' 6" long but only the width of a pallet deep, about 43" or so. I can do 2 stacks per bay, one front and one back with about an 8"-10" air gap in the middle. Ideally, I would have doubled up the pallets adding one in front of each but my wife wasn't thrilled with it as is and would not have let me build something bigger.

I did the calculation and it should hold about 3.5 cords

 

[bigealta]

It's 26' 6" long but only the width of a pallet deep, about 43" or so. I can do 2 stacks per bay, one front and one back with about an 8"-10" air gap in the middle. Ideally, I would have doubled up the pallets adding one in front of each but my wife wasn't thrilled with it as is and would not have let me build something bigger.

I did the calculation and it should hold about 3.5 cords

Looks like a good set up to me.

 

[peakbagger]

I used to triple stack my piles with a very shallow pitch temporary roof and did notice quite a difference between the inner row and both the front and back rows. My permanent wood shed was built for three rows deep but that is my winter stash for when the snow gets deep and the wood in it had already has seasoned for a year minimum out on the sunny side of the house. That means it get restacked at least once when its reloaded. Now that I have switched to two and 1/2 deep stacks, two rows front and back with about a 10" gap in between that I loosely drop in uglies with some long poles weaved in to connect the front and back). When I load the wood shack, the new middle row in the shed used to be an exposed row so its not really an issue.

 

[Garbanzo62]

Unfortunately for me, my pallets are a main part of my structure. I set them on blocks so they are not on the ground, then connect them together to make a solid floor. Other pallets or parts of other pallets are then used for the walls.. Going to try to put a roof on one of them. We will see how it goes.

 

[all night moe]

Man I’m jealous of all the nice pallets you guys can get. I’d have to drive into the city to get pallets.

Out near you.
B-spa