Plan B is having a large stock of your favorite lumber. When you need a certain piece just go to the stack and get a piece that is just about the right size.
Plan B is having a large stock of your favorite lumber. When you need a certain piece just go to the stack and get a piece that is just about the right size.
I spend a lot of time sorting thru pieces to make sure I got the same grain type and coloring.
And I did think of the "screw it, I'll just buy a ton of it and deal when home." At least a can have a beer or 6 while sorting. =) However, while I'm not woodworking to make money I was aware of the "having too much inventory on hand is bad business." But then again, spending 2 hours of labor picking thru wood must be bad business as well.
After I finally got what I needed someone told me they could have taken the forklift and pulled a stack off the warehouse shelf for me to look thru. I'm sure that would have been easier.
Also, it didn't even occur to me to glue up pieces. I literally just bought a jointer too.
Either way, I have my wood and will let the sawdust fly. My garage smells like cedar and thats a happy smell.
As I have moved through time in woodworking, I find that matching boards to each other where that matters is most important. It certainly is important to know how wide and long these boards must be in the end, but making the project look good is still the highest priority. So, for me, I buy whatever I need to match wood that must be glued together and to make the project look good to me. Sometimes, because wood suppliers don't always have exactly what I want, that means I end up buying quite a bit more board feet than the work requires. I tend to buy wood from a place that, while more expensive, there is less waste and I buy less wood. In addition, the wood is generally of much better quality. I have been lucky to consistently have a supplier like that available locally.
A couple of local lumber places here run special sale when they get a huge lot of lumber now and then. I check them out once in a few months when my stock runs low to see if any sale deals are on. Even if I have to drive an hour to get them, they are worth the time whether as a Plan B or Plan A. 50% to 65% off the regular prices for comparable ash, cherry, walnut and even mahogany. Most are planed both sides, and they let you roam around and choose the straightest pieces you can find. It can be a four hour exercise, but after a fully loaded truck, I could be easily saving half a grand or more. That is like making more than $100 an hour, the rate not even a full-time furniture maker gets.
Simon
Just build everything out of maple. Not figured or spalted or anything crazy. Generic maple is easy to match.
Sometimes the cut list determines what wood gets used for a project. Some woods like birch around here tend to be only available in narrower widths, so I don't use it where I need wider boards, I try to go with red oak for those as it is usually available wide. White pine is available wide and long and knot free. Hard maple can often be found wide, but often not flat.
Things change too. Some woods like walnut are ridiculously expensive despite poor quality, and some woods like cherry are now quite inexpensive despite high quality. A dozen years ago it was the reverse, go figure.