Trim percentage

[Kelly Marr]

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/images/icons/icon1.png Trim percentage
Hi,

I have a job to install window trim and door caseings in a office and comes out to roughly 650ft of caseing. How much extra percentent do you guys usually get for this size of a job.
Thanks Kelly

[Chris Fournier]

If you buy your lengths properly I have almost always found 10% to be plenty of overage.

[Lee Schierer]

If you buy your lengths properly I have almost always found 10% to be plenty of overage.

I concur. If you plan all your cut lengths in advance and use a optimizer program you can probably get by with less. The other consideration is whether the molding is a stock molding that is readily available or is it a custom molding that is hard to get.

[johnny means]

I use 20% for most jobs. Of course, some jobs work out better and some worse.

[Mel Fulks]

Percentage ,I think ,depends on application . For casings I would order by pieces ,not footage. For jobs with pieces of a lot of different lengths I figure 15 percent or more.

[Jason Roehl]

It depends on the sizes of windows and doors. If the doors are standard 6'8" doors, and 36" width or less, then it takes five 7' pieces of casing to trim out a door (2 vertical pieces on each side, and half a piece for each of 2 head casings). To reduce waste for the windows, you would need a length of casing that can be divided up into some number of pieces with only very short pieces as waste for the windows. That is, if you have all 3' wide doors and windows, you wouldn't want to get 12' pieces of casing--you would have lots of ~2' pieces left over, which is about 16% waste. Don't forget that with casing, the length of piece you need is the length of the jamb, plus the width of the casing for each miter (i.e., on a 3' wide window the top piece of casing will be approximately 3'4.5" for 2.25" wide casing).

Also, keep in mind that there will be waste on the offcut of a miter, as you will have to either cross cut that miter, or re-miter it the other direction.

[Mel Fulks]

I agree with your math ,but the material is going to have defects. We have had contractors with years of experience buy casing for the same house three times and ordering twice is not unusual. If it is stock stuff ,that's ok. If it is a custom order I think pieces work better for everybody .

[Mel Fulks]

Forgot something .On custom stuff you can't always get the lengths you want .On one large job the office spent several days making a list of how much cherry would be needed, I had told them it was pointless because unless they paid extra they were going to get what was available ,or nothing. When they got on the phone they found out all those 16 footers would not be coming. So they had to spend a couple more days on it.

[Jason Roehl]

I agree with your math ,but the material is going to have defects. We have had contractors with years of experience buy casing for the same house three times and ordering twice is not unusual. If it is stock stuff ,that's ok. If it is a custom order I think pieces work better for everybody .

If the material has defects, I wouldn't consider that "waste"--I would send it back, or hand-pick to begin with to avoid buying it. I'd also make sure that the lumber yard knew beforehand that defective material would be unacceptable.