Oak wood pile

[Viking Mountain Tool Works]

I had to cut down a cluster of red oak trees to make room for an addition to the house. I decided to have it cut-up for boards, because it seemed to nice to use for fire wood. I found a guy with a bandsaw mill in the area and he came over and picked-up the logs. I had some cut at two inches thick, and the rest one inch. The boards are mostly 12 foot long in the big pile, and a mix of 8- ten foot in the small pile. I ended up with 1400 bf of lumber that cost just over $500 to have cut and delivered. I have it air drying in the basement of the new addition for now. I am thinking of covering it with plastic, and sticking a dehumidifier at one end to draw down the moisture, anyone ever try this?
299143299142299141The first project I would like to build is something like this desk
Scott

[Kevin Bourque]

I have a portable sawmill with 2 barns, and a back yard full of assorted hardwoods.

A couple of observations:

1) The basement is a terrible place to dry green wood. Its damp and theres no air flow.
Air flow is the key to drying lumber. You will get mold,staining, and bugs. Plus it will take forever to dry.
I wouldn't ever wrap the piles in plastic, however having a dehumidifier in the room will help some.
The garage, or outside in the yard would be better.

2) You will also need to sticker the wood better than that. You'll get twisting, cupping, and bad end checking that way.
I always put the stickers no more than 1 inch from the ends of the boards and 16" -24" on center depending on the thickness.
Make sure the stickers are all lined up in a row vertically. Don't stagger the rows or the wood will bend.
The stickers must be dry and no smaller than 3/4"x 3/4". Any smaller and they restrict airflow. Green stickers will leave sticker stain on your boards.

Theres more to it than I've described, but a lot more info can be gotten from searching the Web.

[Scott T Smith]

I have a portable sawmill with 2 barns, and a back yard full of assorted hardwoods.

A couple of observations:

1) The basement is a terrible place to dry green wood. Its damp and theres no air flow.
Air flow is the key to drying lumber. You will get mold,staining, and bugs. Plus it will take forever to dry.
I wouldn't ever wrap the piles in plastic, however having a dehumidifier in the room will help some.
The garage, or outside in the yard would be better.

2) You will also need to sticker the wood better than that. You'll get twisting, cupping, and bad end checking that way.
I always put the stickers no more than 1 inch from the ends of the boards and 16" -24" on center depending on the thickness.
Make sure the stickers are all lined up in a row vertically. Don't stagger the rows or the wood will bend.
The stickers must be dry and no smaller than 3/4"x 3/4". Any smaller and they restrict airflow. Green stickers will leave sticker stain on your boards.

Theres more to it than I've described, but a lot more info can be gotten from searching the Web.


Kevin's advice is spot on.

There are times when basement drying is acceptable, but in general you are better of air drying out of doors in a covered structure (such as a carport). Plus, if there are any bugs present in the green lumber you are not introducing them into your house.

[Viking Mountain Tool Works]

Thanks, it had already been air dried in a barn for 3 months before I got it back from the saw guy. Also the basement is mostly out of the ground. Kevin, I will see what I can do to improve the stickering.

[Andrew Pitonyak]

That desk looks very similar in design to one made by my Mother's Uncle; the desk is rather old. Apart from that, your picture is only the second example that I have seen of this design.

[John TenEyck]

If the wood was air dried for 3 months already the 1" wood is probably below the fiber saturation point now, and the 2" might be close, depending upon what the conditions were in the barn. Once wood gets below the fiber saturation point most of the problems have already occurred if they are going to. You still need to be cautious drying it the rest of the way, but it's not as fraught with potential problems anymore.

I dry well dried AD wood (14% MC) in a dehumidification kiln in my basement workshop. It's an insulated, sealed box that allows me to easily raise the temperature with only 300 W of power, and there's a dehumidifier and control system to control the drying process. It can be done with just plastic sheeting and a dehumidifier but it will likely take longer because the temp. will be lower. In any case, you still need to follow a prescribed drying curve or you will induce checks and stress into the wood. There was a good article in FWW several years ago (Nov/Dec. 1991) on drying in a dehumidification kiln. I built my kiln based on that design and follow the drying curve presented in the article. I've dried over 3000 BF of wood now with no problems. It takes me about 7 - 10 days to dry 275 BF of AD lumber down to 6 - 8% MC. For wood at around 30% I suspect it would take around 20 days.

John