About 75% yield from rough cut lumber

[kent wardecke]

I can get utility wood, white pine, hemlock, yellow pine (shortleaf) and tulip poplar for $0.50-0.60/ bdft. I usually get 1" x 8" and It's mostly clear Ralph saws straight boards. It seems I'm getting about 25% waste, straightening and cutting to length that doesn't include the wood i plane off of shrinkage. For example if you need two 1x6x40 boards you can make a 1x2 and you can keep the end piece but you can only store so many scraps. If you need two 1x4x92 that's most of the board.
I'm beginning to find the value in rough cut is using the wood. If i need a 3 foot board i can spend 5 minutes digging through the scrap bin or i can cut 3 feet off a board
So when I buy hardwood for a project i think I'll need to plan on buying an extra 25%

[Jim Becker]

So when I buy hardwood for a project i think I'll need to plan on buying an extra 25%

The 25% is a good starting point but if can vary with the species and quality of the wood. I've had projects where I needed 50% more to do the job simply because I'm really anal about matching grain and color and that's what it took to be able to do that. I shoot for the end result, so whatever I use, it's what I use. I also hate having to return to a supplier for more material in the middle of a project when I greatly underestimate things...it costs me time and sometimes extra cost, depending on the circumstances. So I tend to over buy for sure when I can. Any remaining material doesn't go down in value and since I tend to use certain species as "staples" in my work, there is little waste ultimately.

[Doug Dawson]

I can get utility wood, white pine, hemlock, yellow pine (shortleaf) and tulip poplar for $0.50-0.60/ bdft. I usually get 1" x 8" and It's mostly clear Ralph saws straight boards. It seems I'm getting about 25% waste, straightening and cutting to length that doesn't include the wood i plane off of shrinkage. For example if you need two 1x6x40 boards you can make a 1x2 and you can keep the end piece but you can only store so many scraps. If you need two 1x4x92 that's most of the board.
I'm beginning to find the value in rough cut is using the wood. If i need a 3 foot board i can spend 5 minutes digging through the scrap bin or i can cut 3 feet off a board
So when I buy hardwood for a project i think I'll need to plan on buying an extra 25%

75% yield is very good even for FAS stock. Even with that, I find that about 50% yield is typical when you take figure matching into account, and I plan accordingly. Maybe there is some super-high-end cutlist software that might be able to improve on that a little bit, but I doubt it. IMO there's no substitute for the eye.

[Ron Citerone]

I have mostly bought lumber in quantity when I got a deal and then had plenty of extra to work with. When I buy retail for a project I try to visualize the major components(e.g. top, side, drawer front) and then throw in some extra. Not sure I like the % approach completely but it is one way...... extra wood never goes to waste.

[John TenEyck]

For stain grade work I buy at least 30% over. For paint grade 20% is usually about right. Buying more than you need is good as long as you have a place to store it and will ultimately use it. But you know how it goes. You buy extra cherry, for example and end up with 20 bf left over. Another project comes along needing 60 bf of cherry. Chances are the next batch of cherry you buy won't look the same as what you still have in inventory so, you buy all new stock, and now have some left over from the new project as well as the 20 bf from the other.

John

[David Kumm]

In my world the extra cherry ends up with the other paint grade maple. Yield from rough is more than 25% considering you lose a 1/4" just in thickness. Dave

[kent wardecke]

For stain grade work I buy at least 30% over. For paint grade 20% is usually about right. Buying more than you need is good as long as you have a place to store it and will ultimately use it. But you know how it goes. You buy extra cherry, for example and end up with 20 bf left over. Another project comes along needing 60 bf of cherry. Chances are the next batch of cherry you buy won't look the same as what you still have in inventory so, you buy all new stock, and now have some left over from the new project as well as the 20 bf from the other.

John

That's never happened to me 😆😉

[Perry Hilbert Jr]

A fellow near here got the bright idea to put a pegged hardwood floor in his rather large living room. He cut the oak on his farm and paid a mill to rough cut it. Then he had it kiln dried and planed. Finally he hauled the load to a molding plant and had the board milled with tongue and groove. He cut a black walnut and had that rough sawn and processed into the pegs for the floor. It was a very beautiful job and very impressive with the contrasting pegs. He figures he lost over 75% of the wood he started out with and his final cost with finish came to around $12 a square foot, 20 years ago. with him doing the installation. I had seen one or two original pegged floors but never saw or heard of one being done in the last 100 years.