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John Fricke
02-22-2008, 12:29 PM
I bought 40 - 6/4 x 6/4 x 10' rough sawn cherry pieces at an auction for 20$. I think this was a good deal but not sure how good. How do you calculate board feet. And being new to woodworkin I wasn't sure what cherry sells for. Does cherry work ok for cutting boards. Not sure what else I'll do with it but I'll come up with something.

Sean Kinn
02-22-2008, 12:35 PM
Those sound like some odd cuttoffs you bought, but they'd work great for cutting boards or legs for small tables and such.

To calculate board feet: measure length in inches, width in inches, and thickness in inches. Multiply them all together, then divide by 144.

example:

length = 12"
width = 6"
thickness = 1"

12 x 6 x 1 = 72 -----> 72/144 = 0.5 bd feet

If my math is right (and you bought 40 pieces) that = 75 bd ft. or $0.27/bd ft....nice score!


Around here I was able to purchase nice 4/4 Cherry from a decent fair supplier for $4.50/bd ft. Prices can vary wildly by region, or even by retailer.

Mark Engel
02-22-2008, 12:39 PM
1 bf = 12"x12"x1"thick

Your boards are 1.5"x1.5"x120" = 270". 270"/144" = 1.875 bf

1.875bf x 40 pieces is about 75bf for $40.00 seems like a good deal to me, if you can use strips of that size.

Joe Chritz
02-22-2008, 12:40 PM
Measurements are using in x in x thickness as in 10x120x6/4 but I assume your pieces are 1.5 x 120 x 6/4.

That is 75 BF or 26.6 cents per BF. If you have a use for it that is a steal. I could use about 15 of them for cutting boards.

Joe

Lee Schierer
02-22-2008, 12:40 PM
IMHO the 1-1/2 * 1-1/2 pieces will mill up to 1-1/4 square pieces which will be great for making spindles, but you'll end up with a lot of seams if you try to make panels or wide boards. You'll also have considerable waste becasue resawing 6/4 into wood suitable to mill down to a finsished 3/4" thick ness will be pretty dicey to get two useable pieces from each. Cherry right now around here if you can find it sells for $5 something a bd-ft. A board foot by the way is 12" x 12" x 1" thick. Your pieces would each contain about 1.875 bd ft.

Matt Day
02-22-2008, 12:40 PM
6/4 is used to indicate the thickness, by quarters of an inch. So your 6/4 is 1.5" thick, or 6 quarters.

You generally don't refer to the width in quarters, so I'll guess you mean 1.5" wide. Or did you make a typo and the width is something else?

You bought (40) 6/4 x 1.5" x 10' which in board feet is 40 * (6/4 * 1.5 * 10')/12 = 75 board feet. That comes out to about $.27/board foot which is excellent if you can use the size! Cherry goes for around $5/bdft rough around here, but in much wider sizes.

And milling up lumber that small will be kind of tough I think, so be careful on the jointer.

Sean Kinn
02-22-2008, 12:42 PM
Wow...we must all be eating lunch and killing time at work...most posts at the same time ever!

Mark Engel
02-22-2008, 12:43 PM
Wow...we must all be eating lunch and killing time at work...most posts at the same time ever!

Yup :rolleyes:

John Fricke
02-22-2008, 7:47 PM
Hey Joe, I'm halfway between Mt Pleasant and Lansing. I'd be interested in trading some of those cheery pieces if you have anything you'd want to trade with.