Don't Make These Lumber Mistakes! | Tips for New Woodworkers
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 14 ต.ค. 2021
- Watch our latest video! "Refinishing a Retro Heywood Wakefield Desk With A Stunning New Look!"
• Transforming A Retro H... -~-
I imagine most people think wood is a fairly simple material. But the more you work with it, the more you can appreciate the subtle peculiarities of wood and what it takes to work with it effectively. Over the years, I've made a number of mistakes with regard to purchasing and cutting lumber and plywood and hopefully this list of tips will save you some heartache.
+ Wood Moves After Milling
+ Wood Can Move During a Cut
+ Plan for Expansion and Contraction
+ Don't Cheap Out on Plywood
+ Crap In, Crap Out
+ Buying Thicker Lumber and Resawing Is Not Cheaper
+ Shop Around for Best Price
+ Finish Doesn't Forgive Crappy Wood
+ Learn to Paint With Grain
Join this channel to get access to perks:
/ @woodwhisperer
Check out our new short-form videos on Facebook! / thewoodwhisperer
For more information, free plans, and helpful links:
SUBSCRIBE!
th-cam.com/users/subscription_c...
Take a woodworking class online with The Wood Whisperer
thewoodwhispererguild.com
SUPPORT US ON PATREON!
/ woodwhisperer
PRODUCTS RECOMMENDED BY MARC
US - www.amazon.com/shop/thewoodwh...
Canada - www.amazon.ca/shop/thewoodwhi...
UK - www.amazon.co.uk/shop/thewood...
CHECK OUT OUR BBQ CHANNEL
/ twwbbq
WOOD WHISPERER en Español
/ wood whisperer en español
CHECK OUT OUR SHOP TOURS
www.thewoodwhisperer.com/shop-...
GET INSPIRED BY OUR VIEWER PROJECT LIBRARY
www.thewoodwhisperer.com/viewe...
DOWNLOAD OUR FREE APP
iOS: bit.ly/177u4An
Follow me on:
TWITTER - / woodwhisperer
FACEBOOK - / thewoodwhisperer
INSTAGRAM - / woodwhisperer
Pinterest: / woodwhisperer - แนวปฏิบัติและการใช้ชีวิต
*Attention NOTIFICATION CREW!* If you get here within the first hour you have a chance to win a FREE Wood Whisperer Guild project. All you need to do is go here and fill out the form: thewoodwhisperer.com/notification-crew/
If you're too late, be sure you're subscribed and have all notifications turned on so you don't miss your chance when our next video drops.
Every single new woodworker needs to see this video! As an amateur woodworker myself I’ve seen this happen first hand. Even today on my table saw I saw the off-cut wood bow out as I was cutting it. If only I had left enough margin on the stock to joint it again 🙄 But I’ve learned very early that a project is very fluid - the design has to change with the wood sometimes.
Love your channel and thanks for teaching an amateur all the way down in South Africa 🇿🇦 all these great lessons!
All your points are important but I quite appreciated your last section on "painting with the grain". I need to pay more attention to that.
Agreed. I literally thought, "Wow! What a difference that makes." I'm still very new at furniture making, but I never would have thought of that.
Another option for woodworkers is to find a local sawyer! :D We can mill up logs you find (or might have logs in stock, or lumber in stock) to whatever dimension you want them to be. Of course, they have to be dried before use and this can take time but meeting a local sawyer to secure a steady supply of material can be a great option!
I just came here to say how much I appreciate your sense of humor, Marc! I imagine your thought process (or maybe you even said it somewhere) “ugh I hate clickbait-y videos, but they work, so fine, I guess I’ll try it. But darn it I’m going to poke fun at the whole concept at the same time”. Your thumbnails are awesome.
Dude. That high school photo. You are a brave man.
It’s been a while since I’ve heard you say “stack the cards in our favor”. Good to have you back!
Glad to hear you say it, bc choosing just the right pieces of lumber for a particular component is always among the most time-consuming & laborious chores I face when doing a project. I just thought I was nuts. 🤪
Wow! Nine tips AND a high school picture! My week is complete!😆
I really appreciate the “what I’ve learned” series of videos. Thanks Marc
All good points Marc. Thank you for sharing. Have a great day and stay safe.
Great tips, Marc! I hadn't thought of painting with the grain before!
These tip videos are great. Thanks for posting it. Please keep them coming.
Been studying up on wood movement and this was a great bit of info to add to the knowledge bank. As always, thanks for sharing 🙏
Awesome tips Marc! As always very informative and bloopers are funny too!!
I'm a joiner of around 23 years and even now I still like to be reminded about this stuff. Great advice as usual
Great point on buying boards for specific parts of the project. I do this every time I go to the lumber yard and yes it takes a little longer but man is it with it! Awesome tips Marc!
I am just starting out with my first trips to the lumber yards and living in a small country like Bulgaria where there are not exactly the type of businesses that cater to high end woodworking - your videos are a life saver for someone who bets almost all his cards on woodworking since my other field of work nearly vanished during the pandemic. Many, many thanks!
You always have great advice. I’ve been watching your videos for awhile. Thank you
Thank You..Love your videos & the bloopers at the end.. Watched video while connecting flights at Denvers Airport. Keep up the good work!!
Thank you for sharing your wisdom and experience. I picked up a lot from this video!
9 minutes of pure gold... so much information. Thank you.
Excellent advice. Your vids are awsome! Looks easy to post like you do but there is art in that and not just in your woodworking skills. Thank you
This exact topic was on my mind as I clicked on my subscription tab today...then bam! Thanks Marc!
Really priceless tips, dude! Thanks a bunch! 😃
Stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
I did not see the nipple twister coming, and nearly choked from spontaneous laughter. Thanks man, after a workday like this, I needed that X-D
On a more on-subject note, I'm still fighting heavily to find any lumber around me - I'm in the Swedish south, and nearly all the places that sell lumber to private people are associated with DIY shops, which are... Not great. Both price and quality wise. Heck, finding anything that isn't pine or oak is like winning the lottery. It seems often that the greatest challenge I find, is just getting the basic materials to work on WELL before applying what meager skills I have to a project.
Very enjoyable Marc, the presentation was very well done.
Packed with good stuff! Thank you.
It was really informative and helpful 👌 Thank you so much!
Great tips thanks! also learned a few of these the hard way especially milling and letting it sit made that mistake.
My dad owned a small sawmill when I was in high school. I remember trying to tail behind the head rig when someone logs had so much tension they would either bind the saw blade and cause it to want to lay over or they would curl so far away from the cut it was almost impossible to keep the board on the roll cages. Having been in woodworking for almost 30 years I can attest the same is true to the wood we use. Another thing to pay attention to when purchasing wood is grain direction. Is it quarter sawn or plain sawn and understanding how the wood moves accordingly. Great advice on getting wood that is sized to the project instead of reading it.
@@Robo.1776 if you're trying to purchase wood to resaw for projects instead of the right size you will waste more than you try to save from tension in the wood and in some cases due to case hardening from the kiln process. And understand the way wood moves (expands and contracts from moisture variances) will make a difference on whether you get quarter sawn or flat sawn wood
Some good tips I hadn’t focused on before. Thanks.
Great information! Thanks again for a useful video
Thank you for the suggestions. Make a lot of sense.
As always, great tips. All things i've been frustrated with before...you'd think i would learn, but i'll revisit most of these from time to time. Also not seeing anyone giving you grief of any kink here, so i might just for fun. Love your Colorado shirt, worn like a true import to the state...something only us hoity toity natives would ramble on about!
Thanks for the great video and tips.
So appreciative you explained the 8/4 v 4/4 resaw "myth." I was under the impression that 8/4 was the best way to go to maximize yield, and its just not practical based upon cost, let alone the time, effort, and toolage cost to be able to resaw wide boards.
Most of the time thicker wood has to be a higher grade to make the same size boards. You can start with 5/4 and mill the imperfections out of it for a 4/4 board, but it is alot harder to do the thicker you get. We had to explain this to a customer once that wouldn't understand that 8/4 juniper is impossible to get without bark/wane/knots.
Yup unless you need smaller boards
Yep. If you put yourself in the mind of the mill operator, it makes total sense. Delivering a lovely big timber is quite an achievement. Resawing flitches to get some residual value out of the smaller material is a good way to produce inexpensive lumber IN SMALL DIMENSIONS.
Great tips Marc..........you sure did open my eyes to some very important info.......I am now, not questioning my choice of purchasing Baltic Birch plywood for shop cabinets/carts rather that the other options............Thank you!!
Really great information. Thank you!
Been watching you for years, always excellent knowledge even videos from 15 years ago!
I appreciate that!
I love the maturity, self awareness and self deprecation that you include in your videos these days! That picture from high school is my favorite thing I've seen all day!
Get a room
Great stuff, Marc~!! Thanks for sharing~!
Loved the Kyrsten Sinema curtsy when ya said, "work".
Great advice Marc
Your discussion of plywood was spot on. I bought a lot of birch veneered plywood that was apparently from Vietnam. The veneers were paper thin and came off easily, the cored were irregular with voids/overlaps and poorly glued causing lots of issues. I have never had so many splinters from any one material in my life! Fortunately, most of it was used to cover the walls in my shop rather than building something from it. I got a bunch of Baltic birch from the same source and it was very nice to work with.
Recently I bit the bullet and bought some Purebond maple veneered plywood from a local home center. It is almost as nice as the Baltic birch. The core is all poplar. My good sawblades are out for sharpening so I'm using an inexpensive Diablo at the moment and still had no chipout from the Purebond ply. The veneer is much thicker that the cheap birch veneered import ply and it handles beautifully. My wife was even impressed with how nice the French cleats looked in maple veneer.
And your experience with the plywood is the reason why my biggest pet peeve is suppliers, and even woodworkers, calling ply Baltic Birch when it isn’t TRUE Baltic Birch 😂
Liked, subb'ed. That was some next level advice. Never thought about grain so much. Thanks
This video speaks a lot to me. I ride that struggle bus every day! 😆
Excellent explanation
Great info as always!! There is always something to learn from you! Thank you!
Glad it was helpful!
Good tips. Luved the bloopers!
Good info. Very helpful.
Marc. Another great educational video. I’ve really understood just how much wood moves since I started turning, leave a project on the lathe overnight and it’s out of round the next day.
One thing you can do to help minimize that overnight movement is to cover your piece. Some folks will put a grocery store bag over it and tape it. Personally, I think it helps more to tightly wrap it with Saran Wrap.
Awesome man, thank you for sharing🤘🙌✌
Thanks!! A lot of interesting information.
Great video. Thanks!!
Very helpful.
Love watching ur videos 😬👌🏽
Great Vid!! Well done.
The bit about ripping long lumber. I first learn of that while splitting 2x10s for my bench top. Wow! Some of them looked like pretzels after that. A few of them had so much tension they could not be safely cut all of the way.
Thank you!
U ARE A GENUINE TRUE CARPENTER ! 👍🏿👍🏼
Always nervous when I go to buy wood. Thanks for the tips.
Great advice.
Wood moving during a cut in mind blowing. This whole time I thought my table saw was just out of square.
Thanks Marc!
Great video!!!!! Thanks
Marc, good wood working tips. Plywood is something you really have to look at . Like how many layers does it have? Thanks for posting and sharing.
Good tips!
Hello, WW
Thank you for this excellent video and I greatly appreciate what you have described as i have encountered most if not all of these conditions. Worst part is when you start with perfect pieces and after machining you end up with nothing but warped and twisted pieces.
There are a lot of things that we still don't understand about wood like:
1- How long does it take for lumber to acclimate?
2- Why same wood pieces expand and contract differently?
3- Not sure I agree with calculation of how much oak piece of certain width should expand and contract. A good example is wood flooring. In my mother old house, the humidity various from 19% in winter to 85% in summer. The floor violates every rule with heavy coat of polyurethane on one side and nothing on the bottom side. If I follow calculation of expansion and contraction, that floor should bust and smash into the walls in the summer yet every year I measure less than 1/4" movement.
Again, thank you for excellent video and for recommendations. They help but not always effective. Regarding plywood, plywood warp over time and changes in thickness in contrary to common belief that plywood is a stable material. Anything made out of wood is never stable if humidity is not under control. I follow all the rules and sometimes still end up with warping, twist, and anything but flat and square.
Thank you 👍👍
I found this very interesting. It has been my practice to allow a few days or a week between resawing and dimensioning and to dimension oversize initially and then finish to exact sizes after allowing a few more days for the timber to settle and " relax" between each stage. Maybe I have been wrong!
There certainly is a LOT to this craft.. I have learned quite a bit from you Marc, and thank you ! My projects are better from it, for sure.
Great tips, thanks for sharing. When you were in Arizona where did you purchase your hardwoods?
Love your videos!
Really getting spoiled by the amount and quality of content Marc.
Thanks man. Don’t get used to it, though. 😂
@@woodwhisperer trust me I’ve been with you since the beginning. Weekly, monthly, or quarterly I will always be here.
I had to go back and attempt freeze-framing like, 15 times to land on that high school photo. Good stuff. r/blunderyears ?
That was fun to see!
Good post
Wood!… the final frontier, these are the voyages of TWW🙂
Great tips Marc!
Thanks buddy!
8:08 Great nips Marc!
@@Zav hahaha 🤣
thanks
I first learned about "case hardened" wood after resawing a 5/4 piece of cherry that was supposed to become the frame for a box. It bowed so much that the last 1/2" of the board split on it's own before it got through the bandsaw blade. Made one hell of a sound - like a gunshot. Scared the crap out of me. The board was about 36" long and 9 Inches tall. Putting the two pieces together afterward there was a 1-1/8" gap in the middle. Talk about wood movement! :-(
Phoenix people, the 1/2 priced lumber store he speaks of is Spellman's hardwoods.
That's the one! :)
Cheaper than Timber Woodworking in Mesa?
@@normgraham6658 More 'n likely. They only deal in lumber, and only your standard species, nothing exotic. Last I checked which to be fair was 2018, 8/4 Walnut was $9.30 a board foot.
These were wonderful tips...thank you! Out of curiosity, where do you tend to get your hardwoods and plywoods in the Denver area?
I live in Arizona. I think I know the stores of which you speak!!! Great for exotics you can't get anywhere else, but much cheaper options out there for domestics!
I liked the video when I saw your high school “ hair” picture! Great stuff Marc
Holy cow your jointer is HUMONGOUS
Good video! Also, know the difference between long grow lumber and short.
you got a sub! Thanks!
Thanks for the resaw comparison. I have frequently resawn thinking I was saving money. Also, with re-sawing, for me at least, you have to deal more frequently with cupping and twist. After the board is resawn now the resawn side is now exposed to the air and any moisture or internal is stress released. From experience, this can result in a board that looks like a potato chip.
Tanks
Thank you ,I thought it was me cutting the wood wrong, or that my table saw had something wrong , I was why is my wood bending or curve lol😂, i m new to this so
Love the school pic!
Nice
Sir, I love the sponge example and it is far too true to call around to get the best price. Those two tips alone should be an eye opener that can make a difference.
Conditioned lumber is also big help.
Thanks for another great video.
I recently decided to build a French Cleat wall and used 3/4” birch plywood cut down to 5” x 48” strips. About a week after cutting, I went to put them on the wall and they remained flat but all of them were curved in the middle like a 5” wide parentheses! (Paren?).
I didn’t expect plywood to move like that! Do you have an idea what could have happened? Cheap plywood?
I had to remember which channel I was on. Yours or Matt's.
Heh. Watching you saw that long, thin board on the tablesaw brought back memories of my only injury at the table saw. We ran out of 1x2s (trailer manufacturing) so I had to cut up some 2x4s to make them. Of course that saw's kickback pawls were lost years ago. Started slicing a badly case-hardened 2x4, which started warping badly, and it caught the blade and kickback city.
A standard tablesaw is 36" tall, my inseam was 37". Guess where I got "punched"?
Coworkers and foreman got a great laugh out of it, I didn't think it was quite so funny!
Good video. Many woodworkers know wood moves. High quality laminated plywood's dry or not do have "board memory". The edge has a different moisture and stress levels than the center. On a long rip you will see the space where the saw blade passed through close up or spread out. To combat things like this on panels cut out over sized. Rest time to acclimate. Trim all edges as close to same amount as possible to finished size.
There is another place carpenters can misunderstand properties of wood and moisture. Rough framing lumber and fasteners relationship. Attaching something like dry wall use the shortest screw or nail within reason possible on install to avoid pop. Longer nails or fasteners that go deeper into the lumber will pop more than shorter due to the ratio of shrinkage changing from low at center to more at surface on all sides. Pop happens cause the tip stays put and the surface to tip area shrinks. the longer the fastener the more this happens.
great dance moves at 2:15 lol
Thanks Marc!! This was really helpful! I have been meaning to post a question to the Woodtalk podcast in regard to this topic. Wood movement of solid wood intimidates me and causes me to use veneer plywood for my projects along with some solid wood. The estimator link accounts for grain orientation in the movement of the wood but what would be a good resource for taking grain orientation into consideration when it comes to building furniture projects? Thanks for what you do! Tell Nicole hi...I'm from Spfd. MO
I have had much luck bending back lightly warped and twisted wood by over bending, clamping and heating a few days.
On/over a large wood stove. The sun might take much longer. And it will move given time.