The important difference between air-dried and kiln-dried lumber
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feel better. I deleted it ?
don't worry about responding.
@@tbac2432 - Dude, you can't tell people to "settle down" when they don't get your joke, then get all offended when someone makes a little joke in return. You're taking this stuff WAY to seriously!
hahaha...not...:) if I could give you 3 face palm emojis I would. lol
How does ridge carbide compare to forest blades like the woodworker 2 and chop master. I use the forest and love them. They are in the same price range and the factory is local to me which is great for sharpening service.
Hey stumpy nubs, i realise this is a late response to your video, sorry.
I just purchased my first saw mill in february 2022, I intend to build a lot, a mill house, a solar kiln, a shop/barn and ultimately a house. Furniture may follow. What i need now is guideance, there used to be a book published for (or by) the DNR/US forestry department, the information inside was most valuable to a sawyer, pertaining to how to build a kiln, wood species, optimal cuts, kiln times, calculating board foot, how to charge for lumber, Etc. Etc..
When i asked my local DNR forestry office about this book, the reaction was less than helpful. Being told to just google or you tube search the info I may need when needed was not the favoured response I was hoping for. Despite living in northern MN, the information is scarce and those who have the information are afraid to loose business or their job (insert underlying condition of a union mentality)
In short, I have little help or guidance after cutting a tree down. If you know of such a book or web page and are willing to point me in that direction I'd be most grateful. Thank you. Don
"We can make a whole video about acclimating lumber before you use it" Please do. Would love to watch it.
Azuban Kull agreed! I’m looking to start the process of mfg my own lumber.
@@artiet5982 It's a lot of work and any logs smaller than 14" diameter will only yield junk. Be very precise in your stacking and throw a lot of extra weight on top or half your boards will be so badly warped as to be unusable. The process isn't very complicated. Green wood stinks. If you store it in your attached garage, the smell will invade your house. Still, the summer I spent sawing wood on my friend's mill saved me a lot of money (I still have some planks a decade later!) and having furniture that I took from tree to finished product is very satisfying, so go for it.
Agreed! That's the perfect video idea.
Did this ever happen?
@@michaelgavin7621 Don't think so
Thanks James! You're doing a great job producing useful content . I, for one, really appreciate what you do!!
Just now came across this video. Some good information. Only thing I would add to this would be that, most hardwoods that you'll work with that are dried properly are first cut and air dried for a period of time. Walnut, we cut and stack for up to 18 months to air dry before kiln drying. Oaks, Chestnuts, Cherry, Maple etc are generally air dried for 12 months or so. The target to get them to is < 20% MC before putting them into a kiln. This reduces the instances of case hardening, spider-webbing and allows us to cull out materials that would be a waste of time and money to put into a kiln. Walnut is a special instance in that, air drying allows the tannins to leach out into the sapwood thus converting more of the wood into the darker material that is prized. However, the best method to do this is to steam the walnut first. This process will help convert a much larger percentage of the sapwood to the darker heart wood as well as make the heart wood a much deeper, more chocolaty color rather than its natural brown & purple coloration.
Come for the name, stay for the great lines like "One of the many concepts invented to make woodworking more confusing, like board feet and pre-drilling."
Hi James I don’t really comment on videos much at all, but I felt compelled to give a big thanks for all the great content you guys produce. I’ve been a follower and fan for quite sometime and it’s great informative videos similar to this one that keep me clicking for more. I love the science and logic behind all it is I do and Stumpy Nubs never disappoints! Keep it coming man and thanks so much for what you guys do
"...one of the many concepts invented to make woodworking more confusing - like board feet and pre-drilling." 😂
Depends on where you live. The humidity is low enough where I live we easily get the wood to 8% per inch in less than one year. I have a whole barn full of many different species of wood that I have been using in furniture for decades with no issues.
Lucky you, lol. Humidity around where I live is usually a low of 70%; the past few days it's been 90%+
@@stevebengel1346 yeah same, I made a segmented bowl for my grandparents who live in about 20-30% humidity and the next time I visited them it was full of cracks
Low humidity areas likely have way less available native wood suitable for furniture building.
I use aired dried wood for several projects. I resaw firewood logs, usually various types of oak. I stack them properly and cover with pavers for weight. I paint the ends and write the date on the edge once the paint is dry. Boards are cut to 5/4, quarter sawn when possible and 12 to 18 inches long. I let dry 1 year per inch of width then bring into the garage where they might sit for another 6 months to a year before I decide what I will make.
They may bow and twist a bit but that’s why I cut them to 5/4 to end up planed down to 3/4 or 1/2. I made a jig that I use to take care of the bows and twist on my thickness planer (no $$ or space for a jointer). I make make some beautiful boxes and other small projects, usually to give away.
Steaming walnut is what changes the color not the kiln process.
Another good video on your behalf thank you. So here is a good question - How much moisture is kiln dried wood going to reabsorb in an area like where we live in Florida where we are very often in high humidity?
Haven't noticed much change here in NC, but admittedly we have less humidity year round than FL.
I think the important thing is to let the lumber acclimate for a few weeks - no matter where it comes from.
Even then I always let in stabilize for a few days after re-sawing or any major operation before assembly, both for stress relief if any and if it might have been case hardened.
As described in "Understanding Wood" by R. Bruce Hoadley the water content of wood -- even kiln dried -- will continue to follow the relative humidity of the environment in which it is stored (I'm REALLY paraphrasing here). Basically, take a snapshot of the graph James displayed; wood will vary in moisture content at a rate similar to that graph. I say similar because absorption rates vary by species: something you can go and look up if you need more accurate specifics.
Air dried lumber, works better for acoustic musical instruments. If you use kiln dried, the artificial heating literally changes the woods tonal structure. II think you were a bit high on the air dried at 15%, closer to 12%. You're also using thicker boards, then I do.
Love your channel, have learned a lot, many thanks.
Uk outside drying gets you no lower than 18-20%. I’ve 14 year old Cherry which is shed dried to 11%. Wood will only dry externally to your local emc value.
Hi James, I've always known about moisture %s but know I understand moisture %s. Cheers, Huw
35% RH bwahahahaha ... I forget you don’t live in the South !
Great topic that is well explained 👍
As I said, that's inside a climate-controlled house. You have dehumidifiers in the south, don't you?
Stumpy Nubs not normally, the AC takes out what it can. It’s 75 in my house with 55% at the moment. That’s great and won’t go much/any lower until heating season when it drops to 20ish percent.
@@StumpyNubs Here in Atlanta...might get down to 35%...in the dead of a dry winter... ;-) We often see humidity levels in the 80-95% range, spring through end of summer. Is like breathing hot soup.
@asbrand - I don't live in the south, but we can get pretty humid in Michigan on occasion. However, inside climate controlled houses with air conditioning the humidity level is much lower.
This is a great topic for me because I just cut a walnut tree into 2" slabs hoping to make a table for my family. It's set up and stickered under my shed for a long time I suppose. Living in South AR where humidity is sky high, what's a range of moisture I can live with since I know it will never get down to 8%?? Thanks guys for the help!
Could you recommend a good book or video on the proper steps to go from freshly cut log with bark on it all the way to air dried lumber ready to be used in a project?
I would like to see that also
There is a book I have been meaning to read called "Norwegian Wood: Chopping, Stacking, and Drying Wood the Scandinavian Way" by Lars Mytting. Don't know how that would relate to air or kiln drying. Thank you for the continued education James.
Great video as always, James. thank you!
in a future tools video could you discuss moisture meters? I have seen others discuss the topic and would love to hear your thoughts. I searched and didn't see one on your channel, but if I missed it, just point me to it and I will be on my way.
thanks again.
And note: you CAN absolutely build furniture from undried, green wood. That's how a lot of very durable furniture was made in the past. The difference is that the methods and preparation are almost entirely different, and when you're selecting stock it's much easier if you actually pick the tree itself. A straight oak growing on flat, dry ground, split into wedges will move very little. The same tree planted on a hill has a tremendous amount of tension in it working to keep the trunk from falling downhill, and that will warp the board even after drying.
Look up the work of Peter Follansbee and Jennie Alexander for more.
As a nuclear engineer woodworker, this video scratches an itch I didn’t know I had. Thanks!
So you moonlight as a nuclear engineer? ;)
I have not done well with air-dried but I also hate to leave what I think might be a useable piece of wood on the ground. I use my air-dried for craft and/or toy projects. Furniture or construction... kiln dried.
Fantastic information !!! I love your videos and your "to the point " quality. Thanks for respecting your audience's time by not dragging out your talking points. I think most presenters would have taken an hour to cover the same material. Forever a fan of your channel.
You're kiln me, Smalls! I'll see myself out and get some fresh air now.... 😇😎😀
You should be air dry by now 😁
This is weird.
We used to travel a fair shake to buy air dried pine for furniture. Specifically because it was air dried.
Hardwood air dries nicely, too. I’ve built furniture from trees I cut myself and air dried for a year. Red birch, black cherry, sugar maple. Seems red oak is not generally available sawed from air dried stock around here.
Air dried lumber generally doesn’t have internal tension from drying.
Not against KD but just saying
Hi James, I love your videos and am consuming them at a prodigious rate. But, sorry, I'm gonna be THAT guy.... Hysteresis - hiss-ter-EE-sis. (Yeah, I'm an engineer.) Okay, I'm all better now, carry on. Seriously, though, thank you for what you're doing; you've educated me and entertained me beyond measure!
I’ve been air drying lumber in my mechanical room in the basement. I seal the ends with outdoor duct tape and write the date and species on both ends. I use them for knife scales so I don’t need large pieces. Most of them are 16” in length because that’s the bar size on my chainsaw 😊.
This video is so fantastic!!! I’ve spent forever looking for a video that goes over “drying theory” and you nailed sooooo many of my questions 👍 thanks!
Do you really have around 30% rel. humidity in house when people are writing about 60-90% average humidity outside? Is this related to a lot of American houses have air conditioning? And do you really like to live at 30%? This would be way too dry for me to feel comfortable.
In Germany, we rather talk about 50-60% indoor humidity, which is also teached (to my knowledge) when it comes to wood working. This means we rather use wood at 10-12%. Kiln dried wood should be settled a few days/weeks in the shop to rise the humidity in the wood again ;) Whereas air-dried wood needs to dry in the shop. A lot of waiting here :D
QUESTION
I have "apparently" 2 years dried, 50mm thick beech, with 20 % moisture, which was outside for awhile and looks that have more moisture
i mean originally more
So i have some stupid idea to dry few boards with torch
Not burning them japanese style,
but evenly try to get moisture out
So my question is
Did anyone tried that
What kind results had
Is it even possible
Thanks
Please do more vids on drying your own lumber PLEASE
I use air dried lumber almost exclusively. I've been told the whole story that it never gets as dry as kiln dried. The wood will acclimate to it's environment, after a few months in shop conditions they will both have the same moisture content. I have invited nay sayers out to my shop to test this. everything in my shop was at 8%. I'm a classical guitar builder and this sort of thing is critical. I have found the most stable wood is air dried, you just need to plan ahead a little more.
Colorado humidity is between 30-42% with an annual average of 33% which is in line with the graph in this video. I’m on that Hisao Hanafusa train.
Does anyone here like to work with Bo'darc wood? I have a lot of it here in my part of Texas but its always checking and splitting during dry process...and its a booger to cut down alive.
If you have the space you can often get fresh sawn domestic woods from local sawmills fairly inexpensive, stacking it and letting it dry can save you a lot of money.
One of my older brothers has a supplier that charges a dollar a board foot no mater the species and he rounds down, I was helping my brother with a project and the sawmill owner sold boards that were about 10 feet long as if they were 8 foot long.
I'm the expert woodworker in my family and my brother was disappointed when I told him he really ought to wait at least a year before making a bench top out of the 8/4 hickory he just picked up that had been milled less than a week before.
I ALMOST BUST A NUT AT ALL THOSE TOOLS BEHIND YOU....AS A HOME DEPOT WARRIOR THAT IS...……...EMOTIONALLY BEAUTIFUL!!!!
What about ensuring the wood doesn't have any bugs? What would make it safe?
But, how do you measure the moisture content of wood? I mean, I know there is a gizmo I can buy that will give me a number, but I need to know how it works (and how I could mess up the measurement) before I can trust the number.
I used to work with an old timer that would say "Kill-dried? Yeah, killed in Arkansas and dried on I-55!"
wait .... what????? i dont want to live in a world that doesnt have trees with 200% water content ... :( ... isnt modern furniture, modern on the day its made????? :)
Enjoy your videos. You right about drying times, I cut some chestnut up that was on the ground for 10 months. Took almost five years in a unheated building to get it almost dry enough to use. I finally put it in my motorcycle trailer and heated it with a fan blowing thru to get it dry enough to build a rool top desk. Here in N.C. in my area the wood in our home test 10%. Keep up the great work.
What can't I just hammer two nails into a board of wood to use as electrodes, then attach a simple ten dollar voltmeter, take readings of resistance, voltage, whatever, and then extrapolate from that, what sort of moisture level is present?
How do you moisturize kiln dryer wood to use (12 to 15 percent ) old fashioned hand tool it or semi green tiller a bow....
I love your videos, :) I would love to see a video about how to properly air dry lumber, I imagine many of your viewers are amateurs like me, and many of us cannot afford to buy kiln dried wood especially since we don't make things for profit but out of passion. I am passionate about woodturning especially, and it can be very frustrating to spend time and money on a piece that will crack because of inadequate understanding about moisture content and drying speed ..
stringmanipulator Whenever we air dry larger slabs or wood boards, I put plastic over over the ends. It’s amazing how much that has cut down twisting/bowing/splitting. Moisture escapes out of the end grain way faster than the other sections of the board. By slowing it down, we’ve eliminated many of our air-drying related problems.
"Understanding Wood" 2000. It seems like I have been buying and giving away copies of that book since before 2000.
Yup. Brilliant resource.
i know im a little snarky but i enjoy your content , keep up the good work :)
Those numbers might great for up north bur here I Florida it's a whole different Ball Game. The relative humidity here indoors
can be over 60% even with A/C. If we can find lumber with any level below 20% we are in hog heaven.
You can find them. Just buy a dehumidifier.
Same in the Carolinas, Dave except we get a little break in winter.
Can you imagine emptying a dehumidifier every 5 minutes... I'd need 10 of them for my average sized house and a second mortgage to pay the electric bill LOL
first time on this channel and I thought you had guns behind you🤣🤣🤣
The title picture for this video had to be taken at Lowes home of the straight board that warps when you get it home.
Any thoughts on a solar kiln? I am about to build one and try it out on some pine I milked off my land that has been air drying for about 10 months now.
They can be very effective if you do it right. There are whole forums about it online.
I hear what you are saying... I'll go tell my wife that I need to put some drying racks in our living room.
i haven’t engaged in any woodworking since i was in high school but this is fascinating
That is an impressive tool storage area. I am sure that is only a small part of it.
If i saw mill my own wood can i just burn it burnt wood technique
Thanks for the very useful information.
It's pronounced "hisster-eesiss." Not histera-sieze.
Jokes on you, Stumpy! I do dry my lumber in my living room!
Does it make a difference if the wood is planed while drying
I live in Colorado. Can we call that "Arid Dried"?
Board feet and pre drilling lol fricken hilarious
If you have bugs migrating around your shop like dam dude wth... is that really a thing...c’mon really?
You don't think there are folks who work in garages and sheds? "c'mon really?"
Thanks James! Great information .
Wait, you don't air dry lumber in your living room?
This is a major help, thank you!
Inexperienced woodworker here, especially with wood. I live in Michigan. 78 pct relative humidity lately. I bought 5/4 cherry wood that had been air dried in a non-climate controlled cabin for 6+ years. The wood measured 12% moisture content. I brought it to my garage and stacked it. I have an electric heater that I set to 40 degrees while I’m working. 4-6 hours on the weekends. I milled a board with a planer to make a keepsake box (10” x 5” x 3” with the top and sides 5/16”) for my granddaughter. I did all the cutting, planing, etc work in my garage, but glue required 50+ degree temp so I brought the wood in and let it sit for a day inside then glued the pieces together. A day later I applied Odie’s Oil. The next morning I noticed the top of the box had curled. I think I should have let the wood acclimate longer to the indoor humidity Level (33%)? Or, the piece of wood might have been too thin? Any suggestions on what could I have done differently? I have a feeling the top would curl up in the house no matter how long I let it acclimate. I can’t store the wood inside before making projects
I wondered why walnut turns purple sometimes. Now I know! We used to cut all kinds of stuff from fallen trees in the parks where I worked, and most of the time it would get all kinds of cracks, poplar in particular.
Air drying is an ancient art, thankfully it's not a lost art. where I live, kiln dried lumber is very hard to find, 90% of the lumber we can buy is S-Dry. That means we HAVE to air dry our wood. I dry mine old school, ends painted, standing. It sits in my non-climate controlled barn for at least a year, until it hits the 12% range. Then, I move it to my climate controlled garage until it reaches less than 8%. As Stumpy said, KD lumber can be rather brittle, and I've found that very often when you cut a tenon, or dimension KD lumber, it will warp and twist and split and spall like you would not believe. For now, I am completely happy with Air Dry lumber. But, if I can get good KD, it saves time, though not expense. I have yet to figure out how to assess KD Lumber to buy only properly stress relieved KD, seems like it might be the sound when bounced on one end that is the key. Would love to find out if anyone has figured this one out.
The graph was interesting, especially at levels of 40-60% humidity.
I live in NE Ohio, and my dehumidifier never stops in the summer (trying to keep humidity near 60%). But now (Feb) it’s 40%. I care about that, because the 3 oak trees that I sawed and stacked in the basement (in 2008) are stuck at 10% moisture content. I gave up waiting to reach 8%. But the graph seems to show that an indoor humidity of 40-50% is consistent with an EMC of 10% or a bit more.
Very informative.. I’m thinking about converting an old greenhouse I have into a drying shed..
Suggestions on drying olive wood?
Thanks for the helpful advice. Starting my first wood working project.
Store lumber from warping
Great info. Thanks. I’m in florida. I’m wondering if air drying works here. Outdoor RH is rarely below 80% all year. But indoor I only get RH so perhaps I don’t need to dry as much? Maybe 12% could work?
Hi can u recommend a good moisture meter?
I am a cabinet/furniture maker for the last 7 years. Also I've been an arborist for the last 5 years. I use both kiln and are dried that I cut. 1. Kiln dried is way easier to Mill. 2. I cut apricot, mountain ash, silver maple, oak, elm , black walnut and more from where I live in Missoula Mt.I sometimes get amazing figured grain patterns from what I cut, and alot of time not. Compared to what I buy from the local lumber supply my wood definitely has a unique look but, it is a pain to Mill. it's super cool looking. I'll cut vaneer and vac bag it to mdf or 4 square kiln dried hardwood. Haven't had a failure yet. Love the videos. Thanks
Is acclimating lumber a good practice? And if I keep my lumber in my garage in Phoenix too long (how long is too long?), will it become too brittle? So, I shouldn't stock lumber? I just started this... Hobby? Anyway, I've noticed that some of the lumber I get from my box store is heavier that other cuts of the same dimension and feel cool to the touch. I assume those are higher moisture content. I've also discovered that boards I bought a few weeks ago, now feel lighter and none of them seem to be bent or twisted at all. Is drying a straightening process, too? Or, is it just as likely to twist while sitting in my garage?
I'm doing Wood technology at Nelson Mandela University and this video was informative 😊😊
Unless you live in arizona where the RH is 5% (except monsoon season), I air dry all my mesquite. Typically 11 months for a 6/4 cut, 9 months for a 5/4 cut. I will admit though, it doesn't kill off the boring worms often found in the sap wood areas. But thats OK because I like the trails they leave behind when filled with black epoxy. Great video though.
Hey, all the videos I’ve watched. You’re a straight shooter…..! Thank you sir.
I have a dehumided basement that has been drying some rounds and small logs up to 8 inch diameter and 24 inches long. The wood is black Walnut from a tree I cut down a year and a half ago. I guess my question is how good of an environment is this for drying. Will the wood reach 6-8 percent? Are all the moisture checkers the same?
How can you know at what temp and how fast and slow you should dry the wood in a kiln.
I'm getting my kiln slowly up to 150f, and a week to week in a half it is usually dry. But I get a lot of wrapped boards
Great info. We run a Woodmizer. I learned several things watching your video.
i don't have anything useful to say i'm just adding a comment because i trust that the algorithm will note that before it notes that my comment was silly and not particularly relevant. if this kind of comment isn't helpful, well, I suppose you can delete it. i did buy a ridge carbide blade off your plywood recommendation and it worked like a song, so cheers and thanks!
so we can use the lumbers that are under 8%. I usually buy lumbers from HD and cut it in proper size that I need and then I bring em to my living room or office to make em dry enough for my projects. right thing to do?
This is a very good video, but I had to close my eyes to hear what you were saying. All those tools were to distractiong.
3:50 phenomenon called what?
I have aired dried my milled oak in mesquite outside. It does well in my environment (southern Arizona). 🤣🤣🤣
I’m interested in building solar kiln. New territory to me so I know I got a lot of research to do, but any recommendations on reputable resources? Forums have given me a good dozen different opinions on best methods. Thanks for all the videos!
im forced to work in an effective outdoor environment - little protection from atmospheric temperature and moisture changes. Does anyone have recommendations how to bring a finished piece of furniture into the house to minimise bend/warp/crack?
U forgot about us wood carvers where me myself personally would chose Air dried everytime. Love your channel keep on keeping on
Very well done, easy to understand lesson.
I would like you to do more on this subject for us folks that mill and dry our own lumber.
Discussion of recommended methods to check the m.c. would be great as well.
Many thanks from Oregon!
Stumpy Nubs is just another level in the Woodworking community 💯🔥
Very useful information. Thanks much. Clicked "thumbs up" to crush a troll.
I have a couple of black walnut trees and a pecan tree on my property that are dropping some branches. I'd like to keep some of the wood for small projects. Will see how air drying works out.
Master Nubs, you may have done this before but I am going to ask anyway. Have you done a video on hand planers, different brand models and tasks they perform. This would be very valuable for anyone starting woodworking.
Decades ago I bought myself a dehumidifier and cabinet. It worked really well except I got lovely lines of woodworm along side the stickers. After that I used a greenhouse fumigater bomb to prevent a recurrence. When I had the space after that I just air dried my timber. To avoid splits when drying the evaporation of moisture off the wood surface must be no faster than the rate of moisture loss across the inside of the timber Here in England it was just a matter of stacking the timber in a barn for a year or more, followed by bringing it into the workshop or the house to acclimatise.
Great video, again learned a lot, thank you so much
what % moisture content would be ideal for interior framing. For example, interior bedroom walls.
o/ Air Dried. Kiln Dried. ' Depot left it outside, so it's still all bowed to me. o/ :)
wow.. from now on i will call you mr. wood google hehe you help us a lot, ppl should watch your video before they do something with wood ..
thanks for making this channel
Good info, and I love my Ridge Carbide rip blade, thank you for the advice on that long ago.
My furniture never moves whether I use air dried or kiln dried! The six inch nails see to that!!?? 😁