Wood storage in the shop.

[woodturner]

In the past though, I will say that I have brought a piece in to my air conditioned house for 3 weeks to acclimate and then brought it back into the shop to saw up into project pieces. At the end of the day, I brought everything back into the house. I did this because the piece was intended for indoor use in my own home. Maybe a little extreme.

I don't think that is extreme at all. It's tough to do precision woodworking when the moisture content of the wood is changing. If one has access to the final location for the project, acclimating the wood to the ambient humidity in that location is best. For example, wood flooring manufacturers recommend leaving the wood flooring in the room where it will be installed for a few days before installation. They also recommend opening the packages and spreading out the pieces, since the wood won't exchange much moisture with the air when it is stacked.

For storage, though, stacking maintains a more consistent moisture content. Once wood absorbs moisture, it can be difficult to dry it back to a lower moisture content. Thus, the process is to stack the KD dry so that the moisture content remains in the range it was when it was dried. Then, when one is ready to use it for a project, the wood is acclimated to the shop or the project location and allowed to absorb the humidity from that area.

The standards I was looking at will attach to my cmu wall with 3/16" tapcons. I figure they should hold quite a bit.

If you are concerned, tables showing the force required to extract and shear the fastener are available. If you have 4 fasteners for example, and each fastener resists 300 lbf, you can apply close to 1200 lbs of pull out pressure before they will fail, in theory.

The concern is that lumber is heavy, more so that people often really appreciate. It doesn't take that much lumber to get a ton of weight. If the lumber is on shelf bracket type supports, the leverage of the bracket effectively increases the force. Thus, the forces can be a lot higher than seems intuitive.

If one is only storing a hundred board feet or two, probably not a significnt issue either way. If one is storing more than a few hundred board feet, though, I would suggest at least checking the forces to make sure the design limits of the wall are not exceeded, particularly since walls are not usually designed to resist much lateral stress.

[cabinetman]

If you think that, please post your research. I'm sure we would all be interested in hearing your explanation for how the researchers and experts got it wrong.

Your learning process is reading what is called experimentation. My opinions are from doing the work and finding out what works best for my environment and uses. Now you're saying there is a "right" or "wrong". If you think your procedures are right...that's your prerogative.
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[woodturner]

Your learning process is reading what is called experimentation. My opinions are from doing the work and finding out what works best for my environment and uses.
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Actually, the research is from carefully controlled experimentation, the basis for all scientific research.

Never said your way wasn't working for you. As you suggested, maybe you have gotten lucky. However, the experience of one person in one situation cannot be legitimately extrapolated to be applied broadly, its anecdotal experience.

It would be a little like me saying that since most people's experience is different from yours, you are "wrong". That's just not the case. If it works for you in your shop, it doesn't really matter that most others have different experiences or the science conflicts with your experience.

I am absolutely NOT saying anyone is "right" or "wrong". The science and research simply observes and determines objective fact. Each person is welcome to consider those facts or not, or act in accordance or opposition to those facts, as they see fit. Last time I checked, it was still a free country.

You essentially said the research was in error, so I asked you to support that statement. Your posts make it clear that you think the research and the experts are in error, I just wondered what was your basis for those conclusions. It's OK that your opinion differs from the research, I just thought you had a basis other than opinion. No need to get all insecure about it, it's fine, really.

[cabinetman]

Actually, the research is from carefully controlled experimentation, the basis for all scientific research.

Never said your way wasn't working for you. As you suggested, maybe you have gotten luck. However, the experience of one person in one situation cannot be legitimately extrapolated to be applied broadly, its just anecdotal experience.

It would be a little like me saying that since most people's experience is different from yours, you are "wrong". That's just not the case. If it works for you in your shop, it doesn't really matter that most others have different experiences or the science conflicts with your experience.

I am absolutely NOT saying anyone is "right" or "wrong". The science and research simply observes and determines objective fact. Each person is welcome to consider those facts or not, or act in accordance or opposition to those facts, as they see fit. Last time I checked, it was still a free country.

You essentially said the research was in error, so I asked you to support that statement. Your posts make it clear that you think the research and the experts are in error, I just wondered what was your basis for those conclusions. It's OK that your opinion differs from the research, I just thought you had a basis other than opinion. No need to get all insecure about it, it's fine, really.

I'm all for discussing procedures and techniques, but it seems you have an agenda beyond this discussion.
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[pelligrini]

So how does dead stacking work on shelf mounted storage systems? Unless the boards are narrow or the shelves are unusually deep they're usually only stacked 1 or 2 deep. In this configuration a side of all the boards are exposed as well as a side and face of the top & bottom boards. A lot of the material I get is RS and have uneven sides there will be a lot of air movement in between those boards too. For this dead stacking method to work I guess the boards need to be dressed as well.

My reason for stickering is to let the material have even exposure from all sides. I am under the assumption that a board would have greater chance of movement when only one side is more exposed to humidity changes than the others.

I am also going on the premise that if a board is going to move, twist, cup & warp I would much rather have it do it before I take it off the rack to begin working with it. I don't really need to acclimate a board to my shop as the storage and the shop conditions are the same. I've never really bothered with acclimating material in the project location as I don't exactly work quickly and I don't want to move material back and forth all the time.

[cabinetman]

So how does dead stacking work on shelf mounted storage systems? Unless the boards are narrow or the shelves are unusually deep they're usually only stacked 1 or 2 deep. In this configuration a side of all the boards are exposed as well as a side and face of the top & bottom boards. A lot of the material I get is RS and have uneven sides there will be a lot of air movement in between those boards too. For this dead stacking method to work I guess the boards need to be dressed as well.

My reason for stickering is to let the material have even exposure from all sides. I am under the assumption that a board would have greater chance of movement when only one side is more exposed to humidity changes than the others.

That's the premise that some don't understand. Even with lumber that's dressed to the same width, the edges are exposed.
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[woodturner]

So how does dead stacking work on shelf mounted storage systems? Unless the boards are narrow or the shelves are unusually deep they're usually only stacked 1 or 2 deep.

That's a good point. If one is only stacking a board or two deep, stickering vs stacking probably makes little difference.

That might also account for the range of opinions we are seeing - we are all viewing it from a somewhat different perspective. I was thinking of storing larger quantities of lumber, a few thousand board feet. Sticker or stack that on a wall mounted rack and there are likely to be problems. A lot of hobbyists probably only store wood for a project or two, much smaller quantities, where both the structural concerns and the method of storage are probably non-issues.

I store my lumber dead-stacked on a concrete floor in the shop. I do put plastic down on the concrete and then 2x4s above that to keep the lumber from absorbing moisture from the concrete floor. The biggest problem with this mode of storage is access - it's hard to select "the best board" when you have to shift 1000 board of lumber to find it.

[pelligrini]

That's the premise that some don't understand. Even with lumber that's dressed to the same width, the edges are exposed.
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I understand and mostly agree, but I do think that if a bunch of lumber is dressed and tightly stacked there would be reduced humidity changes for the boards that don't have fully exposed edges and faces. It won't be zero as we're talking about airborne water molecules, but I would assume that it would be far, far less change than a stickerd stack.

Most of the stuff I've read over the last couple days while researching some of the topics in this discussion were mainly concerned about drying, not longer term storage. One or two articles had a small amount of info on storage, and briefly mentioned stacking and that the boards exposed to open air on the stacks will be more prone to changes. There was hardly any details in them though.

[cabinetman]

I understand and mostly agree, but I do think that if a bunch of lumber is dressed and tightly stacked there would be reduced humidity changes for the boards that don't have fully exposed edges and faces. It won't be zero as we're talking about airborne water molecules, but I would assume that it would be far, far less change than a stickerd stack.

In that scenario the center of the stock would have less exposure and the edges would have more. Doesn't sound good to me.
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[woodturner]

Most of the stuff I've read over the last couple days while researching some of the topics in this discussion were mainly concerned about drying, not longer term storage. One or two articles had a small amount of info on storage, and briefly mentioned stacking and that the boards exposed to open air on the stacks will be more prone to changes. There was hardly any details in them though.

The Hoadley book covers this in detail and is an interesting read as well (or at least I found it interesting )

When drying wood, in a kiln or air dried, the wood is stickered to facilitate air movement and faster drying. Once it achieves the desired moisture content, stacking it limits exposure to the edges and ends. The ends are usually sealed to prevent checking and thus don't exchange much moisture. Only the edges of the outside boards are exposed, so other than 1/4" or so in from those edges, it has essentially no effect.

Perhaps the greater issue is making sure the moisture content is consistent when the wood is used. Stacking in storage helps, but there is no real substitute for acclimating the wood before using it and during the project.

[Bruce Cohen]

I only sticker my "Good" (expensive) wood. Stuff like poplar and Pine (OMG) doesn't get the "Royal Treatment".

And we won't even get into plywood and MDF.

Bruce

[gsmittle]

Can we all agree to disagree?

FWIW I sticker the good stuff, and I figure the pine will warp anyway, so why bother?

g.