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Ecnerwal[_3_]

In article , (JJ)
wrote:

For 8ft long lumber, how many supports should one use when air drying?

I bought a dozen 2x12 x 8ft boards at the local big box store.
Geez talk about mediocre wood. Most were pretty damp and I am hoping
it was because they got rained on.

I "borrowed" the lath strips that got exposed as I picked through the
pile. I have eight strips that run almost the full width and laid
those down on the garage floor - a bit over a foot apart.

I'm thinking I will sacrifice some free yard sticks and add those to
the pile.

For 1-inch (real 1 inch, not 3/4 inch planed) 2 feet will do. 3 feet is
fine for 2 inch. So 2 at the ends and two even spaced in the middle will
be fine for stickering an 8-foot long pile of 1-1/2 inch planed. What
you need and probably don't have is sufficient weight on the top of the
stack to pin it in place on each of those 4 points. You can either use
actual weight, or you can drop anchors in a concrete slab and use
threaded rod to wind down on crosspieces.

The bottom sticker (term for the crossways piece of separating wood)
holding it up off the concrete floor should be fairly large, or the damp
from the concrete floor affects things too much - 2x4 on edge or 4x4 to
allow good air circulation under the stack. A regular sticker (3/4x1
inch or so - set on the 3/4 face) goes on top so that you don't have the
wide top of that on the board. Lath and yardstick are better than
nothing, but really too thin even for between the boards stickers, which
should be about an inch thick.

Best bet - go find the nearest real lumberyard that's still in business,
and return the crap to the box store - all the box stores sell is crap
lumber. While the lumber at the real lumberyards is nothing like it was
30 years ago, it's a heck of a lot better than box store lumber.

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