Jack wrote:
On 10/15/2018 4:37 PM, William Ahern wrote:

I'm a novice. I've been building garage shelving the hard way by
meticulously edge gluing 1"x6"x8' pine boards to practice technique. I'm
preparing to edge glue some 2"x12"x4' douglas fir for heavy-duty rolling
shelves (previous shelves hung on wall brackets). I bought some cheap
dimensional douglas fir that was already sufficiently dry but cupped, unlike
the pine boards which were flat enough. But I lack a planer and am not
particularly interested in buying one. (The point of the shelving is to help
reduce clutter and to get everything off the floor. Adding bulky tools isn't
helping things.) I tried hand planing with a jack-plane but there are too
many knots, and I've decided I don't want to deal with 24' of those (nor pay
for wood that can be easily handtooled, which would be the smart thing).

I'm not a novice and I would not recommend edge gluing cupped 2x12's for
shelving. If you want 22 1/2" shelves, I would recommend plywood. If
you really wish to use 2x lumber, stick with 2x6 or less for the glue
ups. When choosing the lumber, look for quarter sawn or rift cut boards
to reduce/eliminate cupping.

Even if you owned a planer, gluing up flat sawn 2x12's, then planing them
flat, will likely just result in thinner cupped shelves. Wood cups because
of grain direction. Planing it doesn't change that. In fact, flat sawn
lumber can be re-sawn into quarter sawn (the edges of flat sawn is quarter
sawn) then glued up to eliminate warpage. A planer makes this a relatively
easy task.

I knew going in that working with such wide, construction grade boards,
could be problematic. It just seemed more expedient as it theoretically
would require half the set ups and glue ups. (Famous last words.) And I did
try to find good boards. The cupping is minimal on most, and my meter showed
13% moisture IIRC. If the first shelf didn't work well I'm willing to rip
the boards. And in any event I'm willing to learn the hard way. Some cupping
or cracking is tolerable considering they're for garage storage. (Though
maybe the design wouldn't tolerate it well?)

What I'm aiming for is something like this

http://lh6.ggpht.com/-7tYSKktV720/Tf...jpg?imgmax=320

I like the simplicity but which can still carry significant weight across a
long span (for stuff too heavy and bulky to put on the wall shelving), which
is one reason why I'm not going the sensible route of plywood and framing. I
also recently began to notice 2x8" and 2x12" pine boards used for commercial
table tops, including a nice oil finished 8' freestanding lunch counter at a
deli using two ~2.5x12" douglas fir boards. So I figured I'd have a go of
it.

If I had a planer I wouldn't hesitate to use 6" boards. I'd like to have a
planer. I'm just trying to resist buying more tools, especially bulky ones.
If I rip the boards and then flatten them with the router sled I worry I
couldn't repeat the thickness without alot of trial+error, causing headaches
with the edge glue up. After 24' of 1x24" shelving I've only just begun to
figure out how to use cauls properly (after ditching dowels). Maybe that's
just my inexperience making for bad priorities.