Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

Only toss "most" of them--just in case! ; )

On 7/2/2016 8:59 PM, sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?


If they are oak, maple, walnut, or cherry, they go into the smoker.
I keep a few pieces that small, but not many.

sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

I have a wooden box (about 18" cube) where I keep my cutoffs. If they
are less than 1 ft. long OR if the box is full they get trashed. It
is handy to have something to confirm the height of a router bit or
the size of a drilled hole for it's intended purpose, etc. But enough
is enough.

--
GW Ross

All the world's a stage and we're not
even making scale.

On Sun, 3 Jul 2016 01:21:35 -0400, "G. Ross"
wrote:

sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

Do you use small pieces (for spacers, or whatever)?

I have a wooden box (about 18" cube) where I keep my cutoffs. If they
are less than 1 ft. long OR if the box is full they get trashed. It
is handy to have something to confirm the height of a router bit or
the size of a drilled hole for it's intended purpose, etc. But enough
is enough.

That's a good solution. If they're in the box for any period of time,
you probably don't use that sort of cut off. It's sort of the "clean
house" mentality - If something hasn't been used in a couple of years,
pitch it.
s

On 7/3/2016 7:55 AM, wrote:
On Sun, 3 Jul 2016 01:21:35 -0400, "G. Ross"
wrote:

sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

Do you use small pieces (for spacers, or whatever)?

I have a wooden box (about 18" cube) where I keep my cutoffs. If they
are less than 1 ft. long OR if the box is full they get trashed. It
is handy to have something to confirm the height of a router bit or
the size of a drilled hole for it's intended purpose, etc. But enough
is enough.

That's a good solution. If they're in the box for any period of time,
you probably don't use that sort of cut off. It's sort of the "clean
house" mentality - If something hasn't been used in a couple of years,
pitch it.
s

And the next day realize that that piece you tossed is just
what you suddenly need.

Bill

sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8.
Should I toss em?

No. You should glue them together to make bigger pieces. Keep at it and
you'll eventually have a really BIG piece. Use that to make something but
save the offcuts and start over

On 7/3/16 8:17 AM, dadiOH wrote:
sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8.
Should I toss em?

No. You should glue them together to make bigger pieces. Keep at it and
you'll eventually have a really BIG piece. Use that to make something but
save the offcuts and start over



Cutting/bread boards. Always a popular gift. Each year I dig through my
4 33-gallon trash cans of cutoffs (stuff that is over 8" or so in length
and/or long and skinny, useful for face frames) and I cull out maybe 50%
for the wood stove and cutting boards.

All smaller pieces get tossed into a large drum for heating during the
winter.

Basically I feel if I paid for it, I'll use it one way or another...

-BR

On Sun, 03 Jul 2016 00:59:53 GMT
sawdustmaker wrote:

8. Should I toss em?

what is the first thought that comes to mind when you look at the cutoffs

answer that and you have your answer

On 02/07/2016 6:59 PM, sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

I'm faced with that now as I'm trying to downsize. However, it is a
variant of Murphy's Law that if you throw out odd pieces, one of them
would have been useful the following week.
A few years ago I built a mobile stand/cabinet for my turning tools with
"holes" for drawers to hold chucks and odd tools. I thought that I had
all sorts of Baltic plywood in the garage until I looked. Then I
remembered that a few months before, I had chucked out all that "scrap".
Graham

On 7/2/2016 7:59 PM, sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?


Plain and simple, keep until it becomes an obstacle.

Leon wrote:
On 7/2/2016 7:59 PM, sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8.
Should
I toss em?


Plain and simple, keep until it becomes an obstacle.

....or until you need kindling wood.

--
-Mike-

On Sunday, July 3, 2016 at 11:42:38 AM UTC-5, Leon wrote:


Plain and simple, keep until it becomes an obstacle.

Obstacles? I've dug through my caches, among the obstacles, there, to get to better scraps, for the pieces I wanted. My shop has a few tools that can be described as obstacles, at times.

I toss unused/scrap pieces onto the lumber racks, to the point that, smaller pieces eventually fall through the greater pieces, onto lower sections. Those fallen pieces become a pain to deal with, sometimes. There's a designated scraps area, among the racks, as well.

I have a few caches I deal with: Interior & exterior caches at the main shop, and there are trash cans I load with firewood and, sometimes, end up sifting through that, for something. The older shop is essentially a lumber, prospective/repair projects, misc. stuff, & scraps storage building, these days.

Two years or so ago, Jonas and the boys came over to clean the shop. Tossed out almost everything they considered trash. We bundled it up and posted on Craigslist "free birdhouse/small projects wood".... also a free work bench. Had several takers. The shop's about due for another cleaning.

Sonny

On 7/3/2016 9:02 AM, Bill Gill wrote:

And the next day realize that that piece you tossed is just
what you suddenly need.

Aye, the First Immutable Law of Wooddorking ...

Followed shortly: by One Trip to Hardware Store - Hah!

--
eWoodShop: www.eWoodShop.com
Wood Shop: www.e-WoodShop.net
https://www.google.com/+eWoodShop
https://plus.google.com/+KarlCaillouet/posts
http://www.custommade.com/by/ewoodshop/
https://www.facebook.com/eWoodShop-206166666122228
KarlCaillouet@ (the obvious)

Mike Marlow wrote in
:

Leon wrote:
On 7/2/2016 7:59 PM, sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut
off should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x
8. Should
I toss em?


Plain and simple, keep until it becomes an obstacle.

...or until you need kindling wood.


I have a "fire scraps" bin that gets emptied and burned every so often.
If I need a test piece for something, I just grab it, do whatever it was
(usually drill or plane) and toss it back in.

Now if you have contrasting woods, you can glue them together as turning
blanks. Make sure you use enough clamping pressure, it's important that
the joints be tight. (It wouldn't hurt to joint the edges first.) You
may even get some interesting patterns alternating grain direction of
the same wood. This is not a "someday" use of the wood, either do it or
bin it.

Puckdropper

Swingman wrote in news:nLCdndIfy42wxeTKnZ2dnUU7-
:

On 7/3/2016 9:02 AM, Bill Gill wrote:

And the next day realize that that piece you tossed is just
what you suddenly need.

Aye, the First Immutable Law of Wooddorking ...

Followed shortly: by One Trip to Hardware Store - Hah!


I thought #1 was "measure twice, cut once, go to the store, you read the
tape on the wrong side of the inch mark twice."

I know--story sticks. But sometimes my story sticks tell tall tales.

:-)

Puckdropper

On 03 Jul 2016 18:49:10 GMT, Puckdropper
puckdropper(at)yahoo(dot)com wrote:

Swingman wrote in news:nLCdndIfy42wxeTKnZ2dnUU7-
:

On 7/3/2016 9:02 AM, Bill Gill wrote:

And the next day realize that that piece you tossed is just
what you suddenly need.

Aye, the First Immutable Law of Wooddorking ...

Followed shortly: by One Trip to Hardware Store - Hah!


I thought #1 was "measure twice, cut once, go to the store, you read the
tape on the wrong side of the inch mark twice."

"I cut that board three times and it's *still* too short!" ;-)

I know--story sticks. But sometimes my story sticks tell tall tales.

:-)

It's always the tape or the stick, right?

On Sun, 3 Jul 2016 09:02:49 -0500, Bill Gill
wrote:

On 7/3/2016 7:55 AM, wrote:
On Sun, 3 Jul 2016 01:21:35 -0400, "G. Ross"
wrote:

sawdustmaker wrote:
Help! I have a (wood) shorts problem.
Polling the group to see how small a (normal, non interesting) cut off
should be saved. I have many pieces as small as 3/4 x 4 or 1/2 x 8. Should
I toss em?

Do you use small pieces (for spacers, or whatever)?

I have a wooden box (about 18" cube) where I keep my cutoffs. If they
are less than 1 ft. long OR if the box is full they get trashed. It
is handy to have something to confirm the height of a router bit or
the size of a drilled hole for it's intended purpose, etc. But enough
is enough.

That's a good solution. If they're in the box for any period of time,
you probably don't use that sort of cut off. It's sort of the "clean
house" mentality - If something hasn't been used in a couple of years,
pitch it.
s

And the next day realize that that piece you tossed is just
what you suddenly need.

Oh, sure. OTOH, if you keep everything you probably can't find what
you need (and know you have somewhere), anyway.

On Sunday, July 3, 2016 at 2:49:12 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Swingman wrote in news:nLCdndIfy42wxeTKnZ2dnUU7-
:

On 7/3/2016 9:02 AM, Bill Gill wrote:

And the next day realize that that piece you tossed is just
what you suddenly need.

Aye, the First Immutable Law of Wooddorking ...

Followed shortly: by One Trip to Hardware Store - Hah!


I thought #1 was "measure twice, cut once, go to the store, you read the
tape on the wrong side of the inch mark twice."


Measure with a micrometer
Mark with chalk
Cut with an ax