Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1885-10-15
WEIGHING WOOD.
The Strength OF Various Kinds Of W0o&-
How to Estimate Lumber.

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The Strength OF Various Kinds Of woo<-
How to Estimate Lumber.
How many people know the weight
of common woods or their hardness?
The hardest of all woods is the she'll
bark hickory; the least hard of woods
for ordinary use is white pine. Next
below hickory comes oak and ash
in hardness. Cedar is not very hard.
Wild cherry comes about halfway be-
tween hickory and white pine. A cord
of hickory weighs over forty-four hum
dred pounds. while cord of white oak
weigh; but little over eighteen hundred
pound. Suppose You are going to
ship lumber On the railroad where they
may charge you so much per hundred
pounds; it is important to know the
weight of the lumber you order. For
every thousand feet of seasoned lumber
in ash you have $3.50 pounds. IN oak
not much more, or 1876 pounds
| Hickory, however hard, does not weigh
when seasoned as much as pitch pine
or even maple. Suppose you build
chimney and want to know the number
of bricks it will take. If your chimney
is sixteen inches square and the f1ue
eight inches square, it will take thirty
bricks for every foot of height in the
chimney The largest timbers required
in house are the stills, and these are
not often larger for ordinary houses
than seven inches by eight. Posts to
correspond may run four inches
by six. the tie-beams run about
four by seven, and the rafters four by
| five. A great many people do not
know how to estimate lumber in any
form. The basis of lumber is called
board measure. Ono foot in board
measure is board one foot long. one
foot high or wide, and one inch thick.
Therefore one thousand feet of lumber
can be imagined to be Il board an inch
thich and foot wide and long. multi
piled by one thousand. Plank measure
is based upon board measure. and a
plank differs from board in being OF
any width whatever. A board twenty
feet long and one foot wide will contain
twenty feet OF lumber, but plank two
inches wide and the same length Us the
board will contain forty feet Of lumber
When you come to hewed timber that
is sold by the solid cubic foot, and if
YOU look at such timber in the board
yard you will find it marked at the end
in Roman characters to correspond
with the number of cubic feet in it. If
YOU require pieces of timber twenty
feet long and two inches by ter wide
and thick, such as make girders, only
thirty of them will make one thousand
feet of lumber, board measure. So If
you are buying some of the expensive
woods for hardwood iOists, for exam
pie, which cost. perhaps, $50 to 500
per thousand, you may estimate to pay
that sum for thirty joists, or. say.
81 piece. The stiffest lumber is
American oak, which is IA per cent.
sitter than English oak; whereas in
strength it is four per cent. weaker, and
in resistance is thirty-six per cent weak
er. The most resisting American wood
is beech, and it is also very strong. but
for stiffness it counts below elm, or yell
low pine or arch. Stiffness is that
quality in a girder, for example. which
makes it hold firm, however weak it
may be or incapable of standing sud-
den shock. In short, it is like stiffness |
in man, who may not be able to strike
out W. tn his arm or resist being upset. |
The least stiff of our building woods is
cedar, but it has very high power Of
resistance, greater than English oak or
yellow pine, while in strength it falls
very low among the woods.
Referring again to the weight OF lum-
Der, a cubic foot of water weighs over
sixty-two pounds. while a cubic. foot OF
dry oak only weighs thirty-nine pounds.
A cubic foot of water weighs some five
pounds less than green oak. 1t is the
water in the unseasoned lumber which
makes the weight. Dry mahogany
weighs only tifty-three pounds to the
cubic foot, or about nine pounds less
than water. This is manifest because
dry mahogany will float in water. A
circular saw cutting lumber, if it is
twelve inches in diameter, revolves
three thousand times in minute. 1t is
said that the rim of a circular saw trav-
els two miles minute. While water
weighs sixy-two and half pounds per
cubic foot and seasoned pine only
weighs half as much, brick weighs just
twice as much. If you want to build q
fence five boards high. a quarter OF a
mile long. it will take thirty-three hun
dred feet board measure.-Gatt, tn Gin
cinnati Enquirer.