Daily Arizona silver belt., 1909-05-11
When q Cord is Not q Cord Defined by the
 GoUernment
When is a cord not a cords

1, for the large fireplace of his country o' seaside home; to the paper manufacturer buying pnlpwood and to the proprietor of the ordinary city woodward, to all of these men this question has an impor ] tant dollar-and-cents meaning.
 Queer to say, and contrary to the be lief of most people, there are many times when cord is less than cord and many conditions when it is more School arithmetics say that cord of wood is 12S cubic feet, or the contents of pile eight feet long, four feer high, and four feet wide. Wood is market. ed on this basis. A pile whose length breadth and height multiplied together gives this number of cubic feet hl.s this requirement, no matter whether the sticks are long or short, straight or crooked, round or split, unless there is an understanding to the contrary. Nev. ertheless, cord, though it comes up to legal measurements, is an uncertain quantity, even when the seller is honest and the buyer satisfied.
 A lumberman may have tract of pulpwood which he sells to paper mill at $5 cord, for as many cords as it will make. It is in the contract that he shall cut and stack it. He cuts it in l2foot lengths, and when the job is complete it measures 200 cords, and he receives $l,000 for it. Would he have made or lost by cutting 4foot lengths instead of l2s
 | He would have lost in the first place from the additional labor required t. cut 4-foot wood, but his principal loss would have resulted from a greatly Ii. minished number of cubic feet, due to the fact that short sticks lie closer to- gether than large.
 Measurements and experimental tests have been made to ascertain exactly how much actual wood is in cords of different lengths, sizes shapes and spe- cies.
 Had the POO cords of 12.foot wood been cut in 4-foot lengths, there would have been only l76 cords, and the owner would have received for it $sS0 instead of $1,Oo0. It was, therefore, clearly to his advantage to cut 12-foot lengths, but it would have been to the buyers advantage to have it cut in 4-foot lengths. He would have received the same actual quantity of wood for $l2o less.
 It also makes considerable difference to the seller whether wood is chopped or sawed. If chopped, the chips are lost and where the logs are large this loss amounts to no small total. In a cord of 4-foot wood, with sticks six inches in diameter, the chip loss is from six to eight per cent, and, of course, the short CT the sticks are cut the greater the loss If the wood is sawed, the sawdust less is scarcely the half of one per cent.
 The difference due to spaces between the sticks of wood of course depends very much on the shape and size of the sticks. Straight, smooth sticks lie close together, and cord contains more wood and less air. For given lengths, sticks of softwoods are usually straight CT and smoother, and when stacked lie closer together. But whatever the kind, cords of long sticks are pretty sure to contain more empty space than cords made of short pieces. Likewise, cords of split wood contain less than cords of round sticks. The finer the wood is split the more it makes. Hence wood dealers are often willing to sell kind lings, all sawed and split, for the same price per cord as unsplit wood They get back the cost of labor in increased pulk.
 hardwood usually contains about B cu- bic feet of solid wood; a cord of 3-foot wood averages S3ia cubic feet; of 2-foot wood, S4 cubic feet, and of 1-foot wood, s5 feet The conifers, softwoods, con. tain 90 to S6 cubic feet. Thus the pur- chaser receives on an average about two-thirds of cord of real wood and one-third of cord of spaces.
 In some countries wood is bought by weight, and the buyer comes more near. ly getting what he bargains for; but even then he may miss it if he receives green wood when he wants dry. Ac- cording to timber testing engineers of the United States Forest Service, wood may lose half or more its green weight in seasoning. Cedar for lead pencils is bought by weight in this country. The pieces are So small and of such irregular size that they can not conven. iently be stacked and measured as cord. wood.
 The bulk of nearly all woods decreas. es as seasoning goes on. A hundred cords green will make from S9 to 93 cords when dry. This is factor of no small importance to dealers who handle large quantities.
 Woodlot owners and farmers who have small forest tracts from which they expect to sell cordwood, are no less interested than contractors who buy and sell large quantities. It win stand them in hand to know how much differ ence it makes whether wood is cut long or short, chopped or sawed, whether the sticks are round or split, whether large or small and vghpfher tho me su repantu