Which cut line is correct? Don’t know, both sides are screwed twisted beyond belief. This is the start cut, the first 2.5" inches are for kid’s projects… Another chance at loosing a finger or two. The worse part is that these were the best picks of the day. Every other 2X6 (1.5x5.5 for the non-retarded among us) were worse splintered, bent, twisted. They need to dry the wood slowly in a well spaced stack. I wouldn’t wish any of this wood on anyone for anything.
That’s why you always buy oversized and mill it down to size and squareness.
Note that it will warp further when you get it home since Home Depot wood is unlikely to be fully dried and the environment in your home will be different as well.
You’ll need to wait a couple of weeks to see what shape the wood settles into. If you try to build something now it might end up warping after construction.
Even if you’re working with S4S lumber you still need to let it acclimate and then finish milling it if you really need very square pieces.
(1.5x5.5 for the non-retarded among us)
I am really not a fan of how common this word is becoming again in everyday vernacular.
It gets an automatic downvote and block from me, and a report depending on the instance.
It never went away, people just started getting offended on others behalf more
I am autistic and do not appreciate it at all. On whose behalf am I offended?
well I am too and I use it daily so who wins
Clearly, there are no winners. I don’t want to encourage people to use it, or make them think it’s okay to use it. There is no “taking it back” in this case.
I am autistic
…so? Are you also stupid enough that your intelligence falls into the range that is considered “mentally retarded”? No? Ok then you’re not retarded. So you tell me on whose behalf you’re offended, because it certainly isn’t yours.
15 years ago, I built an extension on a barn stall to suit my wife’s draft horse.
I am not a carpenter.
I was not trained. I had no experience.
What I had was Home Depot, and I’d seen enough framed work and enough videos about people building buildings, and the belief that I could “figure it out.” Also, this was a barn in rural country, and people wouldn’t be living in it so I wasn’t too concerned. So I bought a Saws-All and cut a giant hole in the side of the barn.
Long story short, I did figure it out, and it wasn’t half bad. Framing the roof gave me the most trouble; I kind of understood the theory, but I had the feeling it wasn’t as neat as it could be; it was the only part of the project that required joining. It had proper siding, a proper roof (with some composite corrugated roofing), and even a ventilated peak with corrugation foam under the top-thingy to frustrate wasps. It had a big-ass sliding door, which I bought pre-made. It had a12" ramp from the door into a paddock made of packed 3/4-minus (second hardest thing). The inside, like the rest of the barn, was just 1x4 horizontal planks, stained, which made everything easier. It didn’t need to be fancy, and the ceilings were all open, so no ceiling work.
In the end, I learned several things:
- Home Depot has everything you need to build a small house, including truck rental to get the material to the house.
- I waaay overbuilt it, out of paranoia that I would under-build it. I had double supports every 16" and horizontal cross beams. Like the rest of the barn, there was no floor - it was all packed 3/4-minus - but I poured a 1’x3’ concrete foundation over basebed gravel for the walls. I’m not certain anymore that the original barn had more that 4x4 posts sunk in concrete. I believe that, had I been experienced with building, I could have done the job with far less material.
- Home Depots wood is absolute shit. I screwed double 2x6s mainly to try to get the damned things straight enough to build on. And I bought only pressure-treated wood because I wasn’t certain that my siding job would be perfect, but also because this was open to the elements.
- I learned to hate Phillips-head screws with a passion that’s lasted the rest of my life so far.
- Someone with no experience can do something like build a glorified shed. A 14’ tall, 16x16, sided and corrugated roofed shed, but a shed.
I was pleased with the result, and I’m grateful for Home Depot because there’s no way I could have done that without them. Not within the season of weekends that it took me.
The only wood I’ll buy from Home Depot is unfinished shelving wood. Their shelving stuff is outrageously expensive, but it’s clean and straight, and properly cured.
I learned to hate Phillips-head screws with a passion that’s lasted the rest of my life so far
You sound Canadian. You’re ready to enter the wonderful world of Robertson screws.
I used to love Philips head screws until one day I tried torx. I’m never going back. I have some Philips around but you know the bits get worn and that damages screws. Sometimes you can’t get the screws out. I just finished a large concrete wall project with all the forms held by the same 20 or so T25 screws. Its crazy how good and reusable they are.
^This guy screws^
Torx FTW. I only use Phillips in situations where Torx aren’t available. They still aren’t easily available in as many varieties as Phillips.
It’s an interresting difference. Where I am, you can’t get construction screws with phillips. I don’t know when we switched, but I started as a carpenter apprentice about 10 years ago, and back then everything was torx.
Scandinavia
Damn. Where do you live? In general. I’m in the Minnesota, and it’s almost easier to find Robertson screws, because Canada.
Robertson is always the correct answer.
It’s better than Phillips, for sure. I prefer Torx, myself, but as long as it isn’t Phillips, I’m in.
Brotip: The Depot isn’t even cheap, it’s just bad. At least in my region, framing lumber from small-time lumber yards is like 2-4% cheaper than the same stuff at a Home Depot or Lowe’s, while simultaneously being considerably better stock. I get custom orders like doors and windows faster and cheaper too. I saved a couple hundred bucks on a flooring project by skipping the Depot a few weeks back.
Fuck the box stores. Slow, expensive, and bad. They have nothing left but brand recognition.
Not to leave out that big box store wood is all #2. Their premium 2x4s are what is a just a normal 2x4 at smaller lumber yards.
I work at Lowe’s and am stunned at what people buy there. In the garden area, why would you count on Lowe’s to have sod?! Go to a fucking sod place if you want more than a few pieces. People pay stunning amounts of money for bags of various rocks when they can go down the road and pay 1/4 that at, guess what, the fucking rock place.
We’re a big box store for FFS. We’re not the best or cheapest at anything, we just carry it all.
Protip: Home Depot is much cheaper on price.
Wrong community, but at the same time you’re right.
I mean it is some shit wood that could become a shit post.
Exactly! Shit wood for a shit post!
deleted by creator
Wrong comment, but at the same time you’re right.
The lines don’t matter as long as you don’t cut it.
Place it, then cut it. The cut will be correct if you cut it where you want it cut, not where you think in advance that you want it cut.
Like the old man said “measure twice, cut as many times as so can until its right”
I say measure once, cut twice. If you’ve cut short, just use your board stretcher.
Whenever possible, don’t measure at all. Mark it in place.
Get used to it because Trump will certainly make it harder and harder to get wood from Canada into the US and Canadian wood is of higher quality because it grows more slowly.
The wood will be stronger, sure, but in modern framing you don’t actually need the added strength. Slowly grown wood is going to be as crooked as fast grown wood. It’s a question about how and where it’s kept. If the wood goes through a lot of drying and remoisturing (not a native speaker, it seems like the wrong word, sorry) the wood will begin to twist and turn. If it’s being kept at a stable moisture and temperature, or at least being dried out consistently, it will stay straight.
Slowly grown wood is going to be as crooked as fast grown wood
No, it’s not. Slow growth leads to a tighter grain, greater density, and reduced moisture content. All of those things make it stronger and more stable. That means less twisting and warping.
But because it is increasingly rare, it is generally more expensive.
I recently did a renovation on my 1953 bungalow. The Douglas fir studs I removed from a wall are both laser straight and tough as guts. That wood is so hard that you can’t drive a modern nail into it without drilling a pilot hole first.
No, it’s not. Slow growth leads to a tighter grain, greater density, and reduced moisture content. All of those things make it stronger and more stable. That means less twisting and warping.
Sure, but in practice it’s all going onto a pallet and stored in badly humidity and temperature controlled warehouses, where it will dry out, then rehumidify, dry out, rehumidify, and so forth day after day. It doesn’t really matter how “good” the wood is, when its storing conditions are shit.
I recently did a renovation on my 1953 bungalow. The Douglas fir studs I removed from a wall are both laser straight and tough as guts. That wood is so hard that you can’t drive a modern nail into it without drilling a pilot hole first.
As a carpenter, I really have to ask you, why would you ever want this though? Sure, you may only need a post every 6 feet, but in reality, nomatter the strength, you’re going to frame it to be compatible with with your interior lining. Strength of wood is seriously not needed or wanted today. It just makes the wood expensive, heavy as fuck, and difficult to work with.
And while the wood may very well have been very straight, that’s what happens when you nail it into a frame, which will straighten it out, and place it in a controlled environment like inside a wall for 70 years. It’s going to conform to that shape. I have seen plenty of dense wood in buildings be crooked as a bow, because it wasn’t limited in its movement, or because it wasn’t shielded from constant change in the environment.
But wouldn’t wood that’s more dense absorb less water in the same amount of time though? Meaning that more dense wood would better resist the abuse of transport.
Possibly, but in practice it’s not going to be that much of a factor. If a piece of wood is laying in the middle of a big pile of wood in a warehouse without humidity control or temperature control, with a big garage door opening and closing 1000 times every day, like most building suppliers have, the wood is going to be twisted as fuck no matter how dense it is.
That’s not true at all. It really depends on environment and proper curing. Where I live, carpenters will rarely use dimensional lumber that’s been stored indoors for these very reasons. It’s stored sheltered outdoors, where the air is dry but temperatures can fluctuate between +30C and -30C depending on season. When it’s been through that, it doesn’t automatically screw up like a silly straw the moment you bring it indoors into a warm and more humid environment.
There are people who wish wood upon others?
I mean, I have, but it was a wildly different type of wood and different circumstance.
May I get wood? I don’t need the circumcision part.
Home Despot
You got the questions.
We got the questions.A Romanian friend of mine used to say that about the home depot slogan when they got rid of the experts.
What were you expecting out of framing lumber?
± 1/8" maybe? Maybe ±1/16". Not -2" on both sides and the whole thing twisted.
