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24th August 2020, 02:48 PM #1Senior Member
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Why is 25mm rough sawn so common?
It seems like 25mm boards are very common when looking at furniture timbers and I'm wondering why? I often find 25mm once dressed is often too thin for tops (e.g. desks/ dressers, not just dining tables) and it requires a lot of laminating for legs etc.
Wouldn't it be better to mill at say 50mm and then the end user can resaw it to the thickness that the piece needs to be?
I'm sure it is faster to dry, but what other reasons are there be for milling so thin?
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24th August 2020, 03:33 PM #2GOLD MEMBER
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When I was selling wholesale to the furniture industry at least 75% of our timber sold was 25mm thick. Keep in mind you cannot get two 25mm boards out of a 50mm sawn. And a 50mm sawn wont stay at 50mm when dry. Even today, on a much smaller scale, I am still cutting to order more 28mm boards, which dry to 25mm, than anything else. There is a bit of a trend towards slabs these days with furniture makers. It used to be slabs for slab furniture, but now they are using them as stock to cut their own requirements. Its funny watching them trying to wrestle them into their utes.
So, to get two 25mm finished dry boards we need to mill at 60mm. The air drying time will be approx two and a half years and the log yield decreases the thicker you mill. Kiln drying also takes longer which is costly both in power and down time. All in all, to green saw thin is a much better return.
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24th August 2020, 03:35 PM #3China
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25mm allows for milling down to 19mm which is a extremely common size for making furniture, if your require thicker the go for the next size up which I think is 50mm
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24th August 2020, 04:08 PM #4GOLD MEMBER
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24th August 2020, 05:59 PM #5Taking a break
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The "3mm per side" rule for dressing really only holds for fully automated production machines where you have to allow for undersize or warped rough boards. I could generally get 21-22mm dressed and sanded from 1" rough sawn which is perfectly fine for desks and small tables.
Most common furniture timbers come in 1" 1.5" and 2" (25, 38, 50 mm rough or 19, 32, 45mm dressed), with some also available in 3" or larger
It can also depend on the mill it's coming from; our usual supplier for US timbers sourced from mills that were quite generous on sizing and very strict on grade (generally 2-3mm over thickness, 100mm over nominal length and their Comsel grade could often pass for Select), we have had other suppliers whose source mills for the same timber were...ummm...lets say disappointing.
Another weird thing is that Euro Beech always comes rough sanded both faces. Dunno why they do it, but they do it.
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24th August 2020, 06:39 PM #6Senior Member
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Elanjacobs,
Do you order and keep a stock of mostly 1 size, a mix of all the sizes or just order for each job as you get it? I've seen your work and you make some big stuff, I imagine you would mostly use 38 and 50mm?
Rusty,
Thanks I hadn't really thought about yield from the log, that would be a factor for the person sawing it for sure! Wrestling slabs into a ute? That's fine for red cedar, not so much for the eucalypts
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24th August 2020, 06:51 PM #7Taking a break
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I've since moved on, but we kept stock of Radiata, Vic Ash and US Oak in 1" 1.5" and 2". Everything else was as needed, but we'd generally order 10% more than calculated to allow for defects so there was always some stock of our regular species.
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24th August 2020, 07:02 PM #8Senior Member
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Ok that makes sense, are still making furniture or changed career entirely?
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24th August 2020, 07:05 PM #9Taking a break
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Changed entirely, now doing a fitting and turning apprenticeship with a company that specialises in small gears
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25th August 2020, 11:58 AM #10
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25th August 2020, 02:56 PM #11Senior Member
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28th August 2020, 09:31 PM #12GOLD MEMBER
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The reason 25mm is the most commonly available is its the most commonly used size.
Not a lot of serious furniture gets built in Australia anymore. And it doesn't really use that much wood anyway.
A kitchen on the other hand runs to about 1 cubic meter of wood, and most of that is either 3/4" or 7/8" finish. And we havent got to panelling or architraving or any of the fun stuff that uses wood in volume.
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29th August 2020, 08:34 AM #13SENIOR MEMBER
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29th August 2020, 06:57 PM #14GOLD MEMBER
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31st August 2020, 08:41 AM #15GOLD MEMBER
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25mm rough sawn is an absolute pain for box making. If its dead straight with no twist you're lucky to get two 9mm finished boards, other than that you get an offcuts which is good for ?????
Whatever happened to the good old 28mm?
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