Thread: Check a US Lumber Price?

Originally Posted by TimStammers

I'm slowly making a Beth sailing canoe, here in New York.

I just got quoted US $520 for the timber for the rudder, and the two masts, two yards, and two booms.

Milled to the sizes shown on Michael Storer's cutting list, in Douglas fir, 10-15 grains per inch.

Is that expensive, or is it just me?

The main mast is 13' (4m) and the mizzen is about half that.

Tim-Here in Australia,clear Oregon (Douglas Fir) would be one of the dearest timbers to purchase now.
It is not available readily such as in a warehouse outlet,but rather only through some boutique timber suppliers.
Many boat builders on a budget here look towards using say a select grade 'Hoop' pine and so on as a substitute.
Without knowing the section sizes you have purchased,you do not get a whole lot of quality timber here for $500 bucks anymore!

I suspect getting them milled to size has added to the cost appreciably.
Have you priced standard stock sizes with a view to reducing them to required dimensions?
You might be able to pick up a planer/thicknesser for the difference in price
(which will make your next boat considerably cheaper... )

Material prices can vary wildly, most everywhere. Millwork prices too have the same trait. In many cases, you can justify renting a table saw to rip up regular dimensional stock to the sizes you need, for much less than paying someone who owns a table saw, to do it for you. The same might be true of a planer, though you can also do this by hand for a lot cheaper. Boat building is all about problem solving and engineering "on the fly". Most boat builders are pretty frugal too, so beg, borrow or steal a table saw and by a bunch of pretty sixteen foot 2x12's at the local big box store. These long 2x12's will need to come from older trees, so the growth rings will be tighter and you can easily find blemish free stuff, if you sort through a rack or two.

Originally Posted by PAR

Material prices can vary wildly, most everywhere. Millwork prices too have the same trait. In many cases, you can justify renting a table saw to rip up regular dimensional stock to the sizes you need, for much less than paying someone who owns a table saw, to do it for you. The same might be true of a planer, though you can also do this by hand for a lot cheaper. Boat building is all about problem solving and engineering "on the fly". Most boat builders are pretty frugal too, so beg, borrow or steal a table saw and by a bunch of pretty sixteen foot 2x12's at the local big box store. These long 2x12's will need to come from older trees, so the growth rings will be tighter and you can easily find blemish free stuff, if you sort through a rack or two.

Thanks for all the answers. Over the phone, the lumber yard guessed that out of the US$550, only US$100 was for the machining. But I went out and bought a table saw, and half a dozen lengths of 8' and 10' lengths of 2x Doug Fir from two big stores here on Long Island, New York, for about $50 total.

From Lowes (for the sake of US readers), I bought kiln dried DF. From HomeDepot, I bought timber which wasn't specified as "green" or "KD, "so I guess it was air dried. On these forum, US members have said that Lowes' stock is better than Home Depot's. To my unpracticed eye, that didn't seem to be the case. I looked for dimensional trueness, as few knots as possible, and at least 8=9 rings per inch at the ends. About the same at the two stores.

I'm sure I can make the rudder, a small cross-beam, and maybe also some short spars from that stuff. That will cut $160 from the bill.

I think I will still buy the timber for the masts and the longer spars from the lumber yard, because I don't want *those* bits breaking. The timber from that yard is way better quality (looks perfect to me.) But I'll be able to save a bit of money yet , by doing the machining for those myself.

Yup, the saw should pay for itself - even if not on this boat, then on the next. I wish I had bought one sooner, because I've already spent a lot on . I bought a $400 DeWalt. No idea if that was overkill, but I was worried that a cheap $150 saw would not cut it (haha sorry couldn't resist) in terms of accuracy.

As usual I rushed, and only skimmed the responses above. I now see two things:

B.o.a.t suggested I buy or borrow a planer/thicknesser. Hmm. I bought a saw table, and have thrown the packaging away, so I can't take it back. Out of interest, would a planer have been better?

Home Depot sells 20' lengths of DF, which at a glance didn't look too bad. When I get to the masts, I'll have a second look at them, and maybe ask some more question here.

BTW, for US members: Lowes rents out a table saw, but the price is $50 per day, and the saw is so big it needs two people to lift it into a car.

Thanks again everybody. I will add some more to my beginner-builds-beth-don't-do-what-I-did thread.

You'll use a table saw more than any other power tool, besides a drill or sander. A planer is great, but in most cases, you can "dress" the lumber with power hand sanders or hand planes. Thickness planers are fine if you have lots of stock you need to grind into dust, but most will be satisfied with ripping it to size on the table saw and cleaning up the surface with a DA.

Good table saws can be had cheap if you look hard, particularly flea markets, online auctions, etc. I have an old 10" that I bought for $50 bucks, from a guy who said it didn't work. I took the cover off the start capacitor enclosure and say it was swollen up, telling me a new set of capacitors would fix it for another $15 bucks. It had a cast iron table and a good, non-wobbling arbor, so . . .

Wot PAR said.
I bought a second-hand thicknesser/planer to complement my table saw (Triton Mk3) .
Rip scantlings oversize from stock on the Triton, then plane them to size.
Have done this with some Douglas Fir out of a neighbour's ceiling.
DF or "Oregon" as we call it is *%$#^* expensive here in AU so it paid for itself very quickly.
Have also bought slightly oversize rough-cut stock cheaper than DAR & planed to the size I wanted.
Either way, $500 bought me a LOT more than just the timber for a part of 1 job...