I make a nice chair from pallets, I have three in my yard now and 2 at my friends house. I have scored on a couple of really nice ones, one made from red oak and one from poplar. Check out the pictures here:
You may or may not realize this but pallets get set into and drug across some pretty toxic and nasty surfaces. What are you doing to the wood to protect against possible transfer with skin contact?
That is an excellent point, Leon. Thanks. Even when cutting them up for firewood, it might be wise to keep that in mind....never mind cooking wieners on that wood. Just never gave that any thought.
Having worked in all aspects of the automotive industry those things most often had wet spots that did not dry and or large stains. Then there were the ones that sat in trailers with questionable loads.
IMHO just not worth the risk.
I was thinking the same thing about all the nasty s**te that's usually on them. I have one sitting in my van, right now, that came under a load of tile. You can bet I'll be wearing a mask and gloves when I tear it up for the bagster. I'll gladly pay WM to deal with that mess.
I know it can be difficult for many to throw away such fine quality wood, though. :-)
You find Bagsters a way to go, Mike? Around here, the whole deal seems rather expensive.
We typically got 2, 18 wheelers of freight every 2 weeks. IIRC that was about 40 skids/pallets. I was indescribably excited when I first saw those pallets coming all the time. I never used them for building, more for fire wood. After the first time of going through the stacks to get relatively clean ones and then cut them all up it was way too much work. On top of that the bottoms are typically impregnated with small rocks and debris.
We had a guy pick ours up every couple of months and he paid us $2 each and no picking and choosing. He had to take them all.
Pallets being contaminated is something to consider. I never thought about that, either.
I salvaged some container crates, long ago, that special pieces of equipment was shipped in, from Brazil. I'm, now, hoping the boards are not contaminated, as a pallet may be. The wood has (decorative) knots in it. Surprisingly, the knots haven't popped out, though some have checked a little. They look nice and are relatively solid, aspects as to why I saved them. I was hoping to make some special project with it - suggestions welcome!
1/2" thick, about 300 sq ft of it, various widths from 4" to 12", most ~ 7' long. Some of it looks mahoganyish.A few pics, here:
Sonny
30 bucks for the Bagster and about $100 for them to haul if off. Under the circumstances that's a great deal.
I'm making one bathroom into two in our modest little 70's split level. This involves going down to the studs/joists on most of it and moving one wall entirely. Then there's the old toilet and metal tub.
In our municipality, if they see any construction materials in the cart...
Without the Bagster, I'm left with the following.... packing all this stuff in my minivan or borrowing a pick-up truck to make three trips. One trip to each of our three dump/recycling facilities that will only receive certain materials. Each will have a dump fee not including fees for large items like tubs and toilets.
All these fees combined would come no where close to the $130 I pay for the Bagster service. However, after taking an entire day to load and haul three separate loads to three separate dumps, wasting the gas and time to do it, I would likely have said to myself, "Man, I would gladly have paid someone 100 bucks to haul all that crap away for me."
I also get the added benefit of throwing away a decade's worth of accumulated crap from the household and shed which is too nasty or beat up to take to the thrift store.
Ironically, WM won't take the old water heater in the Bagster, but the city will come get for free if I put it out at the curb. :-)
From the sounds of it that stuff was from before the heat-treated crating material days. The stowaway invasive bugs and other critters have probably moved on to other parts of your house by now so you should be fine.... ;~)
John
LOL. I think they were fairly clean of bugs, etc. when I got them. I fished the boards off a fire, as they were being burned as scrap, after the crates' contents were unloaded. At least half the boards had already been too damaged to salvage. It was a week before I could get them home, from Houston, and I've since (27 yrs ago) moved from the home I had lived in.
Sonny
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With those numbers the whole idea is clearly worth it.
Look on ABPwoodworking.. I just put on a photo of a Ski chair. WW
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