Wickes "expertise"

Did it last week! Needed some MDF - Wicks was close and cheap, and its not like MDF varies that much - its usually uniformly crap from most places ;-)

Wicks had a pallet of pristine nice flat boards, with one complete dog of a curled up, scared, discoloured, and stained thing on the top. I almost expected someone to have written "oh no, not again" on its underside as I dutifully pulled it off the pile, set it to one side, loaded up the four I needed, and replaced it for the next punter to move.

(still can't fault the customer service, young lad pops out to the car park without me asking, to help lob them on the roof of the car - which given it was blowing up quite a strong wind was quite handy!)

All the sheds have the same problem in that they need to store timber in heated premises, whereas a pukka timber merchant will normally be unheated. That means everything has to be wrapped to supposedly stop it shrinking (fat chance!), plus it probably occupies the same floorspace as 100 tins of paint. They're selling crap at inflated prices but you can see why

The larger B&Qs have a "pseudo yard" where timber and building materials are stored, they seem to be unheated, have a roof but one side is exposed to the elements.

On 18 Feb 2014, stuart noble grunted:

Why is that a bad thing for timber will end up inside a centrally-heated home anyway (which must account for a lot of it)?

Just thinking of the custom-made slatted door we have at home, knocked up by a joiner when our extension was built, using timber direct from the merchant; it has 5mm gaps between all the slats...

Ins there a branch of Ridgeons near you, never had a duff bit of wood from them!...

I've always rather thought that was done on purpose: Supplier putting a crap one (or sacrificial one) on top to protect the rest in transit. Drones don't know or think to remove it (or, more likely, someone in management reckons on some fool buying it.)

Have only ever heard of "BLUE WOOD" which has preservative 'added' to it. To me green is unseasoned (or untrained/unpractised in the case of GREENhorn).

Softwood is traditionally supplied "shipping dry" i.e. only dry enough to withstand attack from fungal infection during shipping and storage. The actual figure is 17% moisture content, which is about as dry as it would get if it was left outdoors but under cover. However, timber used internally requires a moisture content of

So all their branches are sound?

Bill

On 18 Feb 2014, stuart noble grunted:

Yes I understand all that: my point was *if* timber is ultimately going to be fitted in centrally-heated premises, what's inherently wrong with DIY sheds storing it under the same conditions?

Kilning is not just sticking wood in a centrally heated room. It undergoes controlled dry/wet cycles to avoid case hardening and, needless to say, this is all done before it's machined. Nothing inherently wrong, as you say, but in an ideal world stuff that is only ever used indoors would be kilned *at source* to a much lower moisture content. But then timber merchants would store it unheated conditions and it would revert to 17%. Also, sheds can't deal with long lengths. And so on.....

Indeed they are;)..