Home Depot Plywood Quality

There's no point to this message, other than I need to vent somewhere... :)

I'm building a new entertainment center and just bought three sheets of

3/4" birch plywood and one sheet of 1/2" birch plywood from my local Home Depot. This has to be some of the worst plywood I have ever purchased!

I didn't notice it till I got home and unloaded, but the faces of the sheet had numerous blemishes and patches (both sides). I should have looked it over better at the store, BEFORE I started cutting. :) Thankfully, I managed to cut around the major blemishes, or hide them in places where they can't be seen. Unfortunately, this left me a little short, so now I need to pick up a quarter sheet to build the last two shelves.

The plywood is also riddled with numerous voids. I don't think I have made a cut yet that hasn't had pieces of the core falling out.

Even the grain pattern of the sheets is less than attractive. I'm not sure what kind of birch trees they got the wood from, but this stuff is ugly! :)

Perhaps worst of all, the surface veneers are extremely thin and fragile. It appears to be thinner than a sheet of paper. I bought brand new saw blades for making this project, and the chipout is absolutely horrible. I also sanded a couple of pieces yesterday, and can sand through the veneer in less than 20 seconds with 100 grit paper. Now my project is almost finished, and I'm almost scared to sand it for fear of sanding through the veneer and exposing the core.

Worst of all, I paid $40 a sheet for this stuff at Home Depot, and then saw MUCH better quality lumber at Lowes (where I normally get my plywood) for only $30 a sheet.

The plywood sucks, but a lot of the fault obviously lies with me. I made the mistake of shopping on a weekend, when the rest of the DIY crowd was crowding into the store. I thought the convenience of having my wife and daughter there to help load the cart would be nice. But, in my attempt to get in and out of the store, I didn't inspect the sheets closely enough.

Anyway, I'm almost finished with my entertainment center and am happy with the way it is turning out. Despite the poor quality lumber, I have managed to hide the worst blemishes. If I can pull off sanding the project next week without destroying it, there's still a chance it might turn out OK.

Live and learn...

Anthony

Reply to
HerHusband
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Learning to look at what you are buying is a good practice.

BUT when the plywood becomes delaminated or pieces start falling out I Take It Back. Sure it is cut but the piece is defective, how would you know if you had not cut it?

Reply to
Leon

Thanks for posting. Now I know where not to buy plywood. I bought some from Menards. I had to go through the stack before I found 4 acceptable sheets.

Reply to
Dave

The Aruca (sp?) at Lowes is decent as far as splintering and has few voids and it is cheaper than the Birch. Never tried staining it.

Reply to
RayV

Leon,

Yeah, I usually inspect the lumber I buy with much greater detail, but I guess I was busy looking at my lady and talking with her instead. :)

Good point, but it's all hindsight now. Assuming I don't destroy the project when I start sanding, it will all work out in the end.

Anthony

Reply to
HerHusband

All the more reason to use solid wood instead of plywood.

Reply to
efgh

You bet. At about $5.5 a bf for clear birch here, that would make the material cost around $450 when you include sales tax and a tiny bit of waste. Makes great sense.

Then of course, you get to do the monster layup. I don't know if you have ever glued up a really wide,long section of wood, but it can be really hard to control well once you get past about 16" when doing larger lengths. Plus with the crappy, poorly dried and conditioned product we are sold today, my personal experience is that a really large glue up is more of an adventure than an exercise in skill.

But - think of all the extra time in the shop doing glue ups! Extra shop time for a much more difficult project, 5 times the price for material... what's not to like?

Robert

Reply to
nailshooter41

out in the end.

You really need to be extra careful when sanding. I finished up some tables for the VFW (utility type tables) and this was the material that was in their budget.

I have never seen face veneer that thin. I don't think you could spray it on any thinner. I sanded right through that stuff due to some little bumps in the underlying substrate. Luckily, the face of the pieces weren't all that interesting, so with some finish on the top it didn't matter.

I used to buy the "China ply" at HD and it was a decent product. No matter whose plywood it is, it won't be the baltic/russian/cabinet ply stuff with no voids at all in the layers of wood, so that wasn't a big thing.

But the faces on the stuff I bought last week were really bad. The veneer splintered really badly, some of the pieces were covered with footballs (plugs), and the pink glue they used to press the plies together stunk like something was burning.

So for me that stuff has not been relegated to utility/paint grade material.

I fear that if I go to my hardwood supplier though, his $60 a sheet birch won't be that much better.

Robert

Reply to
nailshooter41

Two (2) mistakes:

1) Walking thru the doors of Home Depot. 2) Thinking they even know what Birch cabinet plywood is, much less sell it.

Plywood distributors exist for a reason.

Lew

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

I had a similar experience, but the real problem was in finishing it. The oak veneer I got was so thin that the pores opened to the adhesive surface underneath. The stain would not take on the adhesive, so I had a poor stain job. I ended up having to use Mohawk's Blendal sticks to correct it.

Reply to
eganders

You know, as a sidebar to this, Home Depot sold quality plywood a few years ago. (5?- 7?) It was the same stuff I got at my hardwoods guy, even the same stamps sometimes. It was just a about 20% less.

Then they sold a hardwood faced ply that was called something like "cabply" or "cabinet ply" with no claims as to what wood it was. It was clear, had the appearance of first veneer cut ash, not anything at all resemblign birch, but was very close grained. Not porous at all. It came from Chile, so of course we called it Chiliply. I used a lot of it for all kinds of things stained and painted.

Now they sell that junk. When I built the aforementioned tables, I was really surprised as some of that stuff was a full 3/16" out of square! OK, we are all past thinking that a sheet of >anything< is square. But 3/16"?

My point is that when they sold the better stuff, there was a thriving market for it. A lot of the cabinet guys and smaller contractors ate that stuff up. Many times I would go to HD to get some, and they would be out. At the price, it made wonderful small cabinets, paint grade vanities, uitlity room cabinets, etc. I know it is a function of money/time on the rack/bottom line, etc., but I can't figure out why they QUIT carrying a better grade since it was selling. The sold the daylights out of that stuff.

Now they have the Chinaply whenever I would want it. Problem is, I don't. There is so much in the racks, apparently a lot of others don't either.

Robert

Reply to
nailshooter41

It's hard to beat the cost and stability of plywood, and solid wood has it's own share of issues. Warping, cupping, splitting, etc. I did buy a lot of solid wood for trim, drawer fronts, etc. and it's not picture perfect either.

Of course, then there's the issue of gluing up panels and the labor (and goofs) involved with that.

Anthony

Reply to
HerHusband

Yep, sounds like the same stuff! :)

That's the part I'm worried about. It shouldn't take much sanding on the large flat areas, it's near the edges where the trim meets the plywood that I'm most concerned. That and anywhere I need to fill a nail hole or something.

The majority of my entertainment center will usually have "stuff" on it, the top is higher than most people will see, and most of the front is solid wood. So, maybe there's hope... :)

I've purchased birch ply at HD and Lowes for years and never had a problem. I guess that's why I didn't give it much thought when I bought it. Now I know better.

Interesting, I noticed that smell when I was making some cuts, but didn't see any signs of burning on the wood.

Anthony

Reply to
HerHusband

You're right ... last time I got good Oak 3/4" ply from HD was around 2002. IIRC, it was around $42/sheet, which was a pretty good price at the time, void free, relatively thick veneer compared to the higher wood boutique prices, and much heavier than what they sell as plywood at any BORG today.

I just got a quote from my hardwood dealer yesterday for 3/4"x4x8 A1 rift sawn red oak - $115.95/sheet; up $11/sheet since I bought the last load just about one year ago.

Inflation? ... what inflation?

Reply to
Swingman

Now I don't feel so bad over $75 a sheet for the 3/4" stuff I got from my hardwood dealer last winter. Might have gotten a cut rate due to the rest of the almost $2,000 order.

You're right ... last time I got good Oak 3/4" ply from HD was around 2002. IIRC, it was around $42/sheet, which was a pretty good price at the time, void free, relatively thick veneer compared to the higher wood boutique prices, and much heavier than what they sell as plywood at any BORG today.

I just got a quote from my hardwood dealer yesterday for 3/4"x4x8 A1 rift sawn red oak - $115.95/sheet; up $11/sheet since I bought the last load just about one year ago.

Inflation? ... what inflation?

Reply to
PDQ

Nothing burned, it just smelled like it. That was the confusing part. I am sure the Chinaply is bound by something made from boiled animals and food remnants.

Just as a tip, if you are going to edge this stuff, put your edging up a little where you can, covering the edge plus a little and then sand by hand to get down to the whisper of veneer.

Robert

Reply to
nailshooter41

It's known as "bean counter mentality".

If you want to quickly destroy a business, put a bean counter in charge.

The examples are numerous.

1) L Townsend at Chrysler 2) R Smith at GM

They are the first to come to mind, but there are others.

Lew

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

Try energy costs.

Lew

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

< big snip >

Does anyone with knowledge know the current status of the China plywood flap? The last I heard was that the US was going to file a complaint against China for selling the plywood that is marked as meeting standards that it obviously doesn't meet.

Reply to
Ken Finney

What most Americans don't know is that the US currency is in the toilet. I run a Canadian company which has 99% of its income in US dollars. Our revenue is up but when converted to Canadian dollars it becomes less than years before. I used to get $1.60 Canadian for every one US dollar, now I only get $1.08 per US dollar and the experts say that the two currencies will be par by year end.

This means that whatever you bought a couple of years ago that was imported, now it is going to cost you almost 50% more today because the other currencies in the world have not dropped as much as the US dollar.

Home Depot, Wal-Mart and many others compensate by buying even cheaper crap so that the price doesn't go up, that is why the plywood is now pure junk.

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