Newbie needs advice please getting wood less than 4/4

[Sandie C]

Hi All I see many patterns call for 1/2" wood, how do I achieve this when my local lumber yard sells 4/4 and larger?

thanks in advance Sandie

[John McGaw]

A planer. Or even better, assuming that any wood that you buy will not be perfectly flat, a jointer then a planer. Or I guess you could forget about your local lumber yard and buy from some company that sells thinner stock -- Steve Wall comes to mind immediately since I've bought 1/4" cherry from them to save myself all the work and waste of producing it myself.

[John]

Resaw with tablesaw or bandsaw, Or run thru a planer till the correct thickness

You could also do this with handtools, but it is a major PITA for more than the smallest pieces of wood

John

[Doug Winterburn]

1) resaw using a bandsaw 2) plane using a power planer 3) plane using hand planes (also can be incorporated into body buiding) 4) move to Arizona desert and nail boards on fence. 3/4" cedar was reduced to 1/2" cedar in three years for me :-) 5) find another source - my local guy sells smaller pieces in 1/2" thickness.

-Doug

[Sandie C]

Thanks for the replies seems to me I have to spend a ton of moeny either way...:)

[Edwin Pawlowski]

There will always be a good excuse to spend money. I made some things with the 3/4" boards from Home Depot for a long time. they one day it is just not good enough. You want what looks right, what fits right, what a professional would do. That is when the bandsaw and planer come into play.

If you are serous about the hobby, the good tools will last you for many happy years.

[jo4hn]

I know my local Orange Borg (HD) sells 1/2" stock. They have a "hobby" section in the better lumber department. Also check out hobby and craft stores. Good hunting. mahalo, jo4hn

[George]

Not really. Have a HS or JC shop nearby? Or, meet someone who has a planer and offer a six pack of something or a few BF of the lumber for the courtesy.

[Bob G.]

==================================== ROTFLMAO..... for the price they want for their "thin" stock I get sick... REAL SICK....

Bob Griffiths

[Werlax]

I just recently went through this with my brother. He wanted a bunch of

1/2" oak to face out some cabinets he was making. After calculating the costs, we ended up buying 5/4 oak and had the mill resaw it and put a good edge on it. The cost of the material ended up being less (2 boards out of 1) than if I had bought 4/4 and planed it. *Much* less waste, as well. Mark

[Werlax]

I love to stand around the bin and say things like, "Wow, that comes to over $6/bf for that! I'm glad I only spent $2/bf ." ;)

[Mike G]

At a minimum jointing and planing has to be done if you add in resawing, depending on the thickness of the rough cut stock, you can stretch a bit more use out of a board.

Tools. Resawing would be a band saw though the job can be done of a table saw assuming low enough stock. jointing and planing can be done with hand tools or power jointer and planer.

Pros and cons

Most hardwood suppliers will mill stock for you for an additional charge.

Rough cut stock is cheaper then milled S2S or S4S stock.

Even equipping yourself with hand tools to do the job can, one way or another, carry a fairly high price tag.

You pretty much have to be going through a large amount of stock to realize a savings in lumber costs over the cost of the tools to true stock in anything like a reasonable amount of time.

Milling stock to size, even with power tools, can be a time consuming and boring task.

As you noted, 4/4 is usually the thinnest stock you can buy off the shelf.

Seldom will you get really true stock from a supplier. That is, stock with no warp and all sides are parallel to the others and at 90 degrees to it's joining edges.

Really trued stock is a dream to work with. Having stock that is exactly X inches wide and long, all the sides are at Y degrees to their adjoining sides, and parallel to their opposites, leads to easier assembly with all the pieces coming together as they should and tighter better looking joints.

[Dave Mundt]

Well, how about these alternatives: 1) Get 5/4 wood and resaw it half thickness. If you DON'T have a bandsaw this is a great excuse to BUY one (any excuse to get a new tool). The exact thickness will come as a side effect of smoothing the wood down to get rid of the saw marks. 2) I am sure that the lumber yard will be MORE than happy to plane the wood down to 1/2" for you. They either will do it for free, or, for a nominal charge. 3) Redesign the project to use 3/4" wood. Regards Dave Mundt