Had a chat with my uncle who builds furniture for a living

He told me my "seasoned wood" shelf project was doomed because I used kiln-dried pine from Home Depot and called it good. Said I should have let it acclimate for 6 months in my garage first - who has that kind of patience?

2 comments

2 Comments

johnson.lee1mo ago

Did your uncle explain why letting it sit in the garage for six months is that different from just storing it inside your house for a month or two? Seems like the whole point of buying kiln-dried wood is to skip the long wait, but maybe he knows something about moisture content or seasonal shifts that changes everything. Was he talking about preventing warping, or does the wood actually move enough to mess up the glue joints?

riverp371mo ago

Wait, has @johnson.lee actually tried working with wood that just came out of the kiln and then sat in a house for a month? I'm with you completely on this. My uncle told me the same thing years ago and I blew it off. Bought some kiln dried maple, built a table in two weeks, and within a year the top had a pretty good gap at the glue joints. The wood moved enough that the joints showed, not huge gaps but enough to annoy me. Letting it sit in the garage through a season change lets the wood adjust to your specific climate. Your house might be heated or air conditioned but the garage gets the real local humidity. That six month wait is about letting the wood settle into whatever your area throws at it.