2009 July | Woodworker's Guide

Archive for July, 2009

A Small Vase Made Of Ash • Jul 11, 2009

Here’s a small Ash vase that I recently turned. It is about 5″ tall, 3 1/2″ in diameter at its widest and an 1 3/4″ at its base.

The grain has been accentuated with the red of the Tripoli powder from the Beall Buffing System getting into the pores of the wood. I was concerned with this at first but then realized that it added a becoming feature. I never noticed this effect on other pieces of Ash that I have used the Beall on. Perhaps it was only because this piece of Ash was so white. This is certainly something to watch out for in the future when working with light colored woods.

Here’s another photo of the vase, this time looking down at the top:

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A Board Foot Calculator • Jul 06, 2009

What is a ‘board foot’? No, it’s not what’s at the end of a wooden leg! Sorry, it’s an oldie but a goodie and it had to be said. You’ll often hear reference to this woodworking term when you are in the process of buying wood. Although lumber is sold by the piece in building supply stores, mills and specialty wood dealers price by the ‘board foot’.

A ‘board foot’ is a measure of wood volume instead of linear feet. A board foot is the volume of a 1-foot piece of wood that is 1 foot wide and 1 inch thick. This translates to 144 cubic inches. So, to calculate board feet, you would use the following formula:

Thickness (inches) X Width (inches) X Length (feet) ÷ 12 = Board Feet

Or you can use this handy Board Foot Calculator:

This will give you the calculation for rough lumber. Use the rough lumber measurements in width and thickness when calculating the board feet even if the lumber has been surfaced.

Board-foot is abbreviated as FBM for "foot, board measure" and MFBM represents a thousand board-feet.

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