moisture content


Patty cakes

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Does wood have to be a 10% or whatever the perfect number is for furniture. chairs mostly is on my mind. Have a template n a router for the back legs. Even if i dident use a router when u start to join everything together will it bend n twist extremely if its not on the perfect number n what can i get away with. thanks again

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The idea moisture content is EMC it can be calculated with online calculators based off conditions in your shop. The easier way is just to have a board that's been in your shop for years of the same species and compare to that one. If it's drying or picking up moisture there is a good chance something is going to move.

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I don't have a moisture meter. I bought some pine for a project 4 months ago and it was clearly not dry so I put it in storage. I have a couple of short pieces which I keep in my office, and I weigh them regularly - initially every day and now 2 or 3 times a week. Basically I am using weight as a proxy for moisture content. So far the weight of these pieces has dropped by about 11% and it is still dropping, albeit slowly. I guess now the weight change may be seasonal rather than initial drying, I don't know. I will continue to weigh them for a while to see how it goes come spring & summer.

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I would cut some new samples and keep them with the rest of the wood in storage, preferably under a layer or 2 of wood. The heat/air conditioning in your office will dry out the samples much faster. Pull out the new samples maybe once a week , weigh them and put them back under couple of layers in the stack. This will give you a much more accurate idea how the wood is drying. 

Or buy an inexpensive moisture meter. You don't need an expensive accurate one to tell if it's reached an equilibrium and isn't drying out much anymore. 

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