Being Green - Utilizing Wood Pallets

[PurpLev]

There is a mfg that gets their materials on hardwood pallets (Oak) I got there with my nail removing tools, disassembled the pallets that looked to have the nicer grains, loaded my car with the boards and took the nails to later trash (as not to leave it there).

My plan is to use the lumber for some outdoor furniture projects, some garden fences and the likes.

Question is - aside for the 2 long rails that have some thickness to them and can be milled down flat - how do you utilize the material from the slats that are already fairly thin? seems like if I'll try to plane them down I'll be left with veneer

Any experienced people with pallets? any ideas? thoughts?

I have a stickered pile of 3 pallets in the middle of the shopspace, meaning - I stand on them when I need to cut anything or work on my workbench - not the most ideal. I need to figure out how to use it and clear it out

[LordLQQK]

There are a several things you can do:

• Cut the sections of the slats down to a length that doesn't require great lengths of flatness. You are going to remove a lot more material in making a table top flat than an end table.
  
• Use hand planes over power tools. Hand tools can usually reduce waste in flattening wood, power tools can be a bit messy.
  
• Soak the wood in water prior to stickering the wood pile. This can aid in flattening wood that has been repetitively exposed to the elements, like pallets, and then let sun dry on only one side. Proper stickering saturated wood and slow air drying or kiln drying can remove a good amount of the pallet wood's warp, twists, cups, crooks, and bows.
  
• Use the wood for steam bending projects. Steam bending is a lot easier to do than one might think (see my blog entry on tools and setup LordLQQK the Wood Bender
  
• Laminate laminate laminate. Like steam bending lamination work can utilize 1/8", 1/4", 3/8", and so on boards to make plenty of worthy and mind bending projects. And if you are laminating a bent formed object the requirement for flatness is diminished somewhat.
  

LQQK

[bem1492]

There is a mfg that gets their materials on hardwood pallets (Oak) I got there with my nail removing tools, disassembled the pallets that looked to have the nicer grains, loaded my car with the boards and took the nails to later trash (as not to leave it there).

...

I tried using some pallets, but I found the strange nails they use (almost like screws) really tough to remove. Any special tricks you are using?

Another source of lumber I found was Lumber Liquidators. They have lumber used for shipping that are like the rails of a pallet, but they are not part of a pallet. The LL store I visited had many of them in a variety of interesting woods thrown in the dumpster.

[PurpLev]

Thank LQQK - those are some good ideas to keep in mind. may not be practical at the moment, but sure did bring up some new concept to pursue.

Yes- hand planes would take less material than power tools, and cutting the slats smaller to make the twist less critical is the way to go - but in this case, I got the lumber for it's ability to withstand nature - naturally, and the idea was for larger pieces. more than that, since I want to join parts together, then having them flat and square enough so that the joinery won't throw the pieces out of square is somewhat important. or maybe I'm looking at it all wrong being used to milling everything flat and square on all sides.

I may have to figure out a design that will allow me to use smaller parts.

Blayne - those nails ARE tough to PULL out - indeed. instead - how about PUSHING them out ? (it is by far easier)

fortunately I have gained some experience working on my workbench (where is Marc saying the experience gained while building a bench is insignificant?!?hmmmm?) pulling the worst nails one can find - twisted hardened nails, that are used for bowling alleys (my workbench surface). So I developed different techniques for pulling out nails.

Instead of trying to pull the nails from the 2 parts nailed together (and trying to pull the fully sunk nail with the friction from both parts) I hammer/shim the 2 parts apart. the nails are now half exposed and only needs to be hammered out of 1 piece of lumber with less friction and an easier access to both it's ends. hope this helps.

thanks for the LL reference - sounds like a good source. those rails are very useful.

[bem1492]

Good idea, PurpLev! I'll have to make a pallet run in my pickup and give it a try.

[Dave F]

If you are having issues with the slats being too thin you can always laminate a few together to get the desired demension you need. I'd do a skim pass throgh the planer just to eve the surface out then glue up a two or three. Once you have your gluelam cured you can plane to thickness and work it as you usually would. Considering the cost of your materials,(free I assume) that would certainly be a good method to make use of too thin stock.

[PurpLev]

If you are having issues with the slats being too thin you can always laminate a few together to get the desired demension you need. I'd do a skim pass throgh the planer just to eve the surface out then glue up a two or three. Once you have your gluelam cured you can plane to thickness and work it as you usually would. Considering the cost of your materials,(free I assume) that would certainly be a good method to make use of too thin stock.

Thanks Dave, I thought of that as well, but wasn't sure if I won't end up abusing loads of glue to get useful sized lumber. but I have a feeling that this will be the solution. I can also created longer boards using this method (finally an actual board stretcher for REAL!)

[PaulMarcel]

+1 to Dave's idea. I'd just suggest using a plastic resin glue for the lamination. The rigid glue line will keep things from moving so if you have to glue things up, may as well have it help out.

So, not knowing the final size of what you want, you could also stagger the boards as you laminate them kinda creating a stack of "half-lap"-like joints; this avoids edge gluing later.

Here's my best (ha ha) picture:

[PurpLev]

+1 to Dave's idea. I'd just suggest using a plastic resin glue for the lamination. The rigid glue line will keep things from moving so if you have to glue things up, may as well have it help out.

So, not knowing the final size of what you want, you could also stagger the boards as you laminate them kinda creating a stack of "half-lap"-like joints; this avoids edge gluing later.

Here's my best (ha ha) picture:

Yup, thats what I meant with "wood stretcher" As for the glue - which one are you referring to? since this is for outdoor projects, I was thinking TB II, TB III, or (what I currently have at hand) Gorilla Wood Glue, all of which are supposedly water resistant. what other glues should I consider then?

[PaulMarcel]

Any polyurethane glue would work as they also have a rigid glue line (polyurethane is a plastic resin, just not the same one as in "plastic resin" glues). I just hate the foaming, which while gap-filling to a degree, can cause gaps when it expands 3-4 times.

I meant something like DAP Weldwood Plastic Resin glue. I haven't used that particular plastic resin glue; Weldwood is available nearly everywhere, though. I use Ultra-CAT PPR veneer glue. Similar idea, though Ultra-CAT is only considered a type II glue. For outdoor projects, type II may be good enough, though type III is best; Weldwood is type III.

Just a clarification on your reply, TBII is (surprise) a type II glue meaning moisture resistant. It is not considered waterproof. Type III (-> TBIII) is. A type II glue can work fine outdoors, though; it shouldn't need waterprooof glue under a finish.

[LordLQQK]

Any polyurethane glue would work as they also have a rigid glue line (polyurethane is a plastic resin, just not the same one as in "plastic resin" glues). I just hate the foaming, which while gap-filling to a degree, can cause gaps when it expands 3-4 times.

Something else to note about poly glues, they are rather weak. Almost all other glues are stronger, with one exception that is slipping my mind, oddly enough I think it might be construction adhesive. If you are interested in medium to large gap filling, epoxy is the way to go. Poly is like working with cold honey, it drips everywhere and sticks to everything; then it foams to a mess. Also requires humidity (atmospheric or artificially introduced (spray bottle)) to cure.

LQQK

[PaulMarcel]

I was happy to find that when I went to glue up some scraps for a shooting board, I wanted to use up the poly glue I had... bottle was half hard and virtually empty! One down, one left. I swear, I spent more time last night dealing with the foam and most of the build. uhg.

[DeanJackson]

There is a mfg that gets their materials on hardwood pallets (Oak) I got there with my nail removing tools, disassembled the pallets that looked to have the nicer grains, loaded my car with the boards and took the nails to later trash (as not to leave it there).

My plan is to use the lumber for some outdoor furniture projects, some garden fences and the likes.

Question is - aside for the 2 long rails that have some thickness to them and can be milled down flat - how do you utilize the material from the slats that are already fairly thin? seems like if I'll try to plane them down I'll be left with veneer

Any experienced people with pallets? any ideas? thoughts?

I have a stickered pile of 3 pallets in the middle of the shopspace, meaning - I stand on them when I need to cut anything or work on my workbench - not the most ideal. I need to figure out how to use it and clear it out

How thick are the slats? 1/4"? 1/2? You could get a lot of inner dividers for box-building out of 1/8" stock, or use them as *thick* veneers on an MDF project.

[PurpLev]

How thick are the slats? 1/4"? 1/2? You could get a lot of inner dividers for box-building out of 1/8" stock, or use them as *thick* veneers on an MDF project.

Yes, I could proably do that, but for box making, I have plenty of material. I originally got this material since it is weather resistant, and my plan is to use it for outdoor projects (garden etc). so I want to keep it as thick as possible for some structural stability, and joinery capabilities. I think laminating them together to thicken it up would probably be the way to go.

[jHop]

I believe Marc stated in one of his videos he cut material down as thin as 3/16", which he then used as veneer. The pallet I got was closer to 1/2", which will allow for that thickness of veneer after planing (careful or otherwise). If you're planning something like a bench, I'd laminate two or three together, simply to handle the weight. If you're talking something like compost bins, don't bother laminating. I'd say it kind of depends on the end project, as to how thick it needs to be.

As an aside, I did pick up a pallet, simply because it was a unique size. It was actually smaller than the others in the stack. (This meant it fit into the trunk of the car without issue.) If I had a truck, I'd be "shopping" at a few places near my wife's work; there's a pair of shipping companies that routinely have a stack of no less than five each in front of them, and a construction/ rehabilitation company that has a dumpster of "used/garbage" material. I'd ask permission for the dumpster, but I don't have the cargo capacity right now.

[JimLewis]

When I've used pallets, I just bandsaaw out the stringers. The nails are often glue coated and tough to deal with.

Try motorcycle pallets, you'll get lots of nice tropical hardwoods. That's where I get my small mahogany.

Jimbo