Craigslist Oak.. hot or not?

I bought several board of oak via Craigslist from a guy who is moving. They are apparently reclaimed from some sort of building and fairly old. Close to 40bd ft for $40, seemed like a good deal. Most of the boards have nail holes all along the length about an inch in from the edges, figure I can cut off that part if needed to get clear wood, or just fill them if it doesn't matter. A couple of the boards have large cracks or knots. There is one 12' long piece that's nice and clear with no holes. I am still quite inexperienced when it comes to choosing wood, was this a good find or no?

(The lumber in question in the second picture is on the second shelf from the top)

Steven,

I know oak lumber in your area is much cheaper than in the Texas panhandle, but here if you paid that for it, that would be a good deal. I would consider it a very good deal here, but I don't know what oak that has not been surfaced sells for here, as it is not very available.

However, it will be interesting to see from folks in your area about local prices.

Regards,

Stew

The best way to know if you made a good deal is to calculate how much wood you accumulated and compare that to the local prices in your area. In your case I wouldn't take the areas with the nail holes into the calculation.

Unless you are a bulk buyer, you are possibly like me and stuck buying from places like rockler, woodcraft, etc many times to find wood. If so, they mostly sell rough, non milled lumber and it is much pricier than you paid. For example, I get excited when they have maple on sale for $3.49 per board foot. Realizing this is not ideal, it is my current option based on where I live. Im working on some sourcing via a cabinet shop in my area that has multiple large warehouses and buys material in bulk, like 2,000 board foot at a time. For a guy like me working out of my garage though, that isn’t possible. I might have a few hundred of varied wood types on hand at most.

I would be thrilled to find good, solid wood for $1 per board foot. If you don’t mind the leg work to mill it, that reclaimed oak is probably going to be stellar once you take the outside surface down.

Rest assured, you dun good!

Yep, ya done good. Something that took me a while to learn is that I was not selecting a board for the board itself but, for the parts that I can make out of it. If a board has a good amount of straight grained, good color material and I am looking for frame, stretcher or leg parts, I am pretty sure I can use the balance of the board for something else later even if it is as a secondary material in a no-show location.

If there is a great section of figure right around a gnarly open knot hole and I am looking for something special for a box top panel or a wall cabinet door, I take the board. The worst case scenario is that I end up with some "stove chow" or glue up blanks to become Christmas gifts.

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Originally Posted by Stew Denton

However, it will be interesting to see from folks in your area about local prices.

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There was a thread earlier this year about oak and pricing that had some numbers.

Around here, the price depends on how it is dried, whether it is rough sawn or planed, and where you get the wood. Clear, kiln dried S4S from a specialty dealer, or worse, a woodworking supplier, can be expensive. Rough sawn air dried is far cheaper, I've bought at $2 per board foot. If you want to dry it yourself buy green from a sawmill: I bought "pallet grade" for I think 30 cents, some knots and splits but plenty of clear if you work around those. I bought it mostly for barn siding before I got my own sawmill.

I don't know about the Raleigh area. Call Frank Penta who lives in Carboro - he knows a lot about wood supply in NC.

I'd say the Craigslist find was fine if the wood meets the need! Once I pay for the wood I never look back.

JKJ

I buy from a sawyer and always pay a little extra since he sometimes gives me some good deals. I noticed a few weeks ago, while in a woodworker's supply store that the price of their wood was double what I pay at the saw mill.

Steven, Those nails holes look like the boards may have been used in construction. We have access to oak around here which is specifically intended for use as scaffolding, ramps, etc.. It's still a great find. I just want to give you the heads up that if it came into life as construction boards, it may not have been kiln dried and it may well have some dirt, sand and other grit embedded. All manageable enough. Nice stash.

There is plenty of Oak sawn around here. It's used as logging decks (big logging country), and some sawmills also build the decks. I used White Oak for siding on our house, and barn when I built them in 1980. It was a hundred dollars a thousand then. The last I bought for siding, about 12 years ago, was 1.30 a bd.ft. for 1x6 dressed (still green though, but works fine for board, and board siding). They'll saw it most any way you want it. I put some away on sticks in sheds. There are several such mills North of Raleigh, and maybe other directions too, but I just know about up here. Sorry, but I don't know current prices.

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Originally Posted by Steven Mikes

I bought several board of oak via Craigslist from a guy who is moving. They are apparently reclaimed from some sort of building and fairly old. Close to 40bd ft for $40, seemed like a good deal. Most of the boards have nail holes all along the length about an inch in from the edges, figure I can cut off that part if needed to get clear wood, or just fill them if it doesn't matter. A couple of the boards have large cracks or knots. There is one 12' long piece that's nice and clear with no holes. I am still quite inexperienced when it comes to choosing wood, was this a good find or no?

(The lumber in question in the second picture is on the second shelf from the top)

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Hi Steven,

As long as there are not bugs in the lumber you got a smoking good deal!

Most of those boards appear to be 6/4 to 8/4, and white oak in these thicknesses typically sells for a few dollars per board foot. Paying a buck a board foot is great (As a comparison, I sell green flat sawn white oak for trailer decking for $1.50 per board foot and kiln dried 8/4 is about 5-6 bucks a board foot).