Truck capacity in board feet?

[Matthew Joe]

Anyone have a ballpark estimate of how many board feet of lumber one can stuff into a small or mid-sized pickup truck?

[Scott Schwake]

One layer of 8-foot long 4/4 boards (between the wheel wells) is about 32 bdft in my full size truck. Depends on how high you want to stack it.

[Jason Roehl]

You'll exceed the weight capacity of the pickup long before you get it full of lumber, especially if it's anything smaller than a 3/4-ton truck (Ford F250, Chevy/GMC 2500, Dodge B2500).

[Tom Veatch]

Pay attention to Jason!

A cubic foot of wood (12 bd ft), depending on specie, will be around 30lb, some much heavier, some lighter. So a layer of wood 4x8 in the bed of a pickup is going to weigh somewhere in the neighborhood of a thousand pounds per foot of depth (384 bd ft). So, take the weight capacity of your pickup, divide by 2.5 to 3, and that's about how many board feet of wood you can safely carry in the truck.

I passed a guy in a pickup on the side of the road the other day. It wasn't wood, but he had the bed of his half ton pickup filled to the gunwales with sand. He was probably wondering why his tires were flat and suspension broken. A common misconception among light pickup owners seems to be, "If there's more room, you can pour in more load". It just ain't so!

[Paul Atkins]

Sort of like this?

[Charles Krieger]

Hard to believe that some people have such poor judgement! Great picture though!

[David Schmaus]

At least you have a pickup...

[Chris Barnett]

When you gets it full, thar's the back seat...

[John Keeton]

Well, this is about 435 bd ft - stacked tightly in a 5x8 trailer.


And, this is about 200 bd ft. in a Dodge Dakota - not stacked very well.

[gary Zimmel]

Thanks for the pics guys.
They really made my day.

Sorry I can't help you out on how many board feet in the pickup Matthew.
I've got a F350 pickup and the wallet runs flat before the suspension does..

[jim sauterer]

john i know your pics are real are those other photos real.

[John Keeton]

I've got a F350 pickup and the wallet runs flat before the suspension does..

Yeah, Gary, but you are paying those "conifer land" prices for hardwood!

[Richard M. Wolfe]

It depends on the species how much the pickup will hold, but as Jason said, you will run out of carrying capacity before you run out of space. Oak weighs nearly four lbs per board foot where cedar is about half that. I have a half ton pickup and have carried 1800 lbs about twenty miles with it but I filled the bed about flush full of cedar and then unloaded part as I didn't like how it looked. Granted, it was green. My guess is a bed full of dry cedar would be about the maximum carry.

[John Keeton]

For what it is worth, the walnut in that load had been cut about 30 days, and yes, it WAS A LOAD!! The weight distribution on the trailer, even with the wood loaded toward the front, was horrible and my top speed was about 35 mph. The truck, by itself, wasn't too bad.

[Myk Rian]

It's amazing how stupid people can be, judging from those pics of the fridge and windowed wood.