Estimating Materials

[Robert Engel]

I usually go round and round about this, fearful I will run short of material, but not wanting to over estimate.

I usually end up at the lumber yard, with a helper staring at me, material list in hand, sifting through boards, forgetting to check off something or miscalculating, invariably getting one or two extra boards just to be safe.

Ideally, a cut list is best, but board widths are often random + I don't know board widths until I actually go to the supplier.

My next project is a dresser which has solid panel sides and top.

I have estimated BF based on total square inches of the project + 20% but I see potential errors in this like ending up with an unusable 1 1/2" wide strips after dimensioning.


How do you all do it?

[Stew Hagerty]

I feel your pain. I have been woodworking for about 8 years now, and I still agonize over materials for a project.
Depending on the project I either go to the lumber supplier personally and hand pick each board and compare to a cutlist, then get a couple extra for recuts, last minute design changes, and "oops, I forgot about that's".
Or I pick up the phone and order a board ft. amount. Usually when I do that, it is a common species that I tend to use a lot of. So, I order anywhere from 150 to 200% of what I need. Any extras go into my lumber rack.
I typically stock around 300BF of lumber. A combination of Domestics, Exotics, & One-of-a-Kinds.
As for your dilemma, depending on the species and your project, I would either do what you are doing, and probably get at bare minimum 125%. If it is a special project and/or a species that you may use again, even for some smaller items, I personally would err on the high side and go for as much as 130-150%.

[Matt Day]

I surely don't agonize over it, in fact I enjoy it. I like being at the lumber yard and I never have had a helper waiting on me. I take my time and use printed out views of my project. As I go through the stack and find suitable boards, I mark off which part it will be for. Then when I'm done, I pick another board or two to have in case of an error picking or error calculating or error cutting.

For simpler projects, I might just write down that I need (5) 6" wide 8' long boards. That might mean I come home with 6.5" - 8" wide boards and some might be 8'-10' long.

Going by square footage of material can be misleading. If you're building a table with a 5' top and you buy 8' lumber, you're going to have a lot of waste that you need to account for.

[Andrew Hughes]

This is how I do it.For a dresser I break it down,These boards are for the top here's a extra.These makeup the sides here's a extra.I also ask my supplier to pull out a pallet of rough I look at grain boards with a cathedral grain in the middle.No funny swirling grain in the quartered part.Tight growth rings.And nothing with a heavy bow or cup.
Also look for something special for drawer fronts.
If I want to net a 1 inch top I might ask to look at a lift of 6/4.

[Jim Becker]

I find that a "cut list" is only useful for calculating the minimum requirement and in the end I always source at least 25-30% more for a project because of my need to do careful grain and color matching while selecting boards in my shop for particular project components. I don't consider the resulting extra material as waste as it generally gets used later; either for another project or for jigs and other needs where smaller scraps come in handy. I only abandon truly defective parts. (board ends, etc.) So for me, those 1 1/2" wide strips are very much usable material!

[roger wiegand]

I guess I turn the whole process on its head. I visit lumber yards, sawmills, and follow up on CL ads and whenever I find exceptionally nice wood I buy it. It then incubates on my lumber rack for a time ranging from weeks to decades until it becomes evident what I should make from it. I still have a couple pieces of 28" wide curly maple I bought in 1974 and have moved coast to coast twice awaiting the perfect use. That said, just as the kitchen is always stocked with a list of "staples", so too is the wood pile. I work primarily in cherry and maple, with a little walnut, so I always just keep a couple hundred bf of cherry, maple, and poplar along with sheets of plywood in stock. My trips to the lumberyard are to find special wood. I've always found going out with a very specific need in mind to be an exercise in frustration--the perfect board almost never shows up just when you need it. Everyday projects just get built out of lumber on hand. Often they present an opportunity to use one of those stashed "special" boards.

[Mike Ontko]

I'm still trying to figure out what works best. My purchases are getting closer to being right the first time, but the process off shopping for rough lumber is still stressful for me, particularly when I'm buying for a project that someone else is paying for.

I don't go to the lumber yard until I've completed a detailed drawing and cut list, so I at least know what minimum amount I'll need. But my last estimates (in the diagram below) were based on an average 7" width and either 8 or 10 ft board lengths, when the actual widths can vary from about 4" to 10" and the lengths from 9 to 12. Even with all the pre-planning, it's still a mental workout having to re-calculate everything on the fly when sorting through stacks in the lumber yard. I try to purchase enough extra just in case I make a mistake or to cover cases where a checked end or other imperfection has to be cut out. But at the same time I don't want to end up with too much extra, especially when I'm itemizing my materials info for my customer. I'm not currently making profit on the projects I do, but I don't want to lose money either.

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[Jim Becker]

...whenever I find exceptionally nice wood I buy it. It then incubates on my lumber rack for a time ranging from weeks to decades until it becomes evident what I should make from it...

I kinda use this method myself. LOL Those wide cherry boards I used for the buffet top in my buffet/hutch project were "on the rack" in my shop for at least a decade, if not 12 years.

[Roy Harding]

I live in a semi-remote area - I can buy a few woods locally (red cedar, yellow cedar, pine, spruce, hemlock, birch), but for the more common furniture woods (oak, maple, cherry, etcetera), I have to order either online or over the phone and have it shipped in. In other words, I don't have the luxury of hand-picking my boards.

I use Cutlist Plus for my cutlist planning. I've set it up so that it will calculate that I get 60% usage out of my lumber. So - if a project requires precisely 100 bdft (for an example and ease of math), Cutlist plus will tell me that I need to order 167 bdft. This has always worked for me - I've never run short, have enough flexibility to choose prime boards for specific purposes, and I usually have some leftover - which is fine, it goes on my lumber rack and gets used elsewhere.

I used to live in a big city with local lumberyards which I was able to pick through - and I only rarely miss the opportunity to do so.

[mreza Salav]

What's wrong with having extra lumber, when they can be saved for future project? I have grown my stash of typical lumber (Maple, Cherry, Walnut, Mahogany) that I can make projects out of each. Whenever I need to buy I buy lots extra as the extra cost/hassle of being short is a lot more painful. Plus, with more lumber you will have better selection for matching grains etc.