![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Qiao is supposed to be able to come home this week. :-)
I'm working on a little* project to reduce the height of a bed by replacing the box-spring with wood planks. The bed already has 4 planks made out of plywood under the box-spring. The planks are 3/4 inch thick on the sides which rest on the bed-frame, and twice as thick in the middle, and they feel very sturdy.
While browsing the lumber selection at Lowes, I wondered which kind of wood makes the strongest planks. I was under the vague impression that oak was the strongest and pine the weakest, with the others (spruce, poplar) somewhere in between. I wasn't sure how they all compared to plywood. The oak boards cost about 4 to 5 times as much as the pine ones. Plywood only seemed to be available in big sheets, not boards. I asked one of the Lowes employees about the relative strengths of the different woods. According to him, oak is the strongest, followed by pine, and then the others (with poplar being a very light wood). I specifically asked him about plywood too, mentioning the existing planks on the bed. He said that plywood would be bad to use; that it would be likely to warp in the middle. They guy appeared to work in the lumber section, so I assumed he knew what he was talking about. Based on that info, I went ahead and bought "top choice whitewood" boards (which he said was pine), getting enough to completely cover the bedframe with no gaps in between.
I was pleased to find out that Lowes will cut the boards to whatever size you want for free. I had thought I'd need to cut them myself at home with a saw.
The boards fit almost perfectly on the bed. I think they'll do fine. But after doing some more research on my own, guess what I found out?
Relative Wood Strength Charts - Oak is stronger than yellow pine, which is stronger than both spruce and poplar, which are both slightly stronger than white pine. The "bending strength" is the quality I'm most concerned with. The guy in the store didn't mention any difference between yellow and white pine. For my project, he advised I get the white pine (due to the oak being so expensive); he didn't even mention anything about the yellow pine. He seems to have been wrong about the spruce and poplar being the weakest.
Types of Pine Plywood - plywood would have been stronger after all!
Plywood is made from thin layers of pine stuck together. In a similar way to weaving cloth, the layers are placed at right angles so the natural grain alternates. There are three, five or seven layers in a ply board. This layering makes the plywood much stronger than a length of natural pine the same size. It is also less likely to bend, shrink or expand.
The tags on the boards I bought indicate that "Top Choice" is actually a brand name, not an indication of the quality of the boards. (Ergo, never trust product names/descriptions either!)
*I also have another project to get some kind of temporary wheelchair ramp set up, so that Qiao will be able to get into and out of the house.
I'm working on a little* project to reduce the height of a bed by replacing the box-spring with wood planks. The bed already has 4 planks made out of plywood under the box-spring. The planks are 3/4 inch thick on the sides which rest on the bed-frame, and twice as thick in the middle, and they feel very sturdy.
While browsing the lumber selection at Lowes, I wondered which kind of wood makes the strongest planks. I was under the vague impression that oak was the strongest and pine the weakest, with the others (spruce, poplar) somewhere in between. I wasn't sure how they all compared to plywood. The oak boards cost about 4 to 5 times as much as the pine ones. Plywood only seemed to be available in big sheets, not boards. I asked one of the Lowes employees about the relative strengths of the different woods. According to him, oak is the strongest, followed by pine, and then the others (with poplar being a very light wood). I specifically asked him about plywood too, mentioning the existing planks on the bed. He said that plywood would be bad to use; that it would be likely to warp in the middle. They guy appeared to work in the lumber section, so I assumed he knew what he was talking about. Based on that info, I went ahead and bought "top choice whitewood" boards (which he said was pine), getting enough to completely cover the bedframe with no gaps in between.
I was pleased to find out that Lowes will cut the boards to whatever size you want for free. I had thought I'd need to cut them myself at home with a saw.
The boards fit almost perfectly on the bed. I think they'll do fine. But after doing some more research on my own, guess what I found out?
Relative Wood Strength Charts - Oak is stronger than yellow pine, which is stronger than both spruce and poplar, which are both slightly stronger than white pine. The "bending strength" is the quality I'm most concerned with. The guy in the store didn't mention any difference between yellow and white pine. For my project, he advised I get the white pine (due to the oak being so expensive); he didn't even mention anything about the yellow pine. He seems to have been wrong about the spruce and poplar being the weakest.
Types of Pine Plywood - plywood would have been stronger after all!
Plywood is made from thin layers of pine stuck together. In a similar way to weaving cloth, the layers are placed at right angles so the natural grain alternates. There are three, five or seven layers in a ply board. This layering makes the plywood much stronger than a length of natural pine the same size. It is also less likely to bend, shrink or expand.
The tags on the boards I bought indicate that "Top Choice" is actually a brand name, not an indication of the quality of the boards. (Ergo, never trust product names/descriptions either!)
*I also have another project to get some kind of temporary wheelchair ramp set up, so that Qiao will be able to get into and out of the house.