It would be great to have a shop full of hardwood storage cabinets and benchtops. But let’s face it, using expensive hardwood lumber for every shop project is a luxury few of us can afford. Fortunately, you don’t have to break the bank to build durable and attractive cabinets, worksurfaces, or benches. The solution is as near as the local lumberyard — low-cost, “two-by” lumber. You’re probably already familiar with some of the downsides of dimensional lumber. It comes from a variety of species of pine, fir, or spruce and is often in pretty rough condition. In fact, warped, checked, twisted, and very wet lumber is common. So, it takes a bit more work to get the most out of this material. But with a little extra planning and patience you can get great results.
The first thing I look at is the moisture content. Most of the time I don’t need a moisture meter to see how wet some of this lumber can be. These boards are often wet to the touch. That doesn’t mean you should avoid these boards. It just means you need to allow them to dry out before you use them. All you need to do when you get them back to your shop is stack them with stickers (small pieces of wood) in a place with good air circulation, as shown in the photo and allow them to dry. Depending on conditions, they’ll be dry enough to work in a few weeks.
You’ll still want to pick through the stack pretty thoroughly to find the best boards. The big thing I try to avoid here is twisted stock. You can usually work around slightly bowed or cupped boards, but correcting twist just takes too much effort. And since you’ll most likely have a big selection to choose from, leave the twisted stock at the store.
The next step is getting the boards cut to size, squared-up, and planed to thickness. Here I like to begin by inspecting each board (again) for warping, bowing, and checking. At this point, you can lay them on the bench and start roughing out the parts you need in chalk directly on the boards. This is a good time to identify the knots or other defects you’ll have to work around. I reserve the best boards for the longer pieces of my project. This way, you can compensate for bowed or warped boards by cutting them into shorter pieces and eliminating any problems.
Once the parts are cut to rough size, you can move on to the jointer to square up one edge and one face. The difference here is that you’ll also need to get rid of the rounded edges typical on dimensional lumber. Then, you can plane the opposite face and trim the opposite edge at the table saw. You’ll lose a little more thickness and width in this process than you would with hardwood lumber, so make sure to take that into account in your plan.
One of the best ways to make “two-by” stock more attractive is to make a series of cuts at the table saw exposing the straighter grain. You can start by marking the boards in a way that will yield the straight-grained face. Then, it’s just a matter of ripping the stock on the table saw, rotating it to expose the best edge, and gluing it back together with the straight grain surfaces facing up. This is a great way to make table tops that are both more stable and better-looking. And using this method allows you to determine the thickness of the top just by adjusting the width of the cuts. So you can even make a top thick enough for a workbench.
