Renee
ArboristSite Lurker
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- Oct 25, 2008
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We're going to be building a home in a couple of years, and we're in the planning phases. I want to build this staircase (just the stair treads part of it) out of wood we cut from the land.
We're going to have to cut a 800 foot long road through the land to get to the build site, and then clear the actual area for the house, so even though we're going to save as many trees as we can, I think we'll have enough wood to work with. Most of the trees are oak, some white, some red.
We'll be doing most of the construction ourselves.
So, my question is about how to make those treads. I'm assuming we'd have to take a log, cut it into a basic square, bigger than our final size, then dry it and plane it down. But how to dry them? How much shrinkage should we expect? This is something we've never done before.
The staircase will be going up into a loft, not a main living area, so it can be steeper and narrower than a normal staircase. If it's going to take a year (or more) to dry the wood adequately, that's OK, we can put up a temporary one until it's ready.
So, any advice on this? Is this doable? Thanks!
We're going to have to cut a 800 foot long road through the land to get to the build site, and then clear the actual area for the house, so even though we're going to save as many trees as we can, I think we'll have enough wood to work with. Most of the trees are oak, some white, some red.
We'll be doing most of the construction ourselves.
So, my question is about how to make those treads. I'm assuming we'd have to take a log, cut it into a basic square, bigger than our final size, then dry it and plane it down. But how to dry them? How much shrinkage should we expect? This is something we've never done before.
The staircase will be going up into a loft, not a main living area, so it can be steeper and narrower than a normal staircase. If it's going to take a year (or more) to dry the wood adequately, that's OK, we can put up a temporary one until it's ready.
So, any advice on this? Is this doable? Thanks!