[zubby01]

Has anyone had any experience w/ cabin grade wood? I found some for a deal of about $2 a sf. I don't 'think' I'll have an issue with the shorter boards, knots or streaks but, where I read about possible cracks in the wood - that has me nervous. I thought I would buy about 115% of what I need coverage for to maybe cull out some bad ones.

Thoughts?

[Polestretch]

I did a job in December, it was cabin grade and had splits all over. I asked the customer if they wanted me to pull all the splits before installing them. He said "no". About 20% were splits. Some you could actually see right thru! When I was done it was very hard to pick out the splits in a finished floor. The shorts drove me more nuts than the splits.

[WoodFloorist]

115% sounds about right. I had a customer who wanted rustic fir just recently. My supplier could only find one source of rustic fir and it came in 20 foot lengths. It was actually beveled fir paneling and the square edged side of the boards were rough sawn. I ran short of what I felt was acceptable wood and I ended up finishing the closet off with a lot of filler.

[Nick]

Better off just spending a little extra and getting a decent piece of wood . With all the extra you are buying , it's going to cost you around the same price , and save you a lot of time and aggration.
Whats to say the boards you install won't split ?

[tectonicfloors]

A good quality cabin grade wood will produce a good-looking floor, but it will be more rustic and have more character than better grades of wood. In other words, it will have more light and dark boards, more mineral streaks, pinholes, and small knots holes. When purchasing cabin grade wood, you will need to purchase 15% extra material than the square footage*you are covering. This allows your installer to discard unusable boards or cut out bad sections.