Our sawmill, wholesale sales, retail sales and our postal address...

104 Charley Creek Road
Charley Creek WA 6293

Charley Creek is about 5 minutes out of Donnybrook. You are very welcome to visit us here but please call first.

YOUR SLABS ARE TOO EXPENSIVE!

We sometimes hear this from prospective customers comparing our slabs to others that may be available. It can be difficult to compare apples with apples sometimes. Whilst it is easy enough to establish the species and size of a slab it can be very difficult to ascertain WHETHER IT IS PROPERLY DRY.

Ask a professional woodworker or furniture maker what is the most important consideration when buying timber and they will tell you that the timber has to be properly dry. It is financially destructive not to mention completely heartbreaking to put your heart and soul into a project only to have it distort and/or crack after you have finished.

Does timber have to be kiln dried to be properly dry? NO. However kiln drying is the best way to ensure consistent moisture content, AND for the M/C to be low enough to be used in air-conditioned (which is very dry air) or heated homes. Outdoor applications are not so critical.

I have heard that KILN DRYING IS HARSHER on the timber and can create stress within the boards/slabs. IS THIS TRUE?

POSSIBLY. If you take green sawn timber and bung it into a kiln and heat it to anything over 50 degrees or even less sometimes, yes it is going to be stressed (it’s a bit more complicated than that, but that is the crux of it). It is for this reason that much recycled building timber is stressed greatly. Imagine the effect of putting green sawn timber into a roof space on a new home with a tin roof. Ever been climbing around in there in summer? It’s HOT.

It is for this reason that we gently air dry our timber first until less than 20% and then finish it in a kiln.

Air dried timber may never get dry enough for use with inside timber projects - it depends on where it has been dried and for how long. Timber that has been air dried in the wheatbelt for a suitable time period will be nicely dry because the atmospheric conditions in that area are very dry. Timber dried in Pemberton or Cowaramup (for example) will never dry out to a satisfactory moisture level for indoor furniture. The atmosphere simply does not get dry enough for long enough periods of time to get the moisture content down to an acceptable level. The exception to this is thin boards used at the end of summer.

This is why our timber stored in Donnybrook is stored in a heated/insulated shed after it has been dried. If we didn’t do this our lovingly kiln dried timber will be back up to 16-18% by the end of winter.

We regularly re-machine slabs brought to us by people that have purchased timber elsewhere that is not properly dry and it has bowed or buckled. Often two or three times a week. Often we have people bring us rough sawn slabs purchased elsewhere to get machined (which we are more than happy to do). The first thing we do is check the moisture content. Very often it is above what is acceptable. Very often it is not much lower than when the tree was cut down.

Should I feel like a DILL for having purchased not dry timber?

NO. Unless you have a good quality moisture meter (which will cost you several hundred dollars or more) you are simply not going to know if the timber is properly dry.

Should I feel like a dill for NOT KNOWING about correct moisture content in timber?

NO. Unless you are in the game you will not know - which is why I am telling you.

Do not waste your time and money buying a cheap moisture meter. I have never seen one that is accurate to any degree acceptable.

So- when you are looking on Gumtree for slabs, and they are cheaper than ours the reasons listed above may be why. Should I not buy slabs off Gumtree or from a private backyard supplier? That is not what I am saying at all.

Please note that timber boards and slabs sold at FPC/GOVERNMENT AUCTIONS is 99% of the time green sawn. They are not trying to trick you - they are selling green sawn material that’s all. If you purchase stuff from here you need to allow time to dry it before it is usable for indoor projects. For slabs this is usually two or three years. Some people prefer to buy timber green sawn because it is cheaper. You can buy green sawn from us if you want to.

Can we put OUR SLABS in YOUR KILN?

YES, BUT WE USUALLY DON’T.

This is not because we are being difficult. It is because our timber is air dried before it goes in and if we put yours in that has a much higher moisture content, it will still not be dry when we pull our stuff out. In addition to that, we may cause case hardening and stress. Also, our stacks are already made up to the correct height and size to fit into our kiln, so it is not usually possible for us to add in other stuff.

Do we guarantee that our timber will not move? No. All timber will move with the area that it is moved to and with the different seasons. If you take our timber to Broome in the wet season it will move.

Can I take your timber and use it in the middle of Australia or the tropics without having problems?

As long as you give it time to acclimatise when it gets there, yes.

What we guarantee is that the timber that is supplied by us, that we say is dry, has a moisture content of less than 13%.

The other thing that you must know to ensure that you project doesn’t develop cracks, is that you must use correct joining methods. Screwing a slab firmly to a steel frame, for example, IS going to result in problems.