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Lumber vs Timber
4

Lumber vs Timber

Lumber vs Timber

(OP)
(This relates to the Cement/Concrete thread)

Is anyone as passionately opposed to the misuse of timber as they are to the misuse of cement?  I had a professor in college say that he knew as person was incompetant in wood design if they called any small size of lumber, "timber."  He even gave us an example of how he identified an incompetant engineer who inappropriately used the term when he (the professor) acted as a witness for the prosecution in a court hearing.  The thing is, I've never heard anyone else have the same complaint. I've even heard VERY intelligent engineers use timber instead.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

I have always known it as timber when chopped from the tree, lumber when it is cut to size for sale.

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: Lumber vs Timber

timĀ·ber (t?m'b?r)
n.

1 a Trees or wooded land considered as a source of wood.
  b Wood used as a building material; lumber.

2 a A dressed piece of wood, especially a beam in a structure.
 b Nautical. A rib in a ship's frame.
3 A person considered to have qualities suited for a  particular activity: That trainee is executive timber.

Sounds odd to apply it to small dimensioned pieces, but this (Gurunet) dictionary doesn't make that distinction.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

(OP)
Well, he was from the "old school."  He's probably just a technical purist.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

3
Try explaining to Long John Silver that for all these years he should have been saying, "Shiver me lumber"...

RE: Lumber vs Timber

From an Australian perspective:
Timber; structural material
Wood; what you throw in your stove etc., eg. firewood
Lumber; never used, except in 'LVL'

RE: Lumber vs Timber

Same in the UK apsix, lumber is something Americans call timber, or at least so I thought.

I now know better!!

RE: Lumber vs Timber

I believe 4-inch thick (smaller dimension of the cross section) rough sawn dimensions and smaller are lumber.  5-inch thick members and larger are timber.  That would be by NDS nomenclature but I am not 100% sure on it.  I just call it wood.  

RE: Lumber vs Timber

wood, lumber, timber
Definitions Wood: the hard, fibrous substance that forms the major part of the trunk and branches of a tree. Hardwood and softwood Hardwood trees have broad-leaves and 'nuts' as seeds, softwood trees are coniferous (needle leaves) and naked seeds. Lumber: wood that has been cut and surfaced for construction use. Timber: lumber whose smallest dimension is not less than 5 in. Laminated lumber is commonly used when increased wood lard-carrying capacity and rigidity are required.

Plywood is a panel product made from thin sheets of wood called veneers. Expand 0.2% from dry to saturation.
http://alcor.concordia.ca/~raojw/crd/concept/concept000069.html

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: Lumber vs Timber

Tim'ber
What you holler when you're buddy is about to get crushed by the tree you're about to drop on his head.  That a' way he's got two choices, count 'em.  Stay put and get crushed as in concrete, or run like H  

RE: Lumber vs Timber

I'm not an expert but I've always used the term 'timber' for what comes into the sawmill and 'lumber' for the product that leaves the sawmill.

NozzleTwister
Houston, Texas

RE: Lumber vs Timber

weldtek--don't you mean SEE-ment?

Hg

Eng-Tips guidelines:  FAQ731-376

RE: Lumber vs Timber

weldtek
This being the forum it is I feel compelled to point out the incorrect spelling of the first "your"

Respectively yours, John (or should that be your's?)

RE: Lumber vs Timber

(OP)
What are you talking about, apsix?  (And by the way, it's "yours")  ...but let's not digress.

RE: Lumber vs Timber


Anything that has its smallest dimension 5" or greater is timber.  

So if you got a five incher, feel free to call it a timber.  You only got 4", gotta call it lumber.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

This being the forum it is... (2nd notice)
the word incompetAnt does not exist, the correct spelling is incompetEnt.

saludos.
a.

saludos.
a.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

apsix is right.

Here in Australia, Lumber is a medical term that refers to the lower back region. Even my dictionary says so.

Very strange people those Americans.....

RE: Lumber vs Timber

Warpspeed

That's lumbar not lumber.


RE: Lumber vs Timber

Probably do. No gasoline or drug stores over here either.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

We manage to scrape by with petrol, hehehe.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

Warpspeed, I wish it were the same here.
I just switched lawnmowers, from gas to cordless electric.
Someday I'll do the same with the car.
Also, In Australia, is it concrete or cement?

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: Lumber vs Timber

cement is the grey powder stuff you buy in bags.

After you have mixed it with sand and water and allowed it to set as hard as a rock, it then becomes concrete.

At least that is how it works in oZ...

RE: Lumber vs Timber

I know. I was just curious how it was said in Australia.

Another one. I have heard people say "Austria" when talking about "Australia" and the other way around.

Interesting how technology has allowed us to communicate easier, but the language barriers get all mixed up and communication gets worse.

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: Lumber vs Timber

It's funny but I was in Europe a while back, and people complimented me on how good my English was. They thought I was from Austria too.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

Oh dear, does that mean that us Pomms are going to get hammered at cricket by Austria this summer as well?

Going back to I think a lumbar support is that funny little bumpy bit at the back of a car seat where as the lumber support is the bar across the roof of a pick up.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

I think you may be onto something there ajack1.

We don't have any sidewalks down here in oZ either. So we just have to use the footpath instead.

And we also drive on the left hand side of the road too, much more logical.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

Warpspeed, it makes perfect sense for Aussies to drive on the left side of the road. After all, you're in the Southern Hemisphere.
Is it true though that, unlike here in the North where water swirls clockwise down the drain, it swirls counterclockwise up into the sky?

RE: Lumber vs Timber

I guess you must be referring to something like the native American tornado ?  No, we don't have those here either. Here the water only spirals downward, very unspectacular.

If ever I see a full sized tornado coming out of the plug hole in my bath, I would be mightily impressed.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

A random pun I read today: Lumber companies have many board meetings.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

If I have a block of wood that is 5"x5"x5" does that become timber instead of lumber?  

I've been around some loggers and they seem to think that timber incudes trees that haven't been cut down yet.  I've always thought that wood was called timber until it was prosseced in a mill and then it was lumber.  It's all semantics.

RE: Lumber vs Timber

(OP)
So than they are called "timberjacks"...

...perhaps they work all day and sleep all night, as opposed to lumberjacks.

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