Our lumber goes across a 16 foot Irvington Moore end trimmer to end trim lumber even lengths with nothing shorter than 6 feet. From end trimmer goes direct to our 6 foot Irvington Moore automatic chain arm lumber stacker. From automatic stacker it goes to our air drying buildings.

Lumber is air dried under air drying buildings for about 45 days before going into dry kilns.

We have double brick kilns with apex roof line which are computer controlled two different ways along with hand held monitors in kiln chamber so as to closely monitor drying process. Usually takes about 2 weeks to kiln dry hardwood lumber.

Anytime you start kiln drying lumber you have to figure out what is the start up moisture content as if you start the drying cycle off at too high a temperature it will destroy the usability of it. When lumber is dried to fast the fiber is pulled apart with lumber looking like a honey comb. About 2 percent moisture lost per day is ideal.

You take about 3 algebra formulas to figure out the start up moisture content by weighing samples & drying samples in a small oven. You can then monitor moisture being lost as lumber is being dried. Usually on air dried lumber you start out at about 110 degrees & finish the charge at about 180 degrees. It's not really the heat that dries lumber. It's the depression between the dry heat & wet (humidity) heat that pulls moisture out of lumber.

WE CONDITION (STRESS RELIEVE) all our dry kilned lumber. We feel if the lumber isn't stress relieved then we are doing our customers a disservice. Usually takes about 12 hours to cool down dry kiln chambers then another 12 hours of pumping raw steam into the dry kiln chambers to force moisture back in to relax the lumber.

For those unfamiliar with condition (stress relieve) you have to do this at the end of the dry kiln charge to relax the lumber. As you force moisture out of lumber by the end of the charge it's laying there stressed.

Perfect example is when you use your table saw to split a wide board or cut part of it off. If the saw is pinched where it's hard to get the board to go through the saw then the lumber IS NOT stress relieved.

To resolve this problem you condition the lumber or force moisture back into the lumber at the end of the drying process to relax the lumber. You do this on most all hardwoods. Softwoods or Poplar you don't have to condition. Even though Poplar is a hardwood it's so open poured that it doesn't need conditioning. This makes the lumber more user friendly.