Pine or Doug Fir: pros and cons for barn walls

[arlosmine]

Tomorrow I have a meeting with the owner of a lumber mill (not a sentence I ever thought I’d be writing :))
This outfit will custom mill the wood for my project and set it aside out of the weather to season until spring, at which time I could have it further kiln dried if desired. A pretty cool byproduct of living in lumber country.

2x12" Doug fir at $1.50/SF for 2"x12" boards.
1x12" Pine is $1.20/SF

I’ve already decided to use rough cut, 2" dimensional lumber instead of T/G because of its greater durability and economy. The boards I’ll use for the stall dividers are TRUE 2x12". HEFTY! I want to use DF for the dividers because they will take more of a beating than the stall fronts.

Is there any compelling reason to not use 1X12" pine for the fronts and doors? They typically don’t take the beating that the other walls do…I’m already planning on using pine for the “people areas”: tack rooms, feed room, storage area.
DF for wash rack, grooming stalls and stall dividers/back walls.
It will save me $0.30/ square foot.

Any input from “woodies”? :winkgrin:

[Frog_Pond]

Taste test

I have pine dutch doors into my paddock and the barn itself is pine board & batten. The horses eat it like it’s a candy bar. I’m not sure if doug fir is less delicious than pine, but, tastiness is worth considering. My horses aren’t cribbers, just wood-chompers, and the addition of anti-chew products has had zero impact on there beaver-ish ways. Hopefully others will chime in.

[clanter]

Douglas Fir is stronger than pine and has a lessor tendency to warp

Pine…which species are they referring ?

here is break down
http://www.wwpa.org/TECHGUIDE/SpeciesUses/tabid/853/Default.aspx

[mountainhorse]

We went with Douglas Fir, horses don’t like to eat it, it doesn’t warp, super strong. However, the only thing we found that is a negative,…because it is so strong, when we went to screw boards in place for a wall, the wood cracked at a few screw holes (we screwed them in, instead of using nails, which may have a different result). Just something to be aware of with DF.

[Bluey]

Depending on how the cut in the wood goes, the trouble with roug, not somewhat finished lumber, is that it can have or develop splinters and those can make terrible abscesses on horses if and when they rub on that wood.

Soft pine is a beaver horse’s candy.
We added some height to a shelter with a frame of pine one afternoon.
We finished late, so didn’t creosote it, were going to next morning.

When we went to feed next morning, the whole one side framing had been eaten down to the tin, as high as he could reach, vertical and horizontal boards, courtesy of our then beaver gelding, that was standing there licking his chops.
Wish we had a picture of that, it was impressive.

You can use that kind of lumber if you treat it or cover any edges thoroughly before horses have access to it.

[Jim_in_PA]

D-fir is going to be more durable, but I’d suggest you not use it rough…at least get it skim planed smooth. It will still be nearly 2" thick and strong but be less of a hazard to horse and human.

[clanter]

.at least get it skim planed smooth

that would be S1S… one surface planed

if you are stacking the lumber to build stall walls you might want S1S2E (surfaced 1 side, 2 edges)

[Tiffani_B]

My stalls were built with rough cut lumber (oak from on the property, OMG it’s like IRON) and I HATE IT. I hate the rough wood. It is absolutely impossible to clean. The dust and spiderwebs are permanently adhered, I swear. It’s also rough in terms of horses rubbing on it, and I’ve gotten a few splinters just from pulling a halter off the hook on the door.

If I were building, I’d use oak (I’ve never in my life seen harder wood) but it would be smooth. I’m contemplating trying to sand it somewhat smoother, at least the stall fronts, so I can stain or paint them and keep them clean. But I have a million other things to do first so it’ll probably never happen LOL.

[N2Equus]

“Is there any compelling reason to not use 1X12” pine for the fronts and doors? They typically don’t take the beating that the other walls do…I’m already planning on using pine for the “people areas”: tack rooms, feed room, storage area. "

IMO, 1x12 is not strong enough for horses. Even the fronts of stalls can take a beating. Think horses rolling and kicking the fronts when trying to get up.

[StormyDay]

I think it depends on how rough of horses you have. Some horses could live in a plywood stall and never have an issue, other horses I have seen kick through 2 inch thick boards! If you ever plan on boarding other horses or buying a draft/large warmblood/etc, go with the thicker wood. If you have well behaved horses who never kick or paw, you should be fine with the pine.

[clanter]

2x12" Doug fir at $1.50/SF for 2"x12" boards.
1x12" Pine is $1.20/SF

just wondering and I may be completely incorrect but I believe you meant Board Feet not Square Feet… lumber is normally measured/sold by the board foot (12 inches by 12 inches by one inch)

here is an easy to use calculator
http://extension.missouri.edu/scripts/explore/G05506.asp

[sascha]

“We choose pine, please. It’s DELICIOUS!” said everyhorse everywhere.

[arlosmine]

Thank you all, my meeting was WONDERFUL!
Hank, the owner of the mill, took TWO hours and looked at all aspects of my plans with me. When I mentioned early on that incas creating a riding center primarily for children, he said “I’m getting more excited about this by the minute”…He made some great suggestions about which materials to use where, and at the end of the conversation, when he asked if I tought jumping as well as dressage, I discovered that his daughters had been in Pony Club in California, and he himself used to ride. He has a real soft spot for children’s programs, and that’s the primary focus of my program (along with some nice “dressage ladies”).

It’s so cool to skip the middle man and support a small business in my region. He is obviously so proud of his shop and quality of work.

Good points about the rough surface: I will inquire about the cost of lightly sanding the surface of the DF stall dividers. I like the rough cut for board and batton exterior walls, but I can see how it would be problematic in stalls.

Clanter, I do indeed mean square foot, not linear foot. The DF boards in question are 12" x 2" x 12’.

Any insights about staining/weatherproofing? I don’t want to paint…much prefer stain.

I’ve decided against pine for the horse areas, but I think I’ll go with it for the people areas.

[Jim_in_PA]

[QUOTE=clanter;8979810]
[/COLOR]

that would be S1S… one surface planed

if you are stacking the lumber to build stall walls you might want S1S2E (surfaced 1 side, 2 edges)[/QUOTE]

My reference to skim-planed was very specific to mean only run through just enough to not be “rough” lumber. if the OP asks for it to be surfaced under the nomenclature you mention, they are going to lose 3/8" to 1/2" of thickness from those 2" rough boards. With skim planing, the loss will be less than 1/4" if done correctly. I use this technique for preserving the nature of antique lumber in furniture making, for example, but it’s an effective method for making full 8/4 material (2") safer to use for exposed construction, such as in the barn.

I personally would also prefer that it be T&G for this application, particularly for stall walls because interlocking adds both strength and “straightening” since it’s hard to use mechanical fasteners between the boards.

[clanter]

I personally would also prefer that it be T&G for this application, particularly for stall walls because interlocking adds both strength and “straightening” since it’s hard to use mechanical fasteners between the boards.

we have stalls of both T&G and just finished lumber… we have found that if a T&G connection gets unconnected it is nearly impossible to reconnect unless you disassemble the stall as the boards tend to wrap or be bent by the force that disconnected the joint. The regular finished lumber walls, we just put a vertical 1by4 in the center of the wall to hold all in place (we have channels the lumber is dropped into on each end), the edges of the 1by4 are rounded by a router … have never had any of those stall walls disturbed in twenty-five pulse years

[NancyM]

Run a vertical board half way down the wall’s length to tie all together, no matter which wood you choose. Many years ago we had a mare who got cast, and during her kicking and struggling, the horizontal boards were spread apart, and her leg went through, and they snapped back on her cannon, and held her that way. These were VERY OLD, very dry, very hard boards, one would NOT think that they could have bent this much, but they did. Since then, we have never left a stall wall without support in the middle of the boards, no matter what they were made of or how thick they were.

PS, the mare survived. The cannon bone did not break, though it should have. But it was heavily damaged. She went back to racing the following year, with the huge scar on her hind leg. She died on a BC Ferry accident in 1979 in Active Pass, when the ferry was stuck on the rocks overnight and the tide went out and all the vehicles tipped into each other as the boat listed.
Anyway, brace the boards, please.

[StormyDay]

NancyM: That is horrible about the ferry

[arlosmine]

Definitely planning on bricking the boards!

Thank you for the tip on lightly smoothing the surface, but not losing much board width. I’ll ask the mill-master about that.

I personally hate tongue and groove stall walls. If one board is damaged, you have to pull the whole thing down to get to it, and good luck aligning all the older boards again. I’d much rather deal with being able to pop out a single board and replace that one alone. Also, if a horse has chewing proclivities, the milled side of the TandG provides many little ledges for them to start beavering on.

The dimensional lumber is very stout, and less likely to warp over time as well.

[Jim_in_PA]

If you install the T&G boards in metal channels, it’s easier to replace somewhere in the stack, but I do understand that it could bring alignment issues later. But if the material is properly kiln dried, there will be less issue with that over time than if you use green wood or not fully dried lumber.