Whether gathering firewood or manufacturing furniture, the preferable option is always to go for oak wood in both cases.
Traditionally, oak leaves have been renowned for their many advantages in varying fields, primarily in medicine, which has been used to heal ailments for different conditions.
However, the prominent use of oak wood still exists in the primary and secondary sectors. First, the oak wood is extracted by cutting down hundreds of trees and then sold to other wholesalers who sell it to manufacturers making furniture or to interior designers who use this wood for creating wooded oak floorboards.
Therefore, the work of an oak wood tree remains. But, if you are purchasing a cord of oak, how would you know what it weighs? To assist you in this calculation, Surferhandy bring your investigation into how much does a cord of oak weighs!
How Much Does a Cord of Oak Weigh?
As with determining the answer to any problem, it is with oak that you cannot provide a definitive estimate of the weight the cord will have. This is because several aspects of the cord of oak lead to the conclusion we can draw.
Therefore, there is a real possibility that the cord of oak you bought would have a different weight than your competitor’s. Similarly, some retailers selling you the cord of oak will charge you per the weight it has, while others might have a fixed charge for an entire cord with a nonnegotiable policy.
Even though the standard weight, you can expect your cord of oak to have ranged between two thousand to four thousand pounds. There will be a twenty-five percent variance rate depending on the following factors that we will be bringing into the discussion:
Dryness of the Oak
The moisture content of the cord of oak weight is a factor that can either increase or decrease the total weight that you would be paying for. The moisture content in oak wood can significantly enhance its weight.
However, if the oak wood is dry and has been robbed of all its moisture content due to the environmental conditions and the type of forest it was extracted from, then the weight will be lesser.
Moisture content is high in those pieces of oak wood that have been recently cut out from the tree in comparison to those that have been left in the warehouse now for years. With moisture, the final weight of your oak wood cord can vary up to a thousand pounds.
Pieces
Another one is what type of cord of oak you are purchasing. This means the shape of a wood part that formulates your wood oak. Are they just round logs, or have they been further cut into long wood slices?
Whatever the shape, depending on it, the weight will be determined. For instance, round logs weigh slightly compared to sliced wood pieces. Therefore, the retailer might even charge you less for the round logs because your effort and energy will be going into further chopping those pieces up.
Thus, an additional discount for the energy you will invest in slashing up your freshly purchased cord of round oak logs. Therefore, you must act cleverly, utilize this knowledge of weight differing according to the cord’s shape, and use it as a base to negotiate prices.
Species, wise
There are many species for the oak trees, including Southern Live, White Oak, Bur Oak, and Sessile Oak, etc. with each species comes a set of different characteristics of an oak tree, and these features are inclusive of their weight.
From this information, we can conclude that the oak tree species would play a significant role in the final weight calculated for your oak cord.
While some species of the oak tree are predicted to weigh more, the rest are anticipated to weigh less than you expected.
Stacking Technique
The way the wood will be stacked says a lot about the weight the cord of oak will have. Different methods utilized for stacking result in varying weights of the cord. For instance, if the buyer you are purchasing from has stacked the wood haphazardly, then many unoccupied spaces between the wood pieces will remain.
As a result, the weight will be lesser because the cord is loosely stacked and tied together. In contrast, if the buyer has closely stacked each piece of wood, leaving minimal unoccupied spaces within the pieces, then the cord’s weight will be more.
Therefore, we advise you to have the wood pile stacked neatly when making your purchase because this would ensure that more pieces of wood are stacked and will adequately accommodate the weight.
What Is The Size Of a Cord of Oak?
Remember that the most convenient method to measure oak wood’s size or weight is through a cord. Prominently, it is one of those measurements that every seller and buyer would recognize and prefer dealing in instead of taking the weight of every piece of log, measuring it, and then charging you.
If oak wood is set individually, not only will it be more expensive for you as a buyer to purchase, but the entire task that has to be undertaken is lengthy and unnecessary. Irrelevant and unnecessary because why measure every part when you can measure the whole and charge the buyer?
The term “cord of oak” has many links and, subsequently, different meanings, such as face cord, stove cord, and running cord. However, the term deemed appropriate and legal in Canada and the US is oak wood.
Most of the time, again, we are not guaranteeing for every log, but usually, the cord of oak you will encounter will have a volume of 128 cubic feet. The measurements you will frequently come across for the cord are 4x4x8, four feet tall, four feet wide, and eight feet long.
The measures we mentioned and the volume are the standard dealing numerics in which buyers and sellers do their transactions. With other terms or measurements, it is doubtful that a buyer will be willing to deal with you.
Nevertheless, a crucial point to keep in mind is to discriminate between a cord of wood and a stack. The cord has different measurements than a stack, whereby the height and the length remain the same as the cord of oak, but the width differs and is sixteen.
Number of Wood in A Cord of Oak
Not only is the weight of a cord of oak essential, but the number of wood in it is equally important. You cannot assume just because the cord of oak weighs a lot. It necessarily means that the number of wood will also be more.
There is no such affirmation that the weight of the cord is directly proportional to the pieces of wood present in the cord. Therefore, knowing the estimated number of wood pieces in the cord is necessary before you purchase.
Additionally, apart from the weight, dimension, and size, the number of wood pieces in a cord also acts as a determining aspect when it comes to the final pricing of the cord of oak.
Ideally, and not with a consistent measure, the number of wood pieces you will get in a cord of oak will be estimating be seven hundred pieces of wood that are cut. Now the wood split into the desired shape will impact the present number.
Supposedly, if the logs you purchase of oak are non-split or round, the final number differs and will be significantly lesser. This will happen because the present pieces are massive in size and not negligible, due to which the cord of oak can only accommodate a few pieces, which are lesser than seven hundred.
Once again, it will not always split wood into seven hundred parts, but the shape and thickness determine the final and exact number. Likewise, the specie type and the moisture content will influence the number of wood in the cord of oak.
Why Know the Weight?
Knowing the weight of your cord of oak is necessary for many reasons. Firstly, it can help you plan the transportation method for transferring the wood to where it is destined.
For example, a thousand pounds of oak would require you to book a truck for transportation. Also, you will be in a better position to save on gas by securing a vehicle that can accommodate the entire oak in one go and does not need to take another round.
Moreover, the weight of the cord of oak can also determine how much worth or value the money has. Was the money you exchanged for the oak worthwhile or not?
Conclusion
Now that you know how much does a cord of oak weigh, we hope you can take measures to align the weight when it comes to the transportation of the product.
