Wood Moisture Meter

Tad Lynch

Tad Lynch

Joined
Nov 14, 2006
Messages
1,109
I'm looking at some moisture meters online, and I was wondering if anyone has any recommendations for which ones to buy/not buy. I've got a lot of wood that I've harvested that I would like to get stabilized, but I need to know the moiture content--mostly maple. Which ones are accurate on both soft woods and the harder exotics, such as cocobolo, etc? I would appreciate some advice.

Thanks,

Tad Lynch
 
There are several things to consider here:

1) Are you going to try and force dry the wood with heat, or just let it dry naturally in your garage?
2) What size will the wood be when it is drying?

The reason I asked these questions is that if you are force drying the wood then the moisture meeter is a must. However, if you are just letting the wood dry naturally it will eventually come to equallibruium with it's suroundings. In other words if you live in the desert versus on the coast the wood will have a different moisture content based on your local environment.
If the wood is in small blocks (say 2x2x6) when it is drying naturally, then you can weigh the peices and when they quit losing weight they are at equalibrium with their surroundings. In other words as dry as they will get with this method.

I have a moisture meter that I picked up several years ago for about $100, however, I'm at work at this time and do not remember the type/model. You should be albe to go some wood wroking websites and find somehting there.
 
To add on to what Mark said, I have a chart for humidity vs moisture content in wood.

Relative humidity / Approximate wood moisture content (Equilibrium)
90% / 17%-19%
80% / 15%-16%
70% /12%-13%
60% / 10%-11%
50% / 9%-10%
40% / 7%-8%
30% / 5%-6%
20% / 4%-5%
 
Lignomat
Roughly $100 to $120, but you get what you pay for. You can probably get it cheaper on the bay if you watch for them.

Larry
 
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