BOARD MEASURE 139 



stick of timber sixteen inches in diameter and twelve inches in 

 length shall constitute one cubic foot, and the same ratio shall 

 apply to any other size and quantity. Each cubic foot shall con- 

 stitute ten feet of a thousand board feet. 



This rule is extensively used in scaling spruce in Maine, 

 New Hampshire, and Vermont. A broad caliper bar is 

 stamped with the figures, and the stiff iron jaws attached 

 throw out f inch from the diameter for bark. The diam- 

 eter is taken in the middle of the log, and in ordinary 

 practice logs of any length are measured as one piece. 

 The values given by the rule run parallel to actual cubic 

 contents and the rule is therefore a fair one as applied to 

 pulp wood. It is not a satisfactory measure of the yield 

 of logs at the saw, small logs being for that purpose over- 

 valued and very large logs undervalued. As with cubic 

 measure, however, its values could be readily converted 

 into board measure by the use of different factors for logs 

 of different sizes. 



It is now the uniform practice wherever the New Hamp- 

 shire rule is in use to take 115 feet by the rule for 1000 

 feet of lumber. 



SECTION IV 

 BOARD MEASURE 



1. General. A board foot is a piece of sawed lumber 12 

 inches square and one inch thick, or any piece, as 3 X 4 

 or 2 X 6, which if reduced to 1 inch thickness has 144 

 square inches of area. It is properly the unit of sawed 

 lumber, and there must always be more or less difficulty in 

 adjusting it to the measurement of logs. 



There are a large number of rules in the country to-day 

 purporting to give the contents of logs of given dimensions 

 in feet, board measure. Among these rules there is wide 

 variation in the value given to logs of the same dimensions. 

 In the manner of their use, too, there is a good deal of 

 divergence, resulting sometimes in dispute and loss. 



The figures of eight rules in extensive use in the United 

 States and Canada the Scribner, the Doyle, the Deci- 

 mal, the Maine, the New Brunswick, the Quebec, the 



