12 BULLETIN 440, IT. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
OVERRUN.* 
With average timber and a normal lumber product, the overrun 
at a mill employing an inserted tooth circular saw is negligible if not 
lacking. A solid tooth circular saw does a trifle better, showing a 
possible average overrun of 2 or 3 per cent. The figures obtained 
at a number of efficient band mills range from 5 to 8 per cent, the 
most common being 6 per cent or a fraction over. A short mill tally 
at a band mill sawing pine timber from a National Forest sale in 
the southern Sierras showed an overrun of 5 per cent. 
A mill tally of 4,190 logs made during the summer of 1914 at a 
representative single band mill in the northern Sierras gave the fol- 
lowing average overrun of the decimal C scale: Sugar pine, 7 per 
cent; yellow pine, 6.9 per cent; Douglas fir, 10.3 per cent; white 
fir, 2.5 per cent; incense cedar, 15.6 per cent. These percentages 
are perhaps slightly above the average on account of the manufac- 
ture of sawed ties from many top logs. A second tally of 4,890 logs 
at another single band mill during 1914 gave the following overrun: 
Sugar pine, 2.6 per cent; yellow pine, 0.7 per cent; Douglas fir, 8.1 
per cent; white fir, 1.1 per cent; incense cedar, 16.6 per cent. Most 
of the overrun occurs in the logs of poorer quality. 
TIMBER QUALITY. 
The proportion of the various grades produced depends not only 
upon the quality of the timber but also upon the efficiency of the 
operation, the size of the mill, and the faculties for marketing lum- 
ber. Inefficient operations do not cut as high a proportion of the 
better grades as efficient ones. Small mills without a marketing 
organization do not take as much care in separating grades, and fre- 
quently put all lower grades into box. 
In speaking of the quality of a tract of timber it is customary to 
say that it will produce a certain per cent of uppers, meaning No. 2 
shop and better. The poorer yellow and Jeffrey pine stands in east- 
ern California produce about 20 per cent uppers; better stands pro- 
duce from 25 to 30 per cent. Normal mixed stands of sugar pine, 
yellow pine, Douglas fir, white fir, and incense cedar produce from 
25 to 3 1 per cent. In sugar and yellow pine stands the pine commonly 
cuts from 32 to 45 per cent uppers, yellow pine alone from 30 to 45 
per cent, and sugar pine from 35 to 55 per cent. 
A comparison of the lumber grades produced from sugar and 
yellow pine may be made from Table 2, which shows the results of 
two mill tallies made by the Forest Service during the season of 1914. 
The first of these was for 2,230 logs at a single-band mill in the south- 
ern part of the Shasta National Forest, and the second for 2,490 logs 
1 This information on mill overrun of log scale is derived from a comparison of the figures of scalers and 
tallymen at several representative mills. The log scale is commonly made by the Spalding rule, which 
is somewhat similar to the decimal C rule used on National Forest timber sales. Overrun is greater in small 
or very large logs; less with saws of heavy kerf, and greater when thick planks or timbers are sawed. 
