- Advanced
Rot
- Rot
that has advanced to the stage where it is soft and punky.
Typically this is always a defect.
- Air
Check
- A
small separation of wood fibers that occurs along the
grain and results from stresses set up during the wood
drying process. Typically these are not defects if repaired.
- Arch
Shape
- Any
type of arch-like shape cut into a rail or panel, as when
building doors.
- Back
- The
bottom surface of a door, drawer front, moulding, face
frame, drawer side, component, or stave; typically backsides
are graded differently than the front face.
- Bark
- Rough,
corky protective layer on the outside surface of trees
and shrubs. Typically if left on finished product this
is a defect.
- Bark
Pocket
- A
bark-filled blemish in the board. This may or may not
be a defect, depending on the finished grade.
- Bird
Peck
- A
patch of distorted grain resulting from birds pecking
through the growing cells in the tree and sometimes containing
a hole and/or ingrown bark. This may or may not be a defect,
depending on the finished grade.
- Bird’s
Eye
- Small
areas in wood fiber or in the grain pattern that are contorted
to form small circular figures that resemble birds’
eyes. Typically this isn’t considered a defect.
- Blank
- A
board or piece of lumber cut to size and defect free in
the rough mill that is ready for machining.
- Board
Foot
- A
unit of measurement used in woodworking that is equal
to one square foot. Typically measured as one inch thick,
twelve inches wide and twelve inches long (1”x12”x12”).
This is typically how sales and productivity are measured.
- Bow
- One
of many terms used to describe a warp in lumber. This
may be a defect in wood products, depending on the severity
and customers’ requirement.
- Burly
Grain
- A
distortion of wood grain, resulting in a curly or wavy
appearance. Typically this isn’t a defect.
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Cabinet Door
- Any
type of door located on a kitchen, utility or bathroom
cabinet.
- Cathedral
Shape
- Any
type of arch shaped into a rail or panel.
- Characteristic
- Any
deviation from totally clear wood, such as knot, wormhole,
or mineral streak. Characteristics may or may not be considered
defects, consult the Customer Specification Book.
- Check
- See
“Air Check”.
- Chop
- To
cross cut a board, usually in the process of removing
characteristics or defects.
- Chop
saw
- A
type of saw used to chop or cross cut.
- Clear
- Wood
that is free from knots or other characteristics.
- Climb
Cut
- A
cutting process in which the rotation of a cutting head
is turning in the same direction as the piece of wood
is traveling.
- Closed
Knot (also called tight knot)
- Closed
knots have a flat face with no openings in the lumber
surface. There isn’t a size limitation.
- Color
blend
- A
color matching rule, whereby the colors will vary in the
wood (such as in hickory or red birch), and a pleasing
blend must be done versus an actual match.
- Component
- A
constituent part, usually of a cabinet or assembled face
frame.
- Cope
- To
cut a shape or profile into a piece of wood, typically
but not always, on the ends of the piece.
- Corner
Blend
- The
matching of the lineal and end grain profiled area, typically
on a profiled panel or assembled door.
- Cross
Cut
- Any
cut made across or perpendicular to the direction of the
wood grain.
- Cross-grain
scratches
- Scratches
made by the sanding process when sanding across the grain
of the wood. These are typically considered defects unless
removed by hand sanding.
- Cutting
Head
- A
tool or device to which knives are attached, and is used
to cut a shape or profile into a wood piece.
- Dado
- A
rectangular groove cut in wood across the grain.
- Defect
- A
wood characteristic considered undesirable.
- Door
Assembly Clamp
- A
machine that clamps and fastens together a cabinet door
or face frame.
- Drag
Marks
- Marks
on door parts or panels caused by poor handling of parts
through the various workstations. Caused by not picking
up the piece on top completely, but dragging it across
the piece underneath it.
- Drawer
End
- The
front and back components of an interior drawer box.
- Drawer
Front
- The
face of the cabinet drawer, which is seen at all times.
- Drawer
Side
- The
side components of an interior drawer box.
- Dry
Rot
- Decay
of wood tissue resulting in wood fiber that can be easily
crushed and has a dry, powdery texture. Typically this
is always a defect.
- Dust
Collection
- A
plant-wide system to remove sawdust from individual work
centers by suction and collecting it in a central location.
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Efficiency
- The
ratio of useful output to total input; typically used
to determine productivity rates.
- End
Grain
- Wood
grains seen on the end of a board where a crosscut has
been made.
- End
Checking
- Air
checks or cracking that extends from the inner area of
a blank or stave to the end of the blank or stave. This
is typically a defect.
- Equalize
- To
cut a board to exact length and squareness.
- Fall
Off
- A
rip or cutting not applied to a specific order that is
used to maximize yield.
- Face
- The
top surface and four edges of a door, drawer front, moulding,
face frame, drawer side, component or stave; typically
face sides are graded differently than back sides.
- Face
Frame
- The
framework at the front of a cabinet to which the doors
are mounted.
- Face
Laminate
- Two
or more boards being glued together on the face side instead
of at the edges.
- Feathering
- Excess
wood slivers at the ends of rails caused by cope set-up
and feed speeds.
- Feed
Speed
- The
rate at which a piece of wood moves through a machine;
usually measured in lineal feet per minute.
- Finished
Size
- The
dimension of the fully machine part according to customer
specifications or requirements.
- Finished
Goods
- Packaged
material ready for shipment to the customers.
- Flat
Sanding
- To
sand either face of a panel, door or other component,
usually on a wide belt sander, to a specified grit according
to customer needs.
- Fleck,
or Flecking
- These
are spots or marks on the surface of wood (usually birch)
caused by irregularities in the grain or by irrelevant
matter; very similar to worm tracking. Depending on the
amount, this may or may not be a defect.
- Fluorescent
Stain
- A
stain in the wood, which is only visible with the aid
of a black light. Typically this isn’t a defect.
- FPM
(Feet per Minute)
- Measurement
of the operating rate of a machine.
- Frequency
Gluer
- A
gluing machine that uses radio frequency waves to cure
and dry the glue. It will achieve this in a matter of
just a few minutes.
- Gang
Saw
- Any
saw (usually used for ripping) that is equipped with two
or more saw blades and makes several cuts simultaneously.
- Gluer,
or Clamp Carrier
- A
large clamping machine that applies glue and clamps the
wood pieces (staves) together until the glue dries.
- Grain
- The
direction, size, arrangement or appearance of wood fibers
and growth rings.
- Grinding
- 1)
To shape, sharpen or refine by using friction to remove
material from tooling. Typically this process is used
in the grinding or tool room
2) Grinding of waste wood scraps, to create chips for
ease of collection.
- Grit
- The
tiny abrasive particles that are components of sandpaper.
- Groover
- A
type of cutter that resembles a large or thick saw blade,
used to cut a groove in a wood piece.
- Growth
Ring
- The
annual production of wood by a tree, consisting of springwood
and summerwood.
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Hand Shaper
- A
machine that cuts or shapes a pattern into a wood piece
and is fed or operated by hand.
- Hardwood
- A
type of tree that has broad leaves that are shed each
fall; has no reference to the density of the wood itself.
- Heartwood
- The
wood extending from the center of the tree to the sapwood;
typically heartwood is darker than sapwood.
- Hog
- 1)
To shred or pulverize scrap wood pieces to a uniform consistency
2) a machine that does the grinding, shredding and pulverizing
of the wood.
- Hook
Angle
- The
difference between the angle at which a knife is inserted
into a cutterhead and the radius of that cutterhead.
- Honeycomb
- Large
checks or other deteriorations of wood fibers in the center
of a board. Typically these are so severe as to cause
the wood to be un-usable.
- Incipient
Rot
- Early
stags of rot identified by a slight discoloration or bleaching
of the wood. Typically this is not a defect, so long as
it is on the backside of parts.
- Jig
- Any
device used for holding or guiding a wood piece as it
is fed into a tool or machine. Typically used on shapers,
or other smaller hand operated machines.
- Joint
Fit
- The
machined fit of the stile and rail on an assembled face
frame or door.
- Kiln
Dried
- Wood
that has had the moisture removed in a kiln for the purpose
of improving its usefulness and serviceability.
- Knife
Marks
- Tooling
marks left on profiled areas caused by the cutting action
of the knife. Used to determine the quality of the finish.
- Knives
- Pieces
of steel or carbide that are inserted into a cutterhead
used to cut wood.
- Knot
- A
portion of a branch or limb surrounded by solid wood.
- Knot
Cluster
- A
grouping of knots.
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Lineal
- Refers
to length or along the direction of a grain.
- Lineal
Foot or Feet
- Measurement
of length in feet.
- Lockout
- Safety
procedure to insure that air, electrical, hydraulic or
any other potential power or energy cannot reach the machine
during maintenance or set up.
- Lumber
- Boards
that have been sawn off of a log, to be used for building
as in cabinets.
- Lumber
Code
- A
four-part abbreviation showing lumber thickness, grade
and specie that can be found on lumber when brought into
the plant.
- Lumber
Grade
- A
classification of the quality of the lumber. The higher
the grade, the clearer the lumber; the lower the grade,
the more knots or other characteristics.
- Machining
- To
cut, shape or finish a part by machine.
- Machining
Allowance
- The
amount of excess material removed in the machining process
to attain customer quality and size requirements. It is
the difference between rough and finish size.
- Machining
Tolerance
- The
amount of variance above or below a given dimension, allowable
under the terms of various standards.
- Material
Handling
-
Method to move stock from one place to another.
- Mid-rail
-
Horizontal face frame or door component used in the middle
of such product.
- Mineral
Streak
-
A discoloration of the wood caused by minerals taken up
by the tree from the soil. Mineral streaks are typically
darker than the surrounding wood. These may or may not
be a defect, depending on the customers’ specifications.
- Miter
-
An end cut of a piece of wood usually at a 45-degree angle.
- Miter
Saw
-
Machine used to do miter cuts.
- Mortise
-
A slot cut into a board used to receive a tenon from another
board.
- Moulder
-
Machine used to cut a lineal shape or profile into a piece
of wood.
- Mullion
-
Vertical face frame or door component used in the middle
of such product. May also be called a center stile.
- Open
Grain
-
When wood fibers and growth rings are more open than typical.
Causes stain color variations.
- Open
Knot
-
Knots with open areas on the surface of lumber. These
may or may not be defects, depending on the customer’s
specifications and/or grade required.
- Optimizer
-
A computer driven chop saw that takes the optimum cuttings
out of each board, keeping yield as the foremost criteria.
- Back
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PO Number (Purchase Order Number)
-
Number used in production to identify and track specific
orders.
- Packaging
-
Process used to wrap and band wood parts together for
shipping.
- Paint
Grade
-
Lumber used primarily for being painted; not any specific
specie. Grade varies between customers, but will typically
be a normally undesirable color.
- Panel
-
1) Center part of a cabinet door
2) a single, specific product.
- Pieces
or Piece Count
-
The actual number of individual parts.
- Pin
Knot
-
Knots that are very small and tight, usually smaller than
1/8” in diameter. Typically not a defect, depending
on the amount in a certain area.
- Pitch
Pocket
-
Openings that run parallel to the growth rings containing
resin (usually in cherry). Depending on customers’
specifications, these may or may not be a defect.
- Pitch
Streak
-
Surface discolorations caused by pitch in wood; no void
is visible. Depending on customers’ specifications,
these may or may not be a defect.
- Pith
-
The small, soft core occurring in the center of a tree,
branch, twig or log.
- Planer
-
Machines used to surface or finish either face of a board.
- Platen
-
A piece of heavy felt, wrapped with graphite-impregnated
cloth, used to maintain steady down pressure on the sanders.
- Power
Cut
-
Rotation of a cutting head so the direction that the knives
move through a wood piece in the opposite as the direction
in which the piece is traveling.
- Production
(Productivity)
-
The act or process of manufacturing a product. How plant
efficiencies are measured.
- Profile
-
A shape or pattern cut into a wood piece.
- Profile
Sanding
- To
sand a profile by forming the sandpaper to the specific
shape or pattern desired.
- Back
to Top
Rabbet
-
A groove near the edge of a piece of wood that allows
another piece to fit into it to form a joint.
- Random
Length
-
Lengths of wood of no specific length, but within a given
range of lengths (2-8’ long, etc.).
- Rail
-
Any horizontal piece of a cabinet door or face frame.
- Re-Rip
-
To saw wood a second time along the grain to remove characteristics,
or to improve the sawn edge, or to obtain a more suitable
narrower width.
- Rip
-
To saw wood along or in the direction of the grain.
- Roll
Case
-
A system or racks with rollers on them used to move product
through the plant, from workstation to workstation.
- Rough
Size
-
The dimension of the part in the plant or rough mill.
- Route
-
A groove or pattern machined into either face of a component;
typically these grooves do not start or end at the edge
or end of a piece of wood.
- RPM
(Revolutions Per Minute)
-
A measurement of the speed or rotation of a motor or shaft.
- S2S
-
Abbreviation for “surfaced two sides”; where
wood has been planed or moulded on the two face sides
to a specific dimension, but the edges have not been given
a machined finish, and may or may not have specific dimensions
given for the width.
- S3S
-
Abbreviation for “surfaced three sides”; where
wood has been planed or moulded on the two faces, and
one edge has been cut straight with a saw or moulder,
but the other edge has not been cut, therefore no specific
width dimension is given or needed.
- S4S
-
Abbreviation for “surfaced four sides”; where
wood has been planed or moulded on all four sides to specific
dimensions.
- Sand
Scratch
-
The texture or appearance of wood after it has been sanded
that was caused by the sandpaper grit.
- Sanding
-
To polish or scour with sandpaper.
- Sanding
Grit
-
The size of the individual abrasive particles on sandpaper;
common range for woodworking is from 280 grit (very fine)
to 40 grit (very coarse).
- Sapwood
-
The wood extending from the heartwood to the bark. This
is lighter colored than the heartwood.
- Score
-
A pre-cut made with a saw blade to prevent wood fiber
tear out or chipping during the final cut. Typically this
is done on a tenoner.
- Set
Up
-
To arrange or assemble a machine or it components to produce
a product to customer specifications.
- Shake
-
A separation of wood along the grain, the greater part
of which occurs between the annual growth ring. This is
typically always a defect.
- Shrink
Wrap
-
A plastic packaging film used to secure parts to each
other and the pallet they are stacked on.
- Shrink
Wrap Machine
-
A packaging machine that stretches shrink wrap so that
it will shrink and form to the finished product for protection
from shipping damage.
- Skid
-
A pallet on which wood pieces are stacked, and is suited
for moving to and from various areas of the plant; also
suitable for shipping.
- Skip
-
Area of a board or component that has not been cut cleanly,
and the rough face of the lumber shows through.
- Skip
One Rule
- When
color matching for gluing purposes, or when pre-assembling
a door; two parts joining together can skip one color
number (example, you can put a #3 with a #5, but not a
#2 with a #5)
- Skip
TwoRule
-
Same as the “Skip one rule”, except that you
can skip over two color numbers (you can place a #2 next
to a #5).
- Skip
Zero Rule
-
Same as the “Skip one rule”, except that no
color numbers can be skipped (you may put a #3 next to
a #4, but can’t put a #3 with a #5).
- Snipe
-
A deeper than desired cut made in a piece of wood, typically
at the end of a board. Caused by improper set up or machine
parts being out of line.
- Softwood
-
A type of tree that has needle-like or scale-like leaves
that are retained year-round; has no reference to the
density of the wood.
- Sound
-
A term used to describe the stability of wood and characteristics
such as knots; sound meaning the wood or characteristic
is solid, with no loose defects that will break apart
during the machining process.
- Sound
Knot
-
A knot that is solid across its face, is as hard as the
surrounding wood, and shows no sign of decay. Depending
on customers’ specifications, this may or may not
be a defect. It also has no size limitations.
- Stain
-
1) Areas of discoloration that alter wood properties.
These may or may not be considered defects. They’re
caused by mineral (mineral stain), chemical reaction in
the wood (sticker or water stain), foreign matter in the
wood (iron stain), or bacteria (bacteria stain)
2) a colored liquid used to enhance, and give color to,
wood products.
- Stave
-
One individual piece of wood that is glued together with
others to make up a panel.
- Sticker
-
Strips of boards used to separate the layers of lumber
in a pile to improve air circulation in the drying process.
- Sticker
Stain
-
A discoloration that develops in a board where it has
been in contact with a sticker; occurs during the drying
process. This is typically a defect on the face side of
parts, but not on the backside.
- Stile
-
Any vertical piece of a cabinet door or face frame. Does
not include the panel.
- Straight-Line
Rip Saw
-
A machine designed to rip a board one edge at a time into
various widths.
- Back
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Tabbing
-
Excess wood tab at the end of rails caused by cope set
up and/or feed speeds.
- Tear-out
-
Chipping or tearing of wood fibers caused by improper
cutting techniques such as dull tooling, incorrect feed
speed, or improper tools. Can also happen where the grain
patterns change abruptly. If the tear-out is light and
can be sanded out this isn’t a defect. If it’s
too deep to be able to sand out, then it is considered
a defect.
- Template
-
A pattern or gauge, often a thin plate, used in making
or duplicating something, such as cutting knives.
- Tenon
-
A tongue or projection on a piece of wood, shaped for
insertion into a mortise.
- Tenoner
-
A machine that cuts tenons or other shaper into wood pieces,
either on the end grain or the lineal grain.
- Tiger
Striping
-
A distortion of grain in a piece of wood resulting in
a wavy, striped appearance. Typically this is not a defect.
- Tooling
-
Any cutting tool used to produce wood products; includes
but not limited to saw blades, cutting knives, cutter
heads.
- Transition
Stave
-
One stave with two or more colors that fall outside of
the skip one rule. Typically seen in hickory and red birch.
A stave that is used for “blending” colors
in a panel (see “color blend”).
- Unsound
Knot
-
A knot with a portion that is readily removable, and may
include areas of decay. Depending on customers’
specifications and the grade, this may be a defect.
- Vertical
Grain
-
Wood that is sawn so that the flat surface is at a right
angle to the growth rings.
- Back
to Top
Wane
-
Bark, or lack of wood, along the edge of a board. Depending
how it is used, this may or may not be a defect, but is
always a defect on finished product.
- Warp
-
Any variation from a straight or true surface; includes
bow, cup, twist and crook. This may be a defect, depending
on the severity, and customers’ requirements.
- Waste
-
Also called scrap, this is unuseful wood that is typically
thrown away.
- Work
Center
-
A machine center or group of machines that function as
a unit or in a similar manner.
- Wormholes
-
Small, round holes in wood caused by wood boring insects.
Typically if repaired, these will not be a defect, unless
there are numerous holes in one area.
- Worm
Tracking
-
Areas where a worm had traveled in the tree, but did not
leave an open wormhole. If the tracking isn’t soft
and spongy, and there aren’t numerous tracks in
one area, this may not be a defect. This also depends
on the grade of the product.
- Yield
- The
percentage of usable product left after all machining
processes.
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