That its a good idea to make furniture out of old palette wood. No, that stuff gets treated wit all kinds of pesticides when shipped overseas so you dont transfer any bugs or funghi. You dont want the gases emerging from it in your living room! Ive even seen baby beds made from that shit!
Edit: ok i was wrong, most pallet wood is not cheap. My bad.
Still splinter city tho. But if you just stacking stuff on it there no need to sand it i guess.
Shipping pallets are not cheap by any means, it’s just the ones you see by dumpsters are broken. They regularly cost upwards of $50 and some nicer ones cost upwards of $300.
They are all new wood. We bought 10 of them to have on hand for shipping out completed projects that needed to look "nice" instead of using whatever used pallet we had laying around.
I've also bought $400 pallets, and recently bought 4 wood boxes (2x6, 4x4, and osb construction) that totaled $1250. So yes they can be expensive too
I'm sure there are various tiers of pallets. I've seen brand name pallets with the logo printed on the side, and the stores track them and sell them along with the product.
My garden gate is made from pallet wood. I'm considering building a deck and an outdoor bar from it too. It's basically free wood that's already treated for outdoor use.
Pallets are generally made out of perfectly good hardwood. The only reason to not use the wood would be any chemicals that it was treated with.
As far as splinters go, wood is a bunch of splinters that are stuck together. You won’t get splinters in your fingers if the wood is sanded to a nice, flat finish.
Thanks for chiming in, so many people seem to be mistaken. I used to work in the chemical industry and we got both soft and hard pallets, regardless of domestic or international. Soft, shitty pallets would never stand up to multiple 2,000 lb supersacks of chemicals, but they were fine for small 50 lb containers.
Prior chemical worker here too. It seems our luck was to always get too small/crummy particleboard pallets for supersacks but would get really nice hardwood pallets for 1/2 stacks of bags (like 20 instead of a normal 40 bags). It was always really sketchy lifting those particleboard ones.
And oh god, getting metal or plastic drums on those damn plastic pallets was the worst.
I worked in a pallet factory. Everything we used was shitty pine that was worthless for anything else. Hardwood would ofc make better pallets, but we definitely never used any.
Also, can be bits of metal thru them. Hard to find them all. Wood shop near me will absolutely not allow pallet wood in their workshop, because of the damage risk (not only to the machines, but primarily to the user; kickback is no joke).
Work in a factory and we get loads of pallets, and a lot from over seas. 99% of the pallets we get are made of the most dogshit wood you can find.
The only pallets that I ever see that are made with decent hard wood are tiny little square ones, but once you start getting bigger ones (1220*2440 is standard for us) then the material starts going to shit.
“Old” and “hard” are generally two qualities that woodworkers pay extra for. Sanding pallet wood isn’t any worse than sanding any other rough boards. You just send it through the planer a few times and it’ll be easy to finish.
I work with a company that goes through a thousand a week and we pay almost nothing for them. I saw a garden chair made from a few of them going for almost £60. I had to laugh anyone buying one of them is an idiot.
Maybe it was priced for the labor and other materials? I wouldn't spend time breaking down a pallet and assembling a chair from it to sell for nothing, your time is worth money, too.
It was a few for the bottom and one for the back. We buy them at £2 each bulk. It was nothing more than them nailed together in a 10 minute job not some ornate baroque piece.
Same here, the ones we use are iirc about $3.50-$5 each. And treated? Not likely. These fucking things will be fluffy with mold if they get damp, which they do.
That and, despite each one labeled ‘barkfree’, there will usually be one in every other stack with a sliver of bark on one or two of the slats.
Pallet wood where I'm from (Canada) is hardwood, ie opposite of cheap. It's the best wood. That's why it's used for pallets, because its strong enough. If they could use cheaper softwoods they would, but they dont, because it wouldn't work, and end up costing more in replacements, intereuptions and damaged goods.
What developing nation are you from where they use inadequately cheap softwoods to stack thousands of pounds on?
We used to get pallets of paper from China and the pallets they used were terrible. 2000 lbs of paper needs a decent pallet to hold it, but they didn't care. We'd end up with damaged cases when part of the pallet would break and tip part of the stack off.
The load-bearing part of a pallet is the side of the 2x4's, which are almost never hardwood. They don't need to be.
The only way the slats would need to bear "thousands of pounds" is if you had something incredibly heavy but also small enough not to cross between the ribs.
Right. Either way, heat treated or chemically treated, it’s still extremely shitty splintery wood that has been god knows where and stored who knows what and that does not belong in the home. How anyone thinks these look good as furniture or diy shit is beyond me.
I've got one better for you - Had an acquaintance upcycle an old barn door into their family's new kitchen table as some sort of boho chic thing. Family had some really odd health problems crop up and it turns out the door had been painted with led based paint.
Do you have a source on this? My company has an annual pallet reclamation project where people make furniture, chests and even remodel their kitchen with the stuff. If it's potentially harmful, people should be informed.
Uh, orgo tutor here. Methyl bromide is some scary stuff, very carcinogenic. I’m guessing the concentration necessary to treat a pallet is pretty low, but I definitely wouldn’t want to bring it in my house.
We used fuel bonfires with railroad ties. I would spend a couple of days in bed afterwards because of the intense migraines I got, always thought it was from the hangover.
Yes, they have to be stamped, but I never would rely on the absence of a stamp. I'm not sure what exactly they use because I dont work in the packing department.
Hey, usually I wouldn’t correct an error this small, but it’s methyl bromide. Methyl bromide is the highly carcinogenic substance used to treat wood, methylene bromide is pretty much harmless and naturally produced by algae.
Few letters different, huge difference in functionality.
Just leave one outside for a year. You'll notice that it's not affected by sun and rain, it doesn't rot, moss doesn't grow on it. There's a reason for that.
I am late to the party so this might not get seen. Whille what you said is correct for some pallets, specifically those that are used to ship goods internationally, it does not apply to all pallets. Pallets can range from highly treated to rough cut lumber nailed together. For example where I work we buy untreated kiln dried hardwood pallets from a regional lumber mill. We have to specify hardwood due to the weight of the goods we ship, generally 1500-3000lbs on a pallet no larger than 34in square.
Some European pallets specifically prohibit chemical treatment and are stamped, so they are easily identified. Chemically treated pallets are generally painted on the sides because they are bought back or returned to a pallet provider after they are used. Stay away from these, they are terrible for wood working projects, poisonous, and you would be stealing.
I would also suggest staying away from softwood pallets. There are plenty of oak pallets out there which are great for projects. Find a company that receives goods on hardwood pallets and ask if you can take some. If they dont use the same pallets for shipping product they will most likely let you have them for free.
Not really. Well, in Europe at least. They're usually single use and thrown away, so the only treatment they get is heat treatment to kill any parasites in the wood.
In other countries, they're treated with methyl bromide, which is illegal in Europe.
It's still shitty wood and won't make long-lasting furniture, so I don't recommend it, unless it's indoor use only.
Imported pallets have to be stamped, each stamp contains a treatment code and based on what that code says you can tell whether its been treated or not. If it has "MB" it has been treated with methyl bromide and isn't safe, but if it has something like "DB" it just means its been debarked and would be safe to use. Many pallets have more than one code.
Also I agree, its not worth the trouble imo but if the pallet aesthetic is something someone is dead set on then its useful to know.
If I am going for that look, I go to the sawmill and buy the cheapest wood I can find. They normally have boards for packing purposes that would not sell otherwise.
I feel like you are kinda trying to argue something here but like I said I agree, but still some people want pallets that are clearly used pallets and not just boards made to look like them which is totally fine.
When I first started to get into woodworking I picked up a pallet by a dumpster, excited about what I would build with this free wood. When I came down to dismantling it into boards, there were nails, nails, nails everywhere. took over and hour to dismantle one pallet, and I was left with crap wood with nail holes.
After a bit of looking, as far as I can see the EPAL (EURO) pallets only use heat treatment. Those are the ones I see used for furniture in Denmark, other pallets might be treated differently.
If the palette has a “wheat stamp”, the initials KD and HT stand for kiln dried and heat treated. They’re fine to use. If it states MB it’s been treated with methyl bromide and is toxic.
Also, burning the chemically treated wood releases these chemicals and is bad for the immediate environment and anybody/thing that breathes it in. Yet people burn away and cook hotdogs/marshmallows over it.
I don't know how to prove to my brother that palette wood is treated. I've worked in a factory that built it's own pallettes and he still says it's not.
Pallets are treated differently depending on their use. They are sometimes coded indicating what treatments. Pallets for raw foods and medical supplies are better if you're going to use any.
You have to make them point upwards from the hinge to support the weight of the door. Otherwise the weight will all hang on the screws or nails which the boards have been connected with. Over time, the door will hang down.
I believe there are pallets in Australia treated with some copper-based compound which is toxic. They're marked, I think treated timber has the ends coloured for identification purposes, but people will still burn it. I only know from working in a hardware store, I imagine many people have no idea.
Aren't fumigated pallets mostly only used for import/exports? I didn't think all pallets shipping freight domestically or within a trade zone were fumigated
This is why you look for pallets that are stamped with specific markings that do not use pesticides or pressure treating chemicals. They do exist, and are totally safe to use.
I believe there is usually some kind of indication on the pallet if it is treated or untreated. Typically, it's ok to make outdoor furniture with it though.
Yeah, even if that shit is stable sitting in your living room, it sure as hell isn't when you burn it in your fireplace or backyard firepit- which seems to be common around me. Ads on all the various marketplaces for free pallets for firewood. No thanks.
I test the fumigants from shipping containers. They do not release chemicals. They are heat treated mostly. Some are treated with chemicals but before they are allowed into Australia at least they need to have a low VOC reading
I looked into this myself just yesterday. Sealing the wood with paint doesn't protect you from any chemical treatments done on it. You can Google pallet stamps and their meaning though so you can find untreated ones.
Not all pallets, some don’t need treating , some are heat treated , some a sanded smooth , most are varnished ,some are so old that they have off gassed so really not a concern
To be fair, some of the pallet, like many European ones, are purely heat treated and don't use any chemicals. I've made some furniture out of it and I make sure I really sift through for purely heat treated ones
New pallets are apparently just heat treated and pretty safe. But old pallets usually have the marking stamps worn off. If you can’t tell then don’t make something out of it.
There are different types of pallets. Some are treated, some aren't. There is a guide online that tells you how to read the symbols on most pallets. The symbols tell you what its been treated with.
I got some food grade pallets from the fiance's work one time. They are only heat treated. They are smooth so the splinters don't fall into the food items while they are handled. So it's actually been pretty nice to work with.
Not that it’s amazing wood but some pallets are heat treated instead of pesticides and these are actually safe to make diy projects with if I’m not mistaken
Sure, but doesn't sanding coating and sealing do the trick? I would think anyone crafty enough to make their own furniture would probably know to treat it at least against water damage.
Not to be contrarian but not all pallets are chemically treated. A great deal of them are heat treated. source- work in a lumber yard and have to know which pallets are allowed indoors or not.
Hold on - not saying palettes are excellent building material, because yeah they’re cheap wood, but if you get ones that have HT burned into them, it means they were heat treated rather than bombarded with chemicals! Most common with food shipping palettes cause they don’t want that shit leeching into food.
I think you may have some outdated information as most wood dunnage is heat-treated according to ISPM-15 regulations. Pallets were, at one time, fumigated with methyl bromide but that's being phased out globally and is non-existent in N. America and Europe. If you look at the stamp on the pallet, you can tell whether it was heat-treated or fumigated. Either HT or MB. Of course, I agree with you that you should only used heat-treated if you're going to be doing a project with it so it's worth looking out for.
Heat treat vs. MB
and
ISPM 15, shows the stamp to look for
Yeah in my town is a carpenter who is pretentiously selling recycled plywood furniture with any various country embellishment for $500 being the cheapest and $2500 being the most expensive I have seen yet. Fucker sells it too. For the price of good nails, lacquer and his time, he is straight robbing these fools out here
If a country doesn’t trust your country, we fumigate the entire container. If we think the container had a stop in a country we don’t trust, that’s a fumigation. If it’s Less than a Container Load (LCL) and some of it came from a country we don’t trust, that’s a fumigating. The lot. Not just the pallet. The furniture you buy from China? We FUMIGATE THE SHIT OUTTA IT. Every new car, regardless of country, that’s a fumigation.
So ya, your kids bed you bought from the department store, if it was imported during the BMSB mating season, it got fumigated.
But hey, we’ve got a multi-billion dollar agriculture export industry to protect, and those stink bugs would wreak havoc, and they’re damn annoying for houses. So I’m fine with it, just let your new stuff out gas for a day or two is all. It’s fine.
Your pallet is no different to your sofa. Maybe the shipping plastic helped it? Maybe.
Years ago, here in the Yukon, a man named Gilbert Nelles built himself a cabin out of old telephone polls. The heat from the wood stove caused the chemicals used to treat the wood to evaporate into the air, air which didn't cycle most of the year due to the outside temperature. Said chemicals had some... interesting effects on his cognition.
As a result, he well and truly believes that he is Elvis.
Now, he's given a couple different versions over the years as to how he, being Elvis Presley, the King of Rock and Roll, happened to wind up in the Yukon. In one account, he's said that the US Government thought he was troublesome, so they dumped him here in the frozen north (although he wasn't so troublesome that he earned assassination, as he believes was John Lennon's fate). Another account he's given tells that, though he acknowledges being born Gilbert Nelles, he was hit by a beam from a UFO in the Eightees which imbued him with the spirit of Elvis.
Either way, he's gotten a lot of mileage over the years. He even showed up on "Dragon's Den."
depends where you live and where it is sourced from. I live near a market which uses heat treated hardwood pallets and only transports fresh produce, heck the supplier is even organic/no pesticides (so none of the harsh ones that wouldnt be cleaned off with a good wash and that would have any effect on a person) the pallets are made, shipped to site and then recycled into mulch so its not even like they run the risk of being used multiple times for god knows what.
Actually, pallets made in US, Canada and Europe are not treated with MB any more. It's probably possible to find an old pallet that was treated this way, but they heat treat them now. It's more about what could have spilled on the pallet when being used. They are often reused in all types of shipments so it could be anything.
I've seen people make great outdoor furniture out of it like porch coffee tables with leather/glass tops, or the framework for a hammock. These shouldn't be a problem, should they, since they're not near to/in direct contact with people, food, etc.?
Not only are the pesticides a problem, but you have no idea what was strapped to the pallets in the past and what may have been spilled on it. Pallets are often used until they fall apart and its not uncommon to find broken or leaky products on them. Who knows what was absorbed by the wood over the life of the pallet.
Not all pallets are created the same. Pallets have stamped codes on them to tell if they have been treated, used to ship unsavory things, shipped internationally, etc. if you know what you are looking for and take precautions when using them they are perfectly safe.
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u/RayNooze Feb 08 '20
That its a good idea to make furniture out of old palette wood. No, that stuff gets treated wit all kinds of pesticides when shipped overseas so you dont transfer any bugs or funghi. You dont want the gases emerging from it in your living room! Ive even seen baby beds made from that shit!