What is the difference between quarter sawn and flat sawn

The resulting wood displays a cathedral pattern on the face of the board. See pictures here. Quarter sawn lumber is defined as wood where the annular growth rings intersect the face of the board at a 60 to 90 degree angle. When cutting this lumber at the sawmill, each log is sawed at a radial angle into four quarters, hence the name. Dramatic flecking is also present in red oak and white oak. Find out more. Here are the basics of the flat sawn and quarter sawn methods to help you make a decision on which is the best for you.

This is the most common method, also known as plain sawn. This look is the result of the annular rings being 45 degrees or less to the face of the board known as tangential grain. Flat sawn lumber is the most inexpensive option because it is the easiest to obtain. The rest is quarter sawn or somewhere in between. This makes flat sawn more widely available and therefore cheaper. Logs can be cut to produce more quarter sawn but the yield from the log is lower and therefore more expensive.

Overall, the flat sawn boards are popular for a reason — they are easy to come across and are more cost-effective than other cuts. The quarter sawn method is a little bit more costly. Just as the name suggests, quarter sawn lumber is cut into four quarters and then cut using the plain sawn method. The process overall is more time intensive, but it creates a unique pattern that stands out against the plain sawn lumber.

The vast majority of logs intended for flooring are sawn into Plain Sawn boards. It is the easiest method of sawing logs as it is merely sawing the round log into a series of smaller and smaller squares. Because of the relative ease of this method of sawing, this grain pattern tends to be the least expensive option in each species choice. The resultant grain pattern on the face of a Plain Sawn board is typically wide arching lines that some people refer to as Flame Grain or Cathedral Grain Flat Sawn owing to the growth rings being parallel to the face aspect.

This means that on the face of the board, the growth rings present themselves as more or less straight, more or less parallel lines. The unique thing about Oak is the presence of Medullary Rays that emanate outward from the center of the log like spokes in a wheel.