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Comment by duffbeer703 | Hacker News Reader

The longer you acclimate the wood, the tighter the joints are. You also are able to spot flaws in the wood. This is one of the reasons why people recover wood from old barns -- a farmer I worked for in high school was offered a substantial amount of money for wood in a Dutch barn built in the 1600's.

These guys are old-school craftsman who are obsessed with quality. Refreshing in this age of disposability.

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The reason old wood is valuable is because it has characteristics that are not available in lumber harvested today. These include grain, width of planks and density. Not because its moisture content has had several centuries to change.

When you have a plank, post or beam that has stood in place in an unheated barn for 400 years, it has been subject to the vagaries and every permutation of hot & cold, damp & dry.

These cycles bring out the best and worst of the wood. Obviously you are recovering old wood in a barn for other reasons as well, but in the ladder scenario, they want top notch wood that will last. Since SFFD has ladders that have been in active service since 1919, they obviously have that down.

Undoubtedly the astrological sign of the wood is also a factor in how the wood has responded to its life experiences, but that is all irrelevant for making a ladder as long as the wood's moisture content has stabilized suitably for its target environment.

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