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I apologize ahead of time as I am brand new to wood cutting and do not know a lot.

I am cutting wood that is supposed to be 14 inches long lets say, but when I cut it, I mess up slightly and it winds up being 13 and 15/16th or 13 and 7/8th of an inch. Are these pieces of wood still good to use or is a redo necessary?

Thank you!

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  • Protip: always cut on the waste side of the marked line.
    – Graphus
    Jul 31 '19 at 8:29
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    We cannot answer, at least not without a lot more detail. It depends on whether or not 14 inches is a critical dimension for you. Can you adjust other aspects of your project? That all being said, a 16th is pretty small amount to worry about for general woodworking. An 8th approaches real error for precision work. So, it depends. I'm not sure this can be answered given the information at hand. Unless you give us more information about this project, I'm going to probably vote to close.
    – jdv
    Jul 31 '19 at 13:55
  • @jdv. Concur that more detail is really needed here. But re. acceptable error, a sixteenth is too far to be out really. I would be pretty upset if I were 1mm out and that's 1/25". I'd want to be no more than 1/64" out myself on any measurement that's important, and I'd prefer to do better than that.
    – Graphus
    Jul 31 '19 at 18:30
  • @Graphus I agree. Looking back on my comment I was possibly thinking about general, rough carpentry, where a 1/16th is easily allowed for. This may illustrate some of my bad habits vis-à-vis using gentle dead-blow persuasion more than I like. Pretty trim can hide a lot of sins :/
    – jdv
    Aug 1 '19 at 14:46
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If it is a picnic table no problem if it is in the face of a fancy hutch maybe, maybe not. Sometimes the project can be modified to fit, sometimes it really does not matter, and I have had to scrap a large part from expensive wood for a small error (ouch). Sorry for the clear as mud answer.

Anyone have a good board stretcher for sale? (no such thing)

One of the skills you will pick up on along the way is the ability to hide your mistakes or turn them into features.

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