In this way the weight of the superposed boards tends to keep those under them from warping.

The pile is skidded a foot or two off the ground and is protected above by a roof made of boards so laid that the rain will drain off.
Fire-wood is best dried rapidly so that it will check, making air spaces which facilitate ignition, but lumber needs to be slowly dried in cool air so that the fibers may accommodate themselves to the change of form and the wood check as little as possible.

Good air-drying consumes from two to six years, the longer the better.
(2) Kiln-drying or hot-air-seasoning is a much more rapid process than air-seasoning and is now in common use, Fig.57.The drying is also more complete, for while air-dried wood retains from 10% to 20% of moisture, kiln-dried wood may have no more than 5% as it comes from the kiln.

It will, however, reabsorb some moisture from the air, when exposed to it.
The wood of conifers, with its very regular structure, dries and shrinks more evenly and much more rapidly than the wood of broad-leaved trees, and hence is often put into the kiln without previous air-drying, and dried in a week or even less time.
Oak is the most difficult wood to dry properly.

When it and other hardwoods are rapidly dried without sufficient surrounding moisture, the wood "case-hardens," that is, the outer part dries and shrinks before the interior has had a chance to do the same, and this forms a shell or case of shrunken, and often checked wood around the interior which also checks later.