WORE, in the mensuration of artificers' work, includes the taking of the dimensions of every description of timber necessary in the construction of buildings, finding their contents, and valuing the same.
The works done by the carpenter, in the general construc tion of buildings, are the preparation of piles, sleepers, and planking, or other large timbers in the foundations, cente• ings to vaults, wall-plates, lintels, and bond-timbers, naked flooring, partitioning, roofing, battening to walls, ribbed ceil ings to form vaulting for lath and plaster, &c. These are not necessarily used in the construction of every edifice : piling and planking, or other timbers used in the foundation, are only incidental, depending upon the insufficiency of the ground to be built upon ; the remaining articles may be all used in the most substantial and elegantly constructed houses.
Large and plain articles, where a uniform quantity of materials and workmanship is expended, are generally mea sured by the square of 100 superficial feet.
Piles may be made at per piece, and driven by the foot run, according to their diameter, and the quality of the ground.
Sleepers and planking are measured and valued by taking the superficial contents in yards or squares.
Plain centering is measured by the square ; hut as the ribs and boarding are two different qualities of work, they ought to be measured and valued separately ; one dimension of the boarding is taken by girting it round the arch, the other is the length of the vault.
Centering for groins should be measured and valued as common centering, but in addition thereto, the angles should be paid for by- the foot run, over and above ; that is, the ribs and boarding ought to be measured and valued separately, according to the exact superficial contents of each, and the angles by the lineal foot for workmanship in fitting the ribs and boards, and for the waste of wood occasioned by the operation. Wall-plates, lintels, and bond-timbers, arc mea sured by the cubic foot, under the denomination of bond.
Naked flooring may either be measured and valued by the square, or by the cubic foot, according to the description of the work, and the quantity of timber employed. In forming an idea of its value, it is proper to observe, that in equal cubic quantities of small and large timbers, the small timbers will have a greater superficies than the large ones, and there fore the saving will not be in a ratio with the solid contents; consequently the value of the workmanship will not follow the cubic quantity or said ratio. The difficulty of handling tim bers of the same length increases with the weight or solidity, as the greater quantity requires greater power to handle it, and consequently a greater expenditure of time: and though the time may not be exactly in a ratio with the solid quantity, there will be no great difference, as the respective sections will not vary considerably in their dimensions ; and as the value of the sawing upon a cubic foot is comparatively small to that of the work done by the carpenter, the whole value of labour and materials may be ascertained with sufficient accuracy where the work is uniformly of one description.
In naked flooring, where girders are introduced, they interrupt the uniformity of the work by mortises and tenons. In this respect, the price ascertained by the cubic quantity of the girders, would not be sufficient at the same. rate per foot, as the other parts, not only on account of the great dif ference of size, but as it is cut full of mortises to receive the tenons of the binding-joists, it occasions a siAl greater disparity in the quantity of workmanship. A correct method, therefore, of valuing labour and materials, would he to measure and value the whole by the cubic quantity, and allow an additional rate upon every solid toot of girders ; or if the binding joists were not inserted in the girders at the usual distances, a fixed price for every mortise and tenon, in proportion to their size, which would keep a ratio with the area of the end of the girder.