How Much Firewood Fits in a Truck Bed? Volume and Weight Calculator
A truck bed holds less than most people expect, because a full cord is 128 cubic feet of stacked wood and a bed rarely holds half that. This calculator uses your bed measurements, since beds differ, and covers wood that is stacked neatly.
The math
cubic feet = length × width × height (inches) ÷ 1,728, and cords = cubic feet ÷ 128.
A full cord is 4 ft × 4 ft × 8 ft = 128 cubic feet of stacked wood. A face cord of 16-inch pieces is one third of that, 42.7 cubic feet (see face cord vs full cord).
Worked examples
The truck sizes below are made up to show the arithmetic. Use your own measurements.
| Bed length × width × stack height | Cubic feet | Share of a cord | Face cords (16 in) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 78 × 50 × 20 in | 45.1 | 0.35 | 1.06 |
| 96 × 60 × 24 in | 80.0 | 0.63 | 1.88 |
Check the first row: 78 × 50 × 20 = 78,000 cubic inches ÷ 1,728 = 45.1 cubic feet. Divide by 128 and you get 0.3526 of a cord (about 0.35).
Weight
The load's weight is its share of a cord times the weight per cord. USU lists red oak at 3,528 lb per dry cord and 4,888 lb green. For the 45.1389-cubic-foot example (0.3526 cord, using the unrounded volume):
- Dry red oak: 45.1389 ÷ 128 × 3,528 ≈ 1,244.1 lb (about 1,244 lb)
- Green red oak: 45.1389 ÷ 128 × 4,888 ≈ 1,723.7 lb (about 1,724 lb)
Check the payload rating in your truck's owner's manual before you load it. See the weight of a cord by species.
What this does not cover
- Loosely thrown wood. The calculator assumes pieces stacked neatly. This site has no sourced figure for how much a loosely thrown load holds, so it doesn't give one.
- Price. Turn a price for a truckload into a price per cord with the price converter: choose "Other" and type the cubic feet from this page.
Sources
- Cord geometry: 1 full cord = 4 ft × 4 ft × 8 ft = 128 cubic feet; 1 cubic foot = 1,728 cubic inches.
- Utah State University Extension, Wood Heating, Table 1: weight per cord, dry and green.