Wood-plastic composite
June 3, 2009 by blogtopia
Filed under Definitions
Wood-plastic composite (commonly abbreviated as WPC) is a non-recyclable composite material lumber or timber made of recycled plastic and wood wastes.
There are also application in the market, which utilize only virgin raw materials. Its most widespread use is in outdoor deck floors, but it is also used for railings, fences, landscaping timbers, cladding and siding, park benches, molding and trim, window and door frames, and indoor furniture.
Lumber
June 1, 2009 by blogtopia
Filed under Definitions
Lumber or timber is wood that is used in any of its stages from felling through readiness for use as structural material for construction, or wood pulp for paper production.
Lumber is supplied either rough or finished. Besides pulpwood, rough lumber is the raw material for furniture-making and other items requiring additional cutting and shaping. It is available in many species, usually hardwoods. Finished lumber is supplied in standard sizes, mostly for the construction industry, primarily softwood from coniferous species including pine, fir and spruce (collectively known as Spruce-pine-fir), cedar, hemlock, but also some hardwood, for high-grade flooring.
Dimensional lumber
June 1, 2009 by blogtopia
Filed under Definitions
Dimensional lumber is a term used for lumber that is finished/planed and cut to standardized width and depth specified in inches. Examples of common sizes are 2×4 (pictured, also two-by-four and other variants, such as four-by-two in the UK, Australia, New Zealand), 2×6, and 4×4. The length of a board is usually specified separately from the width and depth. It is thus possible to find 2×4s that are four, eight, or twelve feet in length. In the United States the standard lengths of lumber are 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 22, and 24 feet.
Solid dimensional lumber typically is only available up to lengths of 24 ft, yet since builders have a need for lengths beyond that for roof construction (rafters), builders use "finger-jointed" lumber that can be up to 36 ft long in 2×6 size (see Engineered Lumber below). Finger-jointed lumber is also widely used for smaller lengths like studs, the vertical members of a framed wall. Pre-cut studs save a framer a lot of time as they are pre-cut by the manufacturer to be used in 8 ft, 9 ft & 10 ft ceiling applications, which means they have removed a few inches of the piece to allow for the sill plate and the double top plate with no additional sizing necessary by the framer.
Defects in lumber
June 1, 2009 by blogtopia
Filed under Definitions
Defects occurring in Timber are grouped into the following five divisions:
Defects due to conversion
During the process of converting timber to commercial form, the following defects may occur:
- Chip mark
- Diagonal grain
- Torn grain
- Wane
Timber framing
June 1, 2009 by blogtopia
Filed under Definitions
Timber framing is a style of construction which uses heavier framing elements than modern stick framing, which uses dimensional lumber. The timbers originally were tree boles squared with a broadaxe or adze and joined together with joinery without nails. A modern imitation with sawn timbers is growing in popularity in the United States.
One of the most conventional framing methods is the Neumann Notch, which involves a thirty-two degree angling of adjoining lumber and then a right-angled wedge with an eighteen degree cusp fitted between the lumber before being bolted. This convention was pioneered by Daniel R. Neumann, a carpenter from Germany, that was responsible for the structural development of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. This framing convention spread to construction sites in other colonies, most famously Plymouth and Concord. Neumann’s notched framing then was adopted by carpenters and construction companies and this framing convention is still used today in traditional frame sets.