Lumber 01

Where does it come from?

Lumber (or wood) is utterly abundant and relatively easily replenish-able. It is also by an large the oldest building materials we have used and continued to use as the structural (temporary or not) skeleton for a building. our reliance on wood has made the construction of anything without wood almost impossible. Our need for lumber, gets overshadowed with the use of new materials, and construction methods in today’s buildings. My focus in this and soon other articles is to understand more about wood the material. Leave it to someone in the building industry to write an op ed about an inanimate object.

It should be a safe bet that most people understand lumber comes from a tree. There are a ever increasing types of species of wood. As I started investigating more about the wood it was not just the species of wood that was interesting, but why we use certain species over others. There is a different methods of wood production for every country, but there is a unified standard of wood quality. In large part this is due to an international standard that was started with the ASTM in the United States. The United States has always been able to produce and prepare vast amounts of raw materials, wood is one of these. The United States boasts “the largest production of timber in the world.”(1) and the production will keep growing as “modern forest management ensures not only that felled trees are replaced, but that every year more wood is grown in US forests than is harvested.“(1).

A reason that the United States is a leader in wood production is almost every state is producing wood. The American Forest and Paper Association recently created map concerning wood production throughout the states. It shows very few states (maybe 5) that don't have major wood production.  Nailing down one manufacturing facility is impossible as production spans the entire 50 states, so looking towards industry standards become the only way to understand how wood is made. Which means focusing on the largest typical wood is the best approach, and that wood is Softwood, specifically Southern Yellow Pine. 

America has always been primed for wood production. During  early colonization trees were planted for naval production and to allow for a rapid infrastructure. A large part of why the British empire during the 17th and 18th centuries had the most powerful navy was due the wood production from the states. At the time this was with white pine, but Southern Yellow Pine provided much needed pitch and tar. This is explained in greater detail  in this article Building the Great Warships: NC Timber from Colonial Times to Now By Marget Huffman(13) and in the book White pine by Andrew Vietze. However, it was not until after the Civil War that the United states started major lumber production. (12) Though, production and reforestation of the Southern Yellow Pine specifically took off in 1930 when it started to be used in paper production(12) 

As mentioned above softwoods like the southern yellow pine have been exported from the United States for over 400 years. “Today, America is recognized worldwide as a sustainable source of top quality timber.” (1)  United States lumber is consistent, this is due to: Standardization of sizes and stress ratings, Quality control through the enforcement of a single unified grading system, Strength and durability, Suitability for preservative and fire-retardant treatments, and Construction standardization. That is a lot of things, but out of that list the most important aspect is the single unified grading system. This system is set by NIST. It is completely voluntary, much like the international building code. So, you can manufacture wood however you want, just no one would buy anything in bulk that is not following the PS 20-99 standards, or the more recent addition PS 20-20. These standards are responsible to wood having nominal sizes and actual sizes. The standards required different sizes to have different moisture/shrinkage rates which keeps wood at a set size. Though this was not done at random, but in response to widely accepted industry standards at and around the time wood production was standardized nationally. If you find building code interesting you should read the provided link (click here). It explains why wood is cut the way it is cut. 

My hope is to write up something like this every month for 4 months concerning wood the material. Starting with the history, moving to how its cut and shipped, and how construction has changed with wood over time. I have provided some books that I found interesting in my search, as well as links about all things wood. If you would like to search my sources, please do, I had immense fun finding them and there is so much information I did not touch on. 

Helpful Links

• Organization - American Wood Council

• Organization - APA Engineered Wood Association

• Wood Products - Anthony Forest

• Wood Connector - Quickie Tie

• Wood Connector - Strong Tie

• Wood Connector - USP

• Wood Connector - Hurri-Bolt

• Wood Products - Trout River Lumber

Sources

1. http://www.softwood.org/uploads/7/1/0/6/71061057/as_species_eng.pdf, Accessed November 1, 2019 //Lots of wood

2. https://sfpa.org/industry-links/, Accessed November 1, 2019 //Where the wood comes from

3. https://www.awc.org/faqs, Accessed November 1, 2019 //Tolerance then and now

4. https://www.awc.org/education/ecourses, Accessed November 1, 2019 // What can we do with wood

5. https://icc-es.org/zh/building-products-listing-program/listing-report-directory/, Accessed November 1, 2019 // Products for wood?

6. https://www.apawood.org/publication-search?q=, Accessed November 1, 2019 // Frankestien’s monster’s wood (you read right)

7. https://www.eforester.org/, Accessed November 1, 2019

8. https://www.afandpa.org/, Accessed November 1, 2019

9. http://www.forestprod.org/, Accessed November 1, 2019

10. https://www.fs.fed.us/, Accessed November 1, 2019

11. https://naturalresources.house.gov/, Accessed November 1, 2019

12. https://www.builddirect.com/learning-center/flooring/pine-southern-yellow/, Accessed November 1, 2019

13. https://cals.ncsu.edu/agricultural-and-resource-economics/news/nc-timber-during-colonial-times-and-now/, Accessed November 1, 2019 // How the british ruled the world with American materials

14. https://www.nhla.com/nhla-services/hardwood-industry-rules/, Accessed November 1, 2019 // Grading rules Hardwoods

15. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2010/04/02/2010-7494/final-voluntary-product-standard-doc-ps-20-10-american-softwood-lumber-standard, Accessed November 1, 2019 // About every goverment document

16. https://www.nist.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2019/07/29/ps20-15_proposed_revisions_20190725_track_changes.pdf, Accessed November 1, 2019 // Volentary softwoood grading system

17. Allen, Julia C., and Douglas E. Barnes. “The Causes of Deforestation in Developing Countries.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 75(2) (June 1985)

18. Bengston, David N., Hans M. Gregersen, and John Haygreen. “Seesawing Across the Forty-Ninth Parallel: The International Diffusion of a Wood-Based Technology.” Journal of Forest History 32(2) (April 1988).

19. Greeley, W.B. “The Relation of Geography to Timber Supply.” Economic Geography 1(1) (March 1925): .

20. Guha, Ramachandra. “The Prehistory of Community Forestry in India.” Environmental History 6(2) (April 2001): .

21. Kohlmeyer, Fred W. “Lumber Distribution and Marketing in the United States.” Journal of Forest History 27(2) (April 1983): .

22. Kotok, E. I. “America’s Role in Meeting World Timber Needs.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 89(2) (July 1945): .

23. Streyffert, Thorsten. “Softwood Resources of Europe.” Economic Geography 10(1) (January 1934): .

Books that might Interest you……