3 Misunderstandings About Wood As A Building Or Manufacturing Product
Posted on: 2 August 2018
For a really long time, wood was the traditional building and manufacturing product because it was available pretty much everywhere, inexpensive, and easy to manipulate. As modern materials came to fruition, like plastics and metals, a lot of manufacturers shied away from using wood as much or as often if it could be avoided. Even though utilizing wood building materials is often thought of something with a negative tone, there really is nothing wrong with using this natural resource. Here is a look at some of the common misunderstandings about wood as a building or manufacturing product.
Wood is actually stronger than steel in some ways.
Put a piece of wood and piece of steel side by side and ask anyone you want to choose the strongest material. The chances are, they are going to pick up the piece of steel every time. It is a common misunderstanding that steel is always stronger than wood, but that is simply not the full truth. Wood actually supports its own weight better than steel, which comes as a surprise to some who even have professional or industry experience. In other words, if you were to stack a bunch of steel on top of other pieces of steel, those bottom pieces would have a hard time supporting the heft when wood would not under the same circumstances.
Wood does not conduct electricity when properly treated.
Pretty much everyone has witnessed lightning striking a tree at some point in their life, which leads to the allusion that wood does in fact conduct electricity. While this may be true of wood in its natural state as a tree, this is not true with properly treated lumber pieces. The thing that is conducive in a tree is not actually the wood but the moisture inside of its fibers. When tree pieces are cut, dried, and treated to make lumber, that conducive moisture is eliminated.
Wood is actually environmentally friendly in a lot of ways.
People oftentimes think if you use wood, you are doing much more harm to the environment because of the trees that were harvested to gain that wood, but this isn't true either. Wood is actually one of the few renewable materials because trees can be planted over and over. Plus, when wood reaches the end of its usage cycle, it can be recycled into engineered wood products or returned to the environment where it will naturally deteriorate.
Contact a supplier, like Hillside Lumber, for more help.
Share