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Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

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Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#131

Post by hadlock »

ostenning wrote: post #108

Whenever I hear about renewable trees I cant help but think how policy failures often lead to more and more forests being destroyed. Perhaps it would be better if we stop over commodifying trees in general and try to reduce our reliance on them and hopefully partitioning them off from the economy could encourage regrowth

Places like Washington State have had replanting programs in place since well before I was born. In the US we have more trees now than we did 100 years ago, forestry and forest management as a problem was solved 50+ years ago.

There's the issue of disappearing rainforest in the amazon, but that's largely due to the fact that growing food is a more valuable use of that land than forest, and has nothing to do with the economic value of the wood on the land.

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#132

Post by adolph »

sfink wrote: post #12

I've been intrigued for a while about various modified wood technologies (eg hardened wood, transparent wood), but I'm always disappointed because it usually ends up just being a minor support structure for a very non-wood material (generally epoxy). This one shows a compression step, so maybe it's different, but I'd really like more info on whether this is actually renewable or sustainable in any interesting sense.…

Well, the glue is a renewable resource, old livestock and milk. That's why Borden used mascot Elsie's spouse Elmer as a glue mascot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_glue

https://americacomesalive.com/elmers-glue-the-surprising-sto...

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#133

Post by gonzo41 »

entropicgravity wrote: post #78
canadian_tired wrote: post #64

Wood is renewable when you can grow it, cut it up into useful shapes, then at the end of its useful life, compost it. As soon as you add a shit load of processing and plastic and other stuff it's not "wood" anymore than gasoline is a dead dinosaur. As for things like plywood that use glue for the laminations...glue is the most expensive and important part of the product. Not the wood so much. Replacing steel? I don't…

In addition progress making steel with a lot less CO2, by using hydrogen (and other techniques) instead of coal has come a long way. This isn't just pie in the sky, the world's second largest steel maker plans to reduce CO2 by 30% before 2030. [1] And of course steel is eminently recyclable. I'm not against wood but steel has some good long term attributes as well. [1] https://corporate.arcelormittal.com/sustainabili…

You can also coke iron with carbon from plastic. It's still not super great. But it does reuse plastics which don't get recycled enough.

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#134

Post by oliwarner »

dreamlayers wrote: post #118
oliwarner wrote: post #41

The graph in that composite diagram is really bothering me. Their "hardened wood" product is 23 times harder than "natural" basswood. When dried, basswood (aka lime) is an extremely soft hardwood. It's very popular with novice turners and hand carvers. When green (natural?) you can carve it with a stone. Species matters. Lignum vitae is 20 times harder than basswood.

It is possible to make a knife out of lignum vitae: https://www.solidsmack.com/fabrication/lignum-vitae-ironwood... So I guess the achievement here is that commonly available inexpensive wood can be made as hard as rare expensive wood.

It's not cheap though, all the bloody carvers get it. Not that any wood is cheap at the moment.

I think they might have just been highlighting basswood because it's so soft —softer than many softwoods— and so the outcome shows a much bigger improvement.

Show me pine/spruce, poplar and oak.

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#135

Post by gnabgib »

xxs wrote: post #86
jjtheblunt wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you just reminded me of the marvelous magnesium NeXT cases, before Apple's alumin[i]um became popular.

magnesium is sort of a more expensive version of al.

In that it's one electron from it (like Silicon)? Magnesium is 2.2x stronger, 1.08x harder, and 2.05x more costly, 0.65x as thermally conductive and, 0.64x as dense. Think I'm missing your similarity metric

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#136

Post by katbyte »

gnabgib wrote: post #135
xxs wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

magnesium is sort of a more expensive version of al.

In that it's one electron from it (like Silicon)? Magnesium is 2.2x stronger, 1.08x harder, and 2.05x more costly, 0.65x as thermally conductive and, 0.64x as dense. Think I'm missing your similarity metric

You just reminded me that I used to have a camera with an magnesium body. That thing was a delightfully tough beast.

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#137

Post by katbyte »

soperj wrote: post #94
canadian_tired wrote: post #64

Wood is renewable when you can grow it, cut it up into useful shapes, then at the end of its useful life, compost it. As soon as you add a shit load of processing and plastic and other stuff it's not "wood" anymore than gasoline is a dead dinosaur. As for things like plywood that use glue for the laminations...glue is the most expensive and important part of the product. Not the wood so much. Replacing steel? I don't…

It doesn't last so long in construction, rebar in concrete has like a 75 year lifespan no?

Does that not depend if it’s stainless or not?

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#138

Post by turtlebits »

ksec wrote: post #129

For people who are interested in Timber Building / Construction. The World's Tallest Timber Buildings [1], Why Finland is Building a Wood City [2]. Why There Are No Timber Skyscrapers [3], Why All Buildings Should Be Timber [4] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3JqSsc8ZKk [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4QYkEpw9pA [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_8LlcuV0gc [4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieBVNgMkcpw

All of these sound good, but the caveat is that they are wood + epoxy/resin/glue.

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#139

Post by canadianfella »

gnabgib wrote: post #135
xxs wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

magnesium is sort of a more expensive version of al.

In that it's one electron from it (like Silicon)? Magnesium is 2.2x stronger, 1.08x harder, and 2.05x more costly, 0.65x as thermally conductive and, 0.64x as dense. Think I'm missing your similarity metric

Because it has similar properties as aluminum. This is obvious. Why play dumb?

Re: Hardened wood as a renewable alternative to steel and plastic

#140

Post by canadianfella »

spfzero wrote: post #87
mikeg8 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No expert here but I believe it depends on how it decomposes. If wood rots at the surface, my understanding is more carbon is released into the atmosphere but if it is buried or decomposed using fungi or soil microbes, more carbon is captured into the soil. Forests have a lot of decaying and decomposing deadfall wood but still seem to be a carbon sink so it may be a layering thing...

That's the reason you use wood chips and bark for mulch in a garden; to add carbon to the soil.

Do you have a source for that? That sounds wrong.
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