Influence of Wood Furnish Type on Properties of Oriented Strand Panels

Panels made from oriented strands or flakes provide good structural properties but previous data have indicated only strands from roundwood produced adequate structural properties. Strands from pulp chips produced weak boards. This study was made to determine if suitable panels could be made with mixtures of roundwood strands and pulp chip strands. Furnish including 25 percent of pulp chip strands provided panels with 99 percent of the modulus of rupture and 98 percent of the modulus of elasticity (in the aligned direction) found in all roundwood strand panels. Linear expansion perpendicular to alignment was also about the same with the two types of furnish. Larger additions of pulp chip strands have an increasingly deleterious effect on strength properties and linear expansion. Internal bond strength increased with pulp chip strand additions up to 45 percent but decreased as the proportion of pulp chip strands increased above that amount. Thickness swell was not influenced by the addition of pulp chip strands. Overall the data indicate that some pulp chip strands can be used in structural flakeboard or oriented strand panels with no damage to the structural performance of the panels.

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