Conservation Of Historic Timber Structures

A comprehensive approach to the preservation of historic timber structures. The authors demonstrate that repair methods must be geared towards the specific cultural, architectural and environmental conditions of the area where the timber structure is located.

England has a surprising number of timber-framed buildings, many dating back to pre 1700, which are listed buildings. There is now an increasing demand for these buildings to be adapted to suit modern day requirements. This book takes a practical approach and discusses materials and carpentry techniques used in the repair of these buildings, along with a qualitative account of the structural behaviour of the timber elements.

Timber deals with wide-ranging use of the material in historic buildings, from vaststructural timber-frames through to high-class joinery and simple fixings. Particular attention is paid to how and why timber decays or faults occur, and the methods of assessing and dealing with this. The bulk of the book covers appropriate methods of repair and maintenance.

Selected, peer reviewed papers from the 2nd International Conference on Structural Health Assessment of Timber Structures (SHATIS 13), September 4-6, 2013, Trento, Italy

This is the first book to tackle all the issues relating to timber decay. It presents the facts and explores timber decay problems through case studies. These are illustrated with clear self-explanatory photographs for the reader to use as a diagnostic aid. Section 1 discusses timber as a living material, Section 2 deals with decay organisms and their habitat requirements. Section 3 moves on to the building as an environment for timber and discusses the ways in which wood responds to moisture change. Section 4 ends with an approach to timber decay which integrates knowledge on the decay organism, its requirements and natural predators with appropriate and targeted chemical treatments.

Reports on issues surrounding efforts to preserve wooden architecture of Europe and the former Soviet Union, dealing with braced frame, balloon, and log structures, and presents lessons learned for the future of preservation of the wood heritage in North America. Several papers detail the condition