Nondestructive Evaluation Of Wood

Nature's engineering of wood through genetics, wind, and weather creates a wide variability in wood as a material. Consequently, manufacture and users of wood products are frequently frustrated in dealing with the forest resource. Manufacturers sometimes argue that wood is difficult to consistently process into quality products because of the wide range of properties that exist in this raw material. Users of wood products can be equally frustrated with the performance variability found in finished products. Nondestructive evaluation (NDE) technologies have contributed significantly toward eliminating the cause of these frustrations. NDE technologies have been developed and are currently used in lumber and veneer grading programs that result in engineered materials that have consistent well-defined performance characteristics. This brief volume explores some of the processes that are used to manufacture wood, including green wood technology and provides a bit of history to wood production and its uses too. Other products that may interest you from the US Forest Service can be found at this link: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/agency/819

This report summarizes information on nondestructive testing and evaluation of wood. It includes information on a wide range of nondestructive assessment technologies and their uses for evaluating various wood products.

This report summarizes information on nondestructive testing and evaluation of wood. It includes information on a wide range of nondestructive assessment technologies and their uses for evaluating various wood products.

This book on nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of wood was prepared at the request of our colleagues throughout the world who expressed the desire for a synthesized source of information on the subject. We have attempted to meet their needs through this book. We contacted several widely respected technical authorities and asked them to prepare chapters dealing with their areas of expertise. Professor Frank Beall (University of California-Berkeley), Brian Brashaw (University of Minnesota-Duluth), Kevin Cheung (Western Wood Products Association), Bill Galligan (retired, Frank Lumber Company), John Kearns (Weyerhaeuser Company), and Xiping Wang (University of Minnesota-Duluth) responded positively to our request and prepared excellent chapters on acoustic emission/acousto-ultrasonics, ultrasonic veneer grading, visual grading of lumber, mechanical grading of lumber, and recent research on NDE of green materials, respectively. Sections of the book originally appeared in technical journals, research reports, and various symposia proceedings. We have included, for example, a chapter on inspection of timber structures that originally appeared as a research paper, which was widely distributed and used by engineering consultants who inspect structures as a part of their business. We prepared this book to serve as a primary reference on NDE of wood. More than 400 technical articles are cited in the chapters or listed in the Appendix. We also intended it to be used as a primer or handbook on several widely used NDE technologies. The chapters on machine grading of lumber, ultrasonic veneer grading, and inspection of wood in service were written to provide a concise source of information to manufacturers and users of wood products who are considering use of various commercially available NDE technologies in their manufacturing operation or consulting business. This book was made possible through the efforts of dedicated scientists who spent countless hours in laboratories developing our technical knowledge base on NDE of wood. Roy F. Pellerin Robert J. Ross

This book on the Nondestructive Characterization and Imaging of Wood by Professor Voichita Bucur is truly the most outstanding reference on the subject ever written. Since the origins of mankind, wood has played a key role in the history of humans and other living creatures, ranging from provision of life from trees giving air, heat, light, and food to nourish their bodies to structures to protect them from the elements. Wood has also played a key role in one of the world's primary religions. Nondestructive diagnostics methods have long found application in medi cal practice for examination of the human body in order to detect life threatening abnormalities and permit diagnosis to extend life. Nondestructive testing has been used for many years to insure the safety of machinery, air craft, railroads, tunnels, buildings and many other structures. Therefore, it is timely for a treatise, like the present one, to be written describing how wood can be characterized without employing destructive test methods. Since wood is so valuable to mankind, it is important to know the latest methods to nondestructively characterize wood for all practical applications.