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from the sounds-like-heavy-duty-plywood dept.
Officials in Oregon have approved construction permits for the first all-wood high-rise building in the nation.
Construction on the 12-story building, called Framework, will break ground this fall in Portland's trendy and rapidly growing Pearl District and is expected to be completed by the following winter.
The decision by state and local authorities to allow construction comes after months of painstaking testing of the emerging technologies that will be used to build it, including a product called cross-laminated timber, or CLT.
To make CLT, lumber manufacturers align 2-by-4 boards in perpendicular layers and then glue them together like a giant sandwich before sliding the resulting panels into a massive press for drying. The resulting panels are stronger than traditional wood because of the cross-hatched layers; CLT can withstand horizontal and vertical pressures similar to those from a significant earthquake with minimal damage.
They are also lighter and easier to work with than regular timber, resulting in lower cost and less waste.
For this project, scientists at Portland State University and Oregon State University subjected large panels of CLT to hundreds of thousands of pounds of pressure and experimented with different methods for joining them together.
Could cross-laminated timber revive the timber industry?
Previously: Can You Build A Safe, Sustainable Skyscraper Out Of Wood?
The Case for Wooden Skyscrapers
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NewNic on Wednesday June 07 2017, @10:57PM (14 children)
So, plywood?
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Arik on Wednesday June 07 2017, @11:20PM (10 children)
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Wednesday June 07 2017, @11:35PM (4 children)
Just because Home Depot mostly sells cheap plywood doesn't mean that this isn't plywood. Actually, you can get reasonable quality plywood at Home Depot.
If Plywood is strong enough to make one of the fastest planes that the UK had during WWII [historynet.com], I expect a building can be constructed using it. We have much better glues now, so it should be stronger than could be achieved ~75 years ago.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday June 07 2017, @11:45PM (1 child)
... with graphite on the leading surfaces.
I think they built just one prototype. I never heard about it until after the US Stealth fighter and bomber were well-known, so maybe the allies kept it classified.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:35AM
Not all wood.
It was conceived as a bomber but
Yeah, the prototype had a flameout and, after several attempts to restart the engine, it crashed with loss of the pilot.
They built 2 more. The war in Europe was over soon after that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horten_Ho_229#firstHeading [wikipedia.org]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday June 08 2017, @12:53AM (1 child)
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Thursday June 08 2017, @04:56AM
Nah, that's particle board or MDF.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Snotnose on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:31AM (4 children)
Actually, when I hear "laminate" on this scale I think "tinder". I would not want to live there when some asshat on the bottom floor goes to sleep in bed with a burning cigarette.
I understand it's "fire resistant", but I sure as hell don't want to be one of the guinea pigs verifying that.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:55AM (2 children)
Are you saying Laminate is another hook-up app?
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:29AM
Yeah, for the latex fetishists and Roy Orbison fans :D
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Friday June 09 2017, @02:44AM
Yeah, cuz you are for sure gonna get burned.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday June 08 2017, @10:42AM
"Laminate" is the code word for guinea pigs that breathe "harmless chemicals we cooked up" ..
Those guinea pigs are supposed to pay rent for the service too.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 07 2017, @11:24PM (1 child)
... what a CLT is?
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:57AM
Just don't put your CLT in an erogenous zone... It could get wet, which makes it slippery.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @11:55AM
I believe the term is "panel board" or such.
Plywood is made of three to several layers laminated large perpendicular thin sheets of wood, each scraped from round timber in one spiral cut.
Panel boards are wooden beams laminated in sandwich of two such sheets.
I believe there is possibility nowadays to make lighter structures without sacrificing much strength by doing cookie-cutter cutouts in the inner sheets of plywood , or by using foam filler between thinner wooden internal structural elements of resulting panels - basically using hollow beams, or even I beams. Prior to WW II many technologies for wooden composite construction of airplane hulls were invented which could be useful in building construction today.