WORLD ACHIEVEMENTS

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXVII, Issue 12825, 21 August 1939, Page 2

WORLD ACHIEVEMENTS

I . TIE A KNOT It is a long time since Alexander Pope wrote: As the twig is the tree’s inclined. He was right in what he said, for, in his day it was so. It had always been so. He might have that it would always remain so. But it is not strictly so now, for not only can you find wood with knots in it, but you can now tie knots in wood. That is to say a new process, something revolutionary, has been discovered whereby wood can be made pretty much like rope. What happens is that a length of wood is steamed for a long time. It is then gently but firmly compressed—so firmly and so powerfully that it eventually loses from a third to one-sixth of its length. It is then allowed to cool. When the wood is handled after this it is found to have lost all its original elasticity. Instead, it is perfectly flexible, and can be tied in knots and untied again without breaking or cracking or splitting. It is still tough and strong, but it is not brittle, and when you bend it there is no tendency to jump back to the straight. Ash and elm and beech have all been treated in this way, and it seems as if many woods can be robbed of their splitting tendency and treated so as to be marvellously flexible. It remains to be seen whether the durability of the new product is satisfactory.