Timber building backed

Press, 9 May 1979, Page 15

Timber building backed

There is no reason why timber could not be a dominant structural material in hotels, apartment blocks, and industrial buildings in New Zealand within eight years, a leading Canadian timber engineer, Mr T. A. Eldridge, has said in Christchurch.

Mr Eldridge was invited ,o New Zealand by the Structural Engineered Timber Manufacturers’ Association as guest speaker at its two-day seminar in Auckland. He met association members and engineers in Christ* church.

Mr Eldridge said New Zealand had a ready and renewable resource in its forests, and there was “an awful lot of sense in using

it” and not spending overseas funds on imported steel. By cutting board lengths, interlocking the ends, gluing them with glue stronger than the timber, and gluing flat side-; together, pillars of timber could be produced that, weight for weight, were stronger than steel or reinforced concrete. Using machinery that curved boards as it glued arches and design shapes could be produced. “Glue-laminated” timber took a fifth as much energy to produce as steel. Where long spans were needed, it was cheaper.

I* had taken in Canada eight or nine years to gain

acceptance by engineers, and architects of wood as a structural material. Universities and technical colleges were now producing graduates skilled in using structural timber.

Timber would not displace steel or reinforced conrete, Mr Eldridge said. There would always be a need for these as structural materials.

The president of the Structural Engineered Timber Manufacturers’ Association (Mr J. A. Gibson) said only 20 per cent of imported steel was used for structural building. Timber might affect the building-steel market by about 10 per cent, but it would save New Zealand millions of dollars in overseas funds each year.