TIMBER AIR-DRIED ON WEST COAST.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18550, 25 August 1928, Page 2

TIMBER AIR-DRIED ON WEST COAST.

To The Editor. Dear Sir, —As Mr W. G. Morrison’s published views on the above seem to be an attack on my correspondence of July 24, I venture to reply. Mr Morrison states that “timber upended” to rain and weather will not dry quicker than by “flat stripping.” Has Mr Morrison ever visited a Maori pah, or a bushman’s cottage? If so, he probably has noticed logs stood on end about such places, tepee fashion. These students of nature learned by long experience how much quicker and better they could dry their firewood by upending it. The same applies to sawn iumber. Is it correct to regard Mr Morrison as an expert on timber drying? For forty years past, I cannot remember him as being associated with any local timber yard, so is he qualified to speak as an authority on this subject? Some twenty years’ experience m tree-planting at Hanmer and Balmoral does not warrant his making such sweeping assertions. Regarding kiln drying, having no experience of such I cannot dispute Mr Morrison’s statements, though i do think his knowledge of the same is merely theoretical. I have used local kiln-dried rimu, and in my opinion the process is either incorrect or misapplied. Perhaps some other users will publish their experiences of kiln drying, but for my part I shall be more satisfied to use West Coast air-dried timber.—l am, etc., TRADESMAN.