A company called Invent Wood (based on research out of UMD) is creating “densified” wood that solves a lot of these problems. They have a process that collapses the cell walls in wood and compresses it to a quarter of its thickness, which gives something like a 10x increase in tensile strength, making it stronger than (a certain type of commonly used) steel by volume and weight. It’s also significantly harder than wood (nearly as hard as the carbon steel people use for knives), doesn’t warp, and is resilient to impacts.
My intuition is that trees need wood to serve purposes greater than just structural integrity. It needs to transport water and nutrients. But for building, we don’t care about these channels and it’s better if we collapse them to encourage stronger hydrogen bonding between cellulose chains.
It sounds like a lot of the benefits of “old growth” wood can be manufactured now. This is probably a good thing for preserving nature; there’s a greater demand for wood with these properties than a supply of old trees. Better to leave the great old trees intact and do cool engineering on cheap trees that grow quickly.
> It sounds like a lot of the benefits of “old growth” wood can be manufactured now.
Yes, at greatly increased costs, both economic and ecological.
Fast-growth timber farms may produce an inferior product, but we've already compensated for that in design. 112% of a material that provides 90% of the "goodness" is a viable path; so is buying a Ford* every 5 years instead of a Mercedes every 10*. (Ford haters: :%s/Ford/Chevy) (* MB haters: shaddup, it's just an analogy.)
Until the overhead is lower than growing yellow pine, this is a niche product.
LarsAlereon · 11h ago
It's true that old-growth wood is stronger and denser than modern wood, but it's absolutely not true that obsolete windows made of old-growth wood are better than modern windows or should be retained in a restoration if not required by code. Wood is a terrible material to make window frames out of, and there's simply nothing you can do to a single-glazed window that makes it comfortable to live with.
We have this thing called "building science" now, you can do better than just copying your grandpa.
JR1427 · 5h ago
> Wood is a terrible material to make window frames out of
I respectfully disagree. There are certainly downsides, and upsides to modern materials (e.g. UPVC), but there are reasons to still use wood in many situations.
From a practical perspective, wood is easy to work, and easy to repair. You can pretty much indefinitely go setting in new pieces of wood where needed (speaking as the owner of a 105 year old wooden boat, which still has ~60pct original material).
Wood is also clean and easy to dispose of, whereas modern materials provide a real headache and hazard.
And IMO nothing compares to wood from an aesthetic perspective, which is important for living spaces.
beckthompson · 8h ago
You also have to remember that new 2x4s are actually 1.5x3.5 while older ones were actually 2x4! Its fun to do work on an old house and actually get the correct measurement of 2x4 xD
dnemmers · 5m ago
Original 2x4s were rough cut on all sides, after planing 1/4” smooth on each edge…you lose 1/2” from each dimension, resulting in a 3.5” x 1.5” board.
anon291 · 9h ago
I've lost many a titanium drill bit to old growth wood in my 1921 home. Insanely difficult and hard stuff. It's crazy that we consider it the same material.
dnemmers · 2m ago
You really shouldn’t be breaking any bits in wood without really trying.
Bits need to be sharp, spun at the correct speed, and plunged into the material without putting side to side stress on the bit (Which is why a drill press is so useful)
My intuition is that trees need wood to serve purposes greater than just structural integrity. It needs to transport water and nutrients. But for building, we don’t care about these channels and it’s better if we collapse them to encourage stronger hydrogen bonding between cellulose chains.
It sounds like a lot of the benefits of “old growth” wood can be manufactured now. This is probably a good thing for preserving nature; there’s a greater demand for wood with these properties than a supply of old trees. Better to leave the great old trees intact and do cool engineering on cheap trees that grow quickly.
Recent Hacker News discussion:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44020832
Yes, at greatly increased costs, both economic and ecological.
Fast-growth timber farms may produce an inferior product, but we've already compensated for that in design. 112% of a material that provides 90% of the "goodness" is a viable path; so is buying a Ford* every 5 years instead of a Mercedes every 10*. (Ford haters: :%s/Ford/Chevy) (* MB haters: shaddup, it's just an analogy.)
Until the overhead is lower than growing yellow pine, this is a niche product.
We have this thing called "building science" now, you can do better than just copying your grandpa.
I respectfully disagree. There are certainly downsides, and upsides to modern materials (e.g. UPVC), but there are reasons to still use wood in many situations.
From a practical perspective, wood is easy to work, and easy to repair. You can pretty much indefinitely go setting in new pieces of wood where needed (speaking as the owner of a 105 year old wooden boat, which still has ~60pct original material).
Wood is also clean and easy to dispose of, whereas modern materials provide a real headache and hazard.
And IMO nothing compares to wood from an aesthetic perspective, which is important for living spaces.
Bits need to be sharp, spun at the correct speed, and plunged into the material without putting side to side stress on the bit (Which is why a drill press is so useful)