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hardwood Record — Veneer & Panel Section 



August 25, 1917 



Making Straight -Way Panels 



The Possibility of Saving Cost Without Sacrificing Strength 



TRAIGHT-WAY PANELS mean panels made up 



of two- or three-ply or more with all the plies 



running the same direction instead of crossing 



the alternate plies as is generally done. 



While contemplating the instances that have been 



encountered of woodwork done in this way, a copy of 



Hardwood Record comes to hand with quite a story 



about glue prices going skyward, and this suggests that 





Made in St. Louis by 



^^. 



-^ j St. Louis Basket & Box Co. 



All Three of Us Will Be Benefited if 



the subject may be received with more interest now than 

 at any previous time in the development of the panel 

 business since it offers a chance to economize in glue 

 and to effect some conservation in this item in various 

 kinds of work. 



There are before me some five panel gum veneered 

 doors, which are typical as to size and makeup. The 

 panels in these doors are approximately 10'/2 by IbYz 

 inches and presumably about % of an inch thick. I have 

 not cut into them to see whether they are two or three 

 ply, but generally speaking, in making up a panel of this 

 size we would consider it as three-ply involving three 

 sheets of veneer and two glue joints. 



An opinion based upon several years of observation 

 in straight-way built up work is that ^'g-inch door panels 

 of gum, birch, and other native wood may well be made 

 up of tw^o thicknesses of 3 16 veneer both laid the same 

 direction and requiring only one glue joint as compared 

 to two joints for three-ply panels. 



Naturally, this takes us right into the subject of straight- 

 way panels or built-up work, its possible uses and its 

 qualifications for a place of more importance in the 

 built-up lumber world and in the panel business gen- 

 erally, it is perhaps a safe assertion that the average 

 veneer user does not realize the strength and the qual- 

 ities of two-ply work, with both sheets of veneer run- 

 ning the same direction. The first assumption is that 

 it will not add materially to the strength, and that it will 

 split too easily. Perhaps it is not so strong or so resistant 

 to splitting as the three-ply job with the center ply cross- 

 ing, but if you have never experimented with it and will 

 try making up some two-ply or three-ply work in straight- 

 way panels you will likely be surprised at the strength 

 and resistance to splitting. 



Straight-way is really the only way for built-up two-ply 

 work. To make a two-ply job with one-ply crossing the 

 other is to make an unbalanced job that has little to com- 

 mend it. With two plies running the same direction, 

 however, the job is very well balanced and the effect is 

 the same with two sheets of veneer as it would be to glue 

 two pieces of inch board to get a 2 -inch thickness. 



One of the first impressive encounters with the straight- 

 way built-up work was met with several years ago in St. 

 Louis at a plant where pails and similar packages were 

 made of veneer built up into plies running the same direc- 

 tion. In looking over this product at the time I ques- 

 tioned the manager of the plant about its splitting tend- 

 encies. He showed me experiments they had made by 

 dumping it from the office safe and various other heights 

 to the floor. They had demonstrated pretty thoroughly 

 that ply work built up with all the grain running straight- 



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