Just a little food for thought.
Model building codes typically use the phrase “wood structural panel” to describe the use of plywood and osb. Codes recognize these two materials as the same. Likewise, APA the Engineered Wood Association, the agency responsible for approving more than 75% of the structural panels used in residential construction, treat osb and plywood as equals in their published performance guidelines. And wood scientists agree that the structural performance of osb and plywood are equivalent.
A bumper crop of news stories highlighting contractor ripoffs has left consumers reeling. Reports indicate that some homeowners worry about builders “cheaping out” when they use osb. Customers become suspicious that builders are trying to put something over on them: charging for an expensive product like plywood and substituting it with something cheap, like osb. When it comes to structural integrity, cost is less of an issue among consumers than structural performance.
“It looks like a bunch of junk pounded together.”, is how one homeowner described osb to me. Another homeowner asked, ” What the **** is going on? Aren’t there any more trees?” Public perception is that we are getting stuck with scraps. The uninitiated don’t appreciate the high-level of science and technology used to produce engineered wood products. They think that “glued-together” is not as good as “nailed-together”. And oddly, plywood is perceived as solid wood to a lay person.
Peace
Dave
Model building codes typically use the phrase “wood structural panel” to describe the use of plywood and osb. Codes recognize these two materials as the same. Likewise, APA the Engineered Wood Association, the agency responsible for approving more than 75% of the structural panels used in residential construction, treat osb and plywood as equals in their published performance guidelines. And wood scientists agree that the structural performance of osb and plywood are equivalent.
A bumper crop of news stories highlighting contractor ripoffs has left consumers reeling. Reports indicate that some homeowners worry about builders “cheaping out” when they use osb. Customers become suspicious that builders are trying to put something over on them: charging for an expensive product like plywood and substituting it with something cheap, like osb. When it comes to structural integrity, cost is less of an issue among consumers than structural performance.
“It looks like a bunch of junk pounded together.”, is how one homeowner described osb to me. Another homeowner asked, ” What the **** is going on? Aren’t there any more trees?” Public perception is that we are getting stuck with scraps. The uninitiated don’t appreciate the high-level of science and technology used to produce engineered wood products. They think that “glued-together” is not as good as “nailed-together”. And oddly, plywood is perceived as solid wood to a lay person.
Peace
Dave
