Plywood is many wood veneers bonded together with chemical resins to make a flat sheet. A very versatile product, plywood is used for a wide range of structural, interior and exterior applications – from formwork through to internal paneling.
While it can be tailored to suit an many range of applications, the normal plywood consists of at least 3 plies, with the grain in the alternate plies running at suitable angles.
There are four groupings of plywood products, with each group designed for specific applications:
- Structural
- Exterior
- Interior
- Marine
Plywood have benefits below:
Increased stability
Plywood offers all the inherent advantages of the parent wood plus enhanced properties in its cross and layer structure.
High impact resistance
Being a wood based panel, plywood has the ability to accommodate the occasional short-term overload; up to twice the design load. This is useful where big winds can occur. This property is also effective when used as construction flooring or as concrete formwork. Plywood’s laminated structure distributes loads over a big area on the opposite face of the stress.
Surface dimensional stability
The inner cross construction of plywood ensures that plywood sheets remain relatively stable under changes of temperature and moisture. This is especially important in flooring and cement formwork construction where moisture exposure is very likely.
High strength to weight ratio
With high strength and stiffness to weight ratios, plywood is very cost effective to use in structural applications such as flooring, shearwalls, formwork and webbed beams.
Panel shear
The panel shear of plywood is nearly double that of solid timber due its cross laminated structure. This makes plywood a highly effective material to use in gussets for portal frames, webs of fabricated beams and as bracing panels.
Chemical resistance
Plywood does not corrode and can be used in chemical works and cooling towers as a low-price, durable material when treated with preservative .
