Two significant developments have occurred with regard to the issue of Southern Yellow Pine (SYP) lumber design values leading up to the American Lumber Standards Committee (ALSC) Board of Review hearing scheduled for January 5, 2012.
Recently, there have been design value changes proposed for some visual grades of lumber. This is a reminder that these decisions will have no impact on the design values of MSR and MEL lumber.
The American Wood Council’s (AWC) 2012 National Design Specification® (NDS®) for Wood Construction and 2012 Wood Frame Construction Manual (WFCM) for One- and Two-Family Dwellings are now available for purchase in electronic format (PDF) from the AWC website.
SBCA is seeking to obtain signatures of support to add to the bottom of letters to the US Forest Service and US Forest Products Laboratories regarding the Southern Pine lumber design value.
Changes to the officially published values for tensile strength, strength in bending, and modulus of elasticity of Southern Pine lumber could apply to more than 1 Bbf of SYP, with widespread implications for framers and component manufacturers.
FMW Fasteners has added the FastenMaster® LOK Line™ to their web store, making this collection of premium structural wood-to-wood fasteners available to contractors, homeowners and online consumers.
While some recent reports suggest earlier forecasts regarding the effect of the Mountain Pine Beetle could be too pessimistic, or that the BC forest industry would simply be saved due to improving U.S. and global demand for forest products with higher potential prices, recent events and new information regarding the impact of the beetle suggests otherwise.
Crow's Market Recap -- A condensed recap of the market conditions for the major North American softwood lumber and panel products as reported in Crow's Weekly Market Report.
