Hardwood plywood, depending on grade and appearance, will cost almost as much as an equivalent amount of solid hardwood. Yet there are also benefits of plywood: Dimensional stability. Crossbanded layers and balanced construction ensure that as much as timber, hardwood plywood will not shrink, swell, or warp. The thin layers, lying at right angles to each other as well as the different available core materials, produce consistent strength both with and across the grain.
- The thickness varies. Sheets with thicknesses of 1⁄8 ", 1⁄4 ", 3⁄8 ", 1⁄2 ", and 3⁄4 "eliminate planning and waste."
- Wide panels. Complete 4x8 sheets allow you to work without edge-joining or otherwise making up width with large bits.
- Color-matched look Way. One hand would be identical in color and grain in premium grades, making it easy to stain and finish.
Drawbacks
- Hardwood plywood has its limits. Bear in mind these aspects so that you can make the right choice:
- Price. Hardwood plywood is certainly more costly relative to solid stock on a board-foot basis.
- Selection is small. Your supplier can have only three or four types of hardwood plywood, such as the common oaks, birch, and mahogany, so dealers stock what's in demand. Other types of hardwood veneers may be special-orderable, but you will still be limited to only a dozen of the most common, and no exotic woods.By first determining the type of hardwood plywood available, then selecting the compatible solid stock, you could approach your project.
- Unreliable thickness mentioned. It can be frustrating to have the propensity for hardwood plywood panels to differ in thickness from their specified dimension. "For example, if you buy a 3⁄4 "-thick panel, it may stray from that thickness from 1⁄64 "to 1⁄32 ". This is mostly due to the foreign origin of much of this material and the measurement of metric thickness, particularly in ash and birch plywood. Be sure to purchase all hardwood plywood at one time for the same project.
- Thin face veneers. Hardwood plywood has face veneers with a thickness of 1⁄30" in thickness. Some species, such as black walnut, are sliced thinner, to 1⁄32 ". Foreign veneers are still thinner and can be hard to stitch without splintering and without losing sand.
What are the options for the veneer?
Due to the techniques by which they are extracted, veneers, which are nothing more than meager slices of a log, differ in appearance. Wood, birch, ash, and other abundant species lend themselves to a large lathe for peeling. In general, these rotary-cut, continuous slices cover a sheet in one piece, creating an irregular pattern of the grain. Rotary-cut veneers cost less due to this simpler slicing technique and the removal of matching and other hand jobs.
Flat-sliced veneers, much like a potato goes through a vegetable slicer, come off the log one flitch, or split, at a time. A surface covered with flat-sliced veneer resembles a series of glued-up boards, and nearly all traditional hardwoods are available in this way. This veneer form is moderately costly.
Once veneers have been removed from the log (other than rotary-cut), they must be attached to the center of the plywood. On the face and back, match refers to their arrangement. As they come off the log butted up side by side, slip-matched, the most common method of applying bits, has consecutive flitches. Book-matched often uses consecutive slices, but for a mirror image, the other one is turned over. The right and left pages of an open book resemble a book-matched face.
Comprehension of Grading
The grades of hardwood plywood, decided both by the trade association and by individual mills, cover various degrees of quality. But you just need to get acquainted with those in the following page table.
Although not part of the grading criteria, if your project is to be used outdoors, the classification of hardwood plywood as either Type I or Type II is important to you. The Type II adhesive, a very water-resistant bond, is in most hardwood plywood. You'll want hardwood plywood bonded with a fully waterproof Type I adhesive for outside applications.