Yellow Balau Wooden Decking

Of many holiday occasion in one of the world famous island such as the Maldives and Seychelles; many of us agreed and realized that the combination of wooden structure and the beautiful seaside make up a very perfect picture. The natural beauty of the wooden structure such as decking, wakaf and guest room is one of the very important element in making a resort appear to be closer to the nature, soothing and tranquilizing. Choosing wood as the construction material for a beautiful resort is always the top choice of an architect/designer. Till today, with the advancement of material technology there is no other material can replace wood as the decking material. Imagine walking bare-foot on the wooden decking under the hot sunny day, Vs on a steel/concrete decking; wooden deck protects your bare foot without burning it, but the latter gives you an awful experience.

There are only a certain species of wood can be used as construction material for a resort by the seaside/waterfront. These wood have to withstand the exposure of harsh sunlight (UV) and the constantly-in-contact with seawater condition. Yellow Balau is one of the best construction material for the reason below:

• Long-term exposure of sunlight (Outdoor condition) without deteriorating in mechical strength
• Resistance against the growth of fungus in high humidity environment
• Constant in contact with water without degrading the mechanical property
• High strength and lasting material (Being classified as Strength Group #1 timber, SG1)
• Relatively cheaper compared to Chengal Wood and vastly available

We hence recommend our customer to use Yellow Balau as their high-end wooden construction material. Pictures below showcased our recent project (Feb-2012) in preparing the Yellow Balau wooden deck for the construction of a world-class and famous resort in Seychelles. For more information about Yellow Balau as your marine construction material, please feel free to contact us at: Info@TropicalWood.my

Workers are arranging the finished wooden decking plank

Workers are bundling the wooden deck.

Processed wooden deck. Wooden sticks are placed in between timber plank for the purpose of air-dry process. It is a good practice to do so.

Finished product are labelled properly.

Yellow Balau Wooden Decking

p/s: Yellow Balau is also known as Selangan Batu (West Malaysia) and Bangkirai (Indonesia). For official technical release from Malaysia Timber Council, you may download the extract HERE.

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We are pretty sure you have seen things like this before (picture above); where a wooden plank is discharging powdery matter; or sometimes it happens to your wooden door and you see wood powder all over the place. This powdery matter is in fact the by product of a kind of “wood eater” called Timber Borers. These little creatures feed on the wood to survive. If you observe carefully, Sap Wood is usually very prone to borers attack compared to heart-wood. The reason is simple, sap wood contains higher nutrient than heart wood and it is usually softer. In addition, there are several timber species that are very sensitive to borers, such as Kempas, Nyatoh and most of the mix-hard-wood. In contrast to that, timber species like Balau, Chengal, and Belian is not in favour to timber borers.

A very common and popular practice to prevent borers attack is done by subjecting the timber to Chemical Pressure Treatment. Hence, choosing the right timber, or right treatment for your application is very important to ensure the life span of your timber product.

Contact us today for more information. Thank you!

Brought to you by,

Grand Asia Timber Sdn Bhd

]]> http://www.tropicalwood.my/post-1/feed/ 49 http://www.tropicalwood.my/the-three-musketeers-meranti-solid-wood-bench/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-three-musketeers-meranti-solid-wood-bench http://www.tropicalwood.my/the-three-musketeers-meranti-solid-wood-bench/#comments Mon, 07 Nov 2011 16:11:54 +0000 krischan http://www.tropicalwood.my/?p=337 When we design a furniture, we always have this in mind: Firstly, the furniture has to last for at least a hundred years, and secondly it has to fit naturally into your life style as a masterpiece. Having this in mind, our design hence uses only big-solid-piece of chunky timber as its material. The wood is specially hand-picked and cut using flat-sawn method to review it beautiful-yet-naturally-occurred grain.

We would like to present you: The Three Musketeers; a rustic, bold yet simple wooden bench, made of Red Meranti wood. It measures 18″ tall, 11.5″ wide and 58″ long. The bench top is made of a 4″ thick by 12″ wide single-piece solid wooden slab. If you take a closer look on it, you will be puzzled by the no-nail construction method. This masterpiece will definitely fit nicely in your living room; or add a natural touch to the community library as reading benches. Please feel free to contact us should you require further information. If you need any special customization on the design, please feel free to call us.

Thank you!

Proudly designed and made by,

Grand Asia Timber Sdn Bhd

Info@TropicalWood.my

There are 3 groups of Meranti tree, which are as below:

1. White Meranti
2. Yellow Meranti
3. Red Meranti

Among these 3, Yellow and Red Meranti can be easily found and is abundant in Malaysia rain forest. For Red Meranti, it can be further classified into Light Red Meranti and Dark Red Meranti. Despite its differences in color, as it is named; Light Red and Dark Red Meranti has a very distinct difference in weight(density) where Dark Red Meranti is heavier, denser and stronger in strength.

Nevertheless, Meranti is classified as Light Hardwood, and it has a very good strength over weight ratio. It is light in weight (density is in the range of 380~755 KG/M3); which make it a very suitable construction material for earth quake prone countries. Besides being deployed in construction, it is widely used as material for furniture and joinery work (mainly indoor furniture) due to its beautiful texture and grain.

Below is a comprehensive mechanical properties comparison between: Damar Minyak, Red Meranti and Pine Wood:

Red Meranti Mechanical Properties

Timber Cross Section

Before we talk further about Box-Heart timber, lets take a look at the cross section of a log, and understand some terminology used in timber industry, please take a look at the timber on the left.

Sap Wood: Is the outermost layer of a logs, and it is the living portion of a tree. In term of biological function, this is the part where food (minerals & nutrient) and water is being transported from the root to the rest of the tree, and to a lesser extent, where energy reserves (food) are stored. Sapwood is the most nutrient-rich section, thus wood from this portion get rotten/decay more easily.

True Wood: As the older sapwood cells age and die, they become True Wood, or more commonly known as heartwood. These cells cease to transport water or store energy reserves; and hence it has higher resistance against rotting and decaying compare to sapwood.

Heart: Is usually located at the center of the timber (it can be off-centered sometimes), which is relatively softer and more brittle compare to true wood and sap wood. Hence, it is lower in strength especially in taking tension load.

Box-Heart Timber, simply means timber that includes the heart; being boxed together, as picture shown below. Box-Heart timber is mainly used in application where compression load is more of a concern than tension loading. Where aesthetic and tension loading are a concern, box-heart timber is not recommended; because box-heart timber will easily crack from center.

Picture below shows the production method for box-heart timber and true-wood timber. For the same size, one can notice that log that is used to cut box-heart timber is way much smaller compared to logs that is used to cut true-wood timber.

From, Mr Teh – Kota Damansara, Malaysia

Getting scarce does not mean large logs can no longer be found. Indeed, Malaysia Forestry Department is doing a great job in preserving the rain forest by introducing and enforcing strict policy in giving out forest concession and permit to harvest virgin forest.

In Malaysia, the forest that are opened for harvesting are mainly secondary forest. Secondary forest is a forest that has been harvested before and let to grow naturally. Hence, logs in the secondary forest is usually smaller in diameter and younger.

Quality of timber is VERY dependent on the age of the logs. The bigger and older the logs, the better the quality in term of timber dimensional stability. Usually logs with diameter above 30inches is considered old and matured enough, thus classified as high quality timber.

Timber that is produced from young tree will have tendency to warp, cup and sometimes bend. Hence, high end product such as musical instrument, crafting and flooring are best to be made using matured timber. Due to the scarcity of matured and large logs, timber price is always inversely proportional to the availability of large timber.

Brought to you by,
Grand Asia Timber Sdn Bhd
www.TropicalWood.my

MGR 1984 EDITION HAS BEEN REVISED

Malaysian Timber Industry Board (MTIB) is pleased to announce the release of the new edition of the Malaysian Grading Rules for Sawn Hardwood Timber (MGR). The 2009 Edition supersedes the previous edition and comes into effect from July 2009.

The timber fraternity throughout the world is well aware of the MGR and its crucial role in raising the profile of the Malaysian timber industry as a supplier of quality hardwood timber. It is well recognised by the international market and is used by several countries as a reference document for sawn timber grading.

The previous edition (1984) had to be revised to keep abreast with market requirements as well as to accommodate technological advancements and R & D accomplishments. In addition to the inclusion of provisions to accommodate these developments, this edition has added the Sarawak Timber Industry Development Corporation (STIDC) as the Grading Authority for Sarawak. Further, administrative requirements contained in the rules have been removed. Any administrative or procedural requirements henceforth will be issued as and when required, in the form of circulars or bulletins.

Among the notable changes made to this edition are :-

• The Grade Mark has been changed from F  D (reference to Forestry Department) to MTIB, since MTIB is the Grading Authority in Malaysia.
• A new specification for the grading of Door and Window Frames has been added to accommodate the increasing demand for these products, especially from European market.
• The Prime Wide and Panels specification has been deleted as this specification has not been used and is unlikely to be ever used.
• The term Large Scantlings and Squares has been replaced with Baulks.
• Section J (Stress Grading) has been deleted since a Malaysian Standard, MS 1714: 2003 “Specification for visual strength grading of tropical hardwood timber” has been developed and contains provisions for stress grading of timber.

For more information, kindly visit: http://www.mtib.gov.my/