Is plywood better or worse that solid timber?
When customers come in and are starting a new project, a question that often comes up is whether or not they should be looking at plywood or solid timber as their main material. We’re big fans of solid timber here at Among The Trees – it’s the majority of what we stock – but there are still reasons why plywood might be useful or the right material for you, so let’s look into what it is and why you might choose to use it.
What is plywood?
Plywood is a manufactured material made up of multiple wooden layers that have been fixed together with a glue, resin, or other binding material. These layers are often very think, in the realm of 1-2mm, and more or less layers can be stacked together to vary the final thickness of the material. You can often find plywood in a range of thicknesses that will vary depending on region and manufacturer.
Because plywood is made from multiple layers of timber, these can be oriented in different directions, resulting in an even strength across the face of the materials, as opposed to solid timber which has grain that runs along the timber and has stronger and weaker directions.
While plywood is a term for all manufactured timber products made from “plys” of timber, the timber used and what binds them together can vary, from pretty low quality timber and glue, to stronger glues (resulting in products like structural plywood), and higher quality timbers (sometimes even with a layer of veneer on the face to act as a presentation finish).
This is different to solid timber in that it’s a manufactured material: someone has had to cut those layers and glue them together, whereas that process is happening on a cell-by-cell level within the tree itself as it makes wood.
When would I use plywood or solid timber?
Because of these layers in plywood, it is quite a dimensionally stable material – it isn’t likely to expand and contract unevenly in the way that all solid timber does, and it is less prone to cupping and warping than wide panels of solid timber. It is also simply far more available in large, cohesive sheets than solid timber is.
As a result, plywood is often used for jobs where you need a large single piece, or dimensional stability, such as the backing board for furniture, jigs and other woodworking setup pieces, cupboard doors, and more. In some cases, entire pieces of furniture are constructed from plywood quite happily.
However, there are things that plywood can’t do as well as solid timber: it’s rarely found in pieces thicker than 20-25mm, longer spans are weaker than when made from solid timber, and those layers of plys are visible on the side. For many joinery, furniture building and fine woodworking applications, plywood just doesn’t have the structural soundness or look desired by woodworkers. It also works quite differently to solid timber due to the multiple grain directions.
So which is better?
As usual it’s a trick question – the right material for the job is the best one!
If you’re not sure what is the right material for your next project, or you’re interested in learning more, come and visit us in store to see the range of timber we have available and how we can help with your next project!
