• Korean Journal of Agricultural Science
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.103-110
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• 1994

Since the supply of the Southeast Asian tropical timber decreases and its price steeply increases in the international lumber market, door and window frame manufacturers in this country are eagerly searching for their substitutes. This is the first step to replace Southeast Asian tropical timber by low grade North American softwoods, whose reliable and steady supply is expected, but their appearances are not as good as the tropical timber. In this study, knot distribution on the softwood boards and their warp were examined The yield and production cost were also calculated. The average numbers of knots on a door frame were 7.2 for Douglas-fir and 3.4 for Western hemlock. Only 11% of the knots of Douglas-fir door frames are larger than 5cm in diameter, while are 35% of the knots of Western hemlock. The deformations of door frames, after 2 months air-drying, were measured with a warp table. The deformations of Western hemlock door frames were mostly less than 6mm, while those of Douglas-fir distributed in the range of 0.5 and 9.5mm. The yield of Western hemlock is higher than that of Douglas-fir. It can be concluded that the door frames made of the softwoods are compatible with those made of the tropical timber in most aspects except appearance.