Kiln Drying Reclaimed Lumber Benefits, Process

Kiln drying reclaimed lumber is becoming increasingly popular in design, especially for materials salvaged from old buildings, barns, and warehouses. This antique wood is primarily used for decoration and home building, with common applications including siding, architectural details, cabinetry, furniture, and flooring.”

Overlogging and disease have limited woods like western redwood, Longleaf Heart Pine, and American Chestnut to reclaimed lumber. Barns, especially those built around the 19th century, serve as a key source of this wood. Early barns used hand-hewn beams, while later barns used beams made by sawmills.

Kiln Drying Reclaimed Lumber Benefits, Process

Reclaimed Lumber is Inherantly Eco Friendly

^{The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System is the US Green Building Council’s (USGBC) benchmark for designing, building, and operating green buildings. To become certified, projects must first meet the prerequisites set by the USGBC. Then, they must earn a certain number of credits across six categories: sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources, indoor environmental quality, and innovation and design process.1}

Reclaimed lumber is LEED certified.

Kiln Drying Reclaimed Lumber Benefits, Process

Using reclaimed wood can earn credits towards achieving LEED project certification. Since reclaimed wood is considered recycled content, it meets the ‘materials and resources’ criteria for LEED certification. Moreover, because some reclaimed lumber products are Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified, they can also qualify for LEED credits under the ‘certified wood’ category..

Reclaimed Lumber is Stronger and More Durable

Reclaimed lumber is chosen for its unique appearance, strength, stability, and durability. Experts believe its increased strength comes from fewer air pollutants before the 20th century and the fact that these trees were harvested from virgin forests with centuries of slow, natural growth.

Wood naturally expands and contracts through the year as the moisture content and temperature of the air changes. Newly sawn lumber does this inherently more than lumber that has been reclaimed. Reclaimed lumber has been through this expansion and contraction hundreds of time in many cases rendering the wood more stable than new lumber.

Using Reclaimed Lumber

Reclaimed lumber can be used in it’s aged, rustic form or it can be resawn into high quality boards. Reclaimed beams can often be sawn into wider boards than are available from trees today due to the larger size of virgin timber.

Kiln Drying Reclaimed Lumber Benefits, Process

The most common reason reclaimed lumber should not go straight from the barn into your home is insects.

In either case, there is some precaution that must be taken when utilizing reclaimed lumber in your project. Reclaimed lumber can contain foreign metal objects.

In some cases, reclaimed lumber may have been treated with unknown compounds that could have environmental or health consequences.

The most common reason reclaimed lumber should not go straight from the barn into your home is insects. Often time these barns and antique structures are not completely dry, making opportunities for ants, bees, termites and other harmful insects to take up residence.

Reclaimed lumber should be kiln dried for at least three days at a temperature greater than 127 degrees to kill both adults and larval forms of all insects. This process has the additional benefit of ensuring the stability of the lumber.

For information and pricing on drying kiln-drying your reclaimed lumber call Timber Works today.

References

1: Usgbc: Leed