This week we took delivery of a brand new product sourced from British forests. The thermally-modified hardwood cladding will be used on the first building at the Sylva Wood Centre. The ash and sycamore cladding was supplied by Tyler Hardwoods, and its application supported by Grown in Britain. We will be following the story of its sourcing, manufacture and application over the next few weeks.
Meanwhile here is a sneak preview of the product. Those who know their timbers will be the first to point out that neither sycamore or ash are durable outdoors, and normally would be unsuitable for cladding. However, the thermal modification process renders their timber durable. This is exciting news for these two timbers especially. Sycamore is one of our fastest growing hardwoods but often goes to low value markets such as firewood. Ash can be high value but has niche markets yet supply is anticipated to increase when ash dieback disease has full impact in our woodlands.
Innovation in timber engineering is an important step towards realising a functional bioeconomy. Watch this space for further details and future updates.
Thermally-modified GB hardwood timber cladding for the Sylva Wood Centre. Left and top, sycamore. Right and bottom, ash.
Where do I go to buy it —- no contact given !!!!
Hi Edmund. This is a brand new product still in development and being tested for the first time, so it is not yet available commercially. Do watch this space.
What an excellent idea and good to see see sycamore being put to good use. It’s an attractive wood, and, as you say, very fast growing. This would look wonderful cladding new builds, barns etc. and must be cheaper to source (and more easilly renewable) than oak
Thermal modification is? please clarify as this covers many things and also more elaboration on the process that renders non exterior woods usable outside sounds like a revolution if true
cheers
Thanks for your question. We will very soon be publishing here a more detailed article about the process.
is the thermal modification process akin to kiln drying? and steam treatment process?
We successfully modified ash in this way a couple of years ago for construction timber, though on a very small scale.
For supplies of Grown in Britain thermally modified Ash and Sycamore, contact me Dougal@growninbritain.org