Steam Bending And Laminates

Steam Bending

Steam Bending uses hot steam to get absorbed into the woods that in turn makes the wood more flexible. Once the wood has been shaped into the shape desired the shaped wood is then seasoned to remove the moisture content into the vorrect amount depending of the environment of where the wood will be used.
The process is used in both small scale and large scale production and the products can make anything from stairs to chairs.
It takes about one hour to steam a piece of wood per 25mm thickness of the wood.
So;
50 mm thick = 2 hours steaming
75 mm thick = 3 hours steaming
and so on.

Laminated Wood

Laminates are made up from a variety of layers all bonded together using an adhesive which is in fact stronger than the wood itself which makes the finished Laminate extremely strong and hard.

The layers of wood have all their grains going in different directions alot like in Plywood which makes the woods strong in all direction which it wouldn't be if all the grains were facing the same way. Laminates are sometimes used as decorative features such as flooring. One of the most commonly found uses for Laminates is Laminate flooring.