Bamboo Plywood for Enclosure

[pjpoes]

Hey, I have become quite into "green" products as of lately, and a while back remembered seeing Bamboo flooring. It was nice because, besides looking nice and being durable, Bamboo is a reed, like grass sorta, and grows much quicker than tree's. I recently bought a bunch of bamboo cutting boards and noticed that the construction was like a butchblock or plywood construction. I looked around and found a few places that sell actual Bampoo plywood, and was wondering if anyone had ever thought of using it as a speaker enclosure material before, and if so, what they thought. If not check it out and let me know what you think, good or bad. Its quite attractive.

http://www.wfibamboo.com/home.html

[aussie78]

actually, I have been thinking of bamboo as well.... haven't done research on it though. But i think it is VERY attractive as flooring and could be for an enclosure too. I don't know how well it would be for making a box but I will see what comes of this thread

[Audiophilenoob]

I'm all for green conscience folks

easy way to test it's strength .... cut a piece of MDF and take it with you...

compare flexablity of it

likely it dampens fairly close to the same as MDF... so no worries there...

[HWV]

I've been interested in the alternative plywoods as well, since seeing them advertised in a magazine. The lumber does look quite nice!

Some more links:

http://www.plyboo.com
http://www.durapalm.com

-Hans

[Christer]

Why does it have to be alternative plywood to be "green"? You could buy plain standard plywood from forests that are replanted. Or was it some other environmental aspect that I missed?

BTW, isn't bamboo a rather porous and low density material? If so, they must have compressed it quite hard or otherwise treated it if it is suitable for floors and similar.

[noah katz]

I'm guessing they just use the outer shell part of bamboo, which is quite hard.

No mention of prices, either. If it's like the bamboo flooring in my area, it's rather pricey.

[Audiophilenoob]

Originally posted by noah katz
I'm guessing they just use the outer shell part of bamboo, which is quite hard.

No mention of prices, either. If it's like the bamboo flooring in my area, it's rather pricey.

I bet it's pressed bamboo dust... which could be very cheap

[pjpoes]

its just the outer husk of the bamboo, a very very dense and hard wood like material. It is not pressed dust, and it is rather pricey at times, but not terrible either.

I consider this "more Green" than just plywood from a replanted forest in that, Bamboo grows in a much quicker time than trees. Even a replanted forest is not as good as switching to alternatives like Bamboo as far as regrowth.

As for the cost, its understandable. If you look at how they form it into useable pieces, it really is quite an intensive process. The wood is cut into fourths, or whatever, then soaked, then pressed, etc. Once that is done, they then layer it much like a butcher block to create the "plywood." As far as I can tell thus far, I have a fiew samples, its very hard, very rigid, and about as dead as a piece of maple or ash. It is lighter weight too, though I am not really sure why that is, it does give a strange feel to the boards. Actually, I have a rock maple butcher block I made a while back, it was one of the hardest pieces of maple I had ever seen, and I fully expected that to be the ultimate block. I am impressed thus far with my Bamboo cutting boards, they seem to cut less easily than the maple does. My only concern at this point is that it may be so hard, like ironwood, that its actually dulling my blades.

[Audiophilenoob]

replanted forests are generally where they clear huge old oaks and replant pines

[Christer]

Originally posted by pjpoes

I consider this "more Green" than just plywood from a replanted forest in that, Bamboo grows in a much quicker time than trees. Even a replanted forest is not as good as switching to alternatives like Bamboo as far as regrowth.

Why? OK you need less space perhaps, because it grows quicker, but so what? If wew save some space here we will use it for some other purpose like farming, cities, highways or whatever that is less friendly for the nature. Here in Sweden we have legislation since more than 100 years that all forests that are cut down must be replanted, and it works very well. We actually have more trees now than when this started. Besides, bamboo doesn't grow very well in Sweden.

Originally posted by Audiophilenoob
replanted forests are generally where they clear huge old oaks and replant pines

Not here at least, but maybe in some countries. Thats just insufficient regulation of the wood industry if that happens.