Eucalyptus plywood.

Hello Guys.
I am renovating a trailer and need new ply boarding for it. It will need to be Phenolic coated which is the standard board we use for trailers because of its durability.
Over here in the UK the standard wood for good quality ply is Birch sourced in Europe as it is strong and has some moisture resistance.
I've been sourcing some sheets and I see that we now have Eucalyptus ply phenolic resing coated.
Would appreciate any comments from you about Eucalyptus ply. Durability , strength etc. There are'nt that many Eucalyptus trees in the UK ! Does it compare well with Birch ply ?
I think that the board is made in China......

thanks

Never even heard of it until now...

Not something I have come across either but a google shows that the is Euc ply out there.
Eucalypt Laserply | Plyco.
Likely not the stuff Badgers Den is looking at however. I would imagine it comes with some data sheet and a list of applications.
Regards
John

Almost forgot. Welcome to the forum BD

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Originally Posted by BadgersDen

Does it compare well with Birch ply ?
I think that the board is made in China......

thanks

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I think you have answered your question....:rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by cava

I think you have answered your question....:rolleyes:

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Well not all stuff that comes from China is c**p. They are making good quality router cutters which are sold via an American company.
I am always cautious as Chinese stuff has historically a bad reputation however I think that is changing as more companies get things made in China under strict quality control.
I don't know much about this Phenolic Euc plywood, but it is being imported here in the UK and is about a third of the price of quality Birch ply such as 'Buffalo' board.
I thought I would ask you guys in Aus as you have Eucalpts in abundance (well not so many now). The nearest i've been to Eucalyptus is watching 'Skippy' as a kid.

As another note since I've beem Googling I've also come across phenolic coated Poplar ply.

Years ago I replaced the tongue and grooved hardwood timber floor of my table top truck. I foolishly used Form Ply. At that time Form Ply was made from hardwood (Euc) plies and a marine type glue to bond them. It only lasted a few years before the ply started to delaminate. I had to go back to tongue and grooved hardwood. With the climate in the UK I would have thought that plywood out doors would perform as did my Formply. Our climate is predominately hot and dry while you fells have wet wet wet. The Form Ply we see here now is made from a softwood with a marine type glue (from our Asian exporter) and it performs even less well as the hardwood ply

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Originally Posted by cava

I think you have answered your question....:rolleyes:

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Sadly we have very few ply manufacturers left in Australia, and certainly nothing like the hey days of the 1950's to late 1970's in FNQ and QLD in general. According to a 1950's timber report there were 60+ ply / veneer mills in the Cairns hinterland alone.

A significant amount of veneer grade logs / billets are exported to China for veneer manufacture, then re-exported / imported for sale.

No idea what is available in the UK but Plyco & The Big River Group both have a range of Euc plywoods.

Armourply Hardwood Plywood (bigrivergroup.com.au) - unexposed applications!

Armourform F27 - premium quality total hardwood formply manufactured from Australian hardwood eucalypt species. It is extremely strong, stiff and durable, outperforming other formply in all respects. Can achieve up to 60 castings.

Formwork Products - Largest suppliers of high quality plywood products (bigrivergroup.com.au)

By far the best marine plywood available in Australia is Hoop Pine Marine Plywood - Marine Plywood Collection (plyco.com.au) - though it is not designed for high wear flooring etc.

This link may help

A Guide to Trailer Deck Options — Industrial Wood Technology

There are also a number of composite floor panel options used mainly in horse float manufacture.

I researched this topic a while back myself for an acquaintance who is about to renovate / modify a horse float.
POLEXIUM | Imperial Horse Floats (imperialfloats.com.au) is just one out there in the market.
Discovery Horse Floats Flooring (discoveryfloats.com.au)

Oh, be warned - there are a number of "fake" phenolic resin coated "form plywoods" on the market. They look the goods but do not meet structural standards and have a very thin coating.

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Sadly we have very few ply manufacturers left in Australia, and certainly nothing like the hey days of the 1950's to late 1970's in FNQ and QLD in general. According to a 1950's timber report there were 60+ ply / veneer mills in the Cairns hinterland alone.

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Apologies for the slight thread drift.
As you say, in the '50 & '60s there were any number of ply & veneer mills in the Cairns area. When they cut the veneers (plain slice, not rotary) there was a back board left, usually about 12-15 mm thick. These were dumped at the Cairns tip, whence canny woodworkers would salvage them. I know one bloke who supplemented his pension by turning lampstands from laminated timbers he salvaged from the tip. My uncle used to ship a couple of ARC backboards at a time down to my father in Sydney. A cousin & I used the last of them in the early 2000's, 40 years after my father had died.

In Melbourne I get my hardwood ply from Big River Timber, as the name suggests they might have a mill in NSW big river country.

Thanks Mobyturns.
Like you say some of the 'cheaper' options in phenolic coated ply look the goods but are probably not going to stand the test of time.

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Originally Posted by BadgersDen

...
I thought I would ask you guys in Aus as you have Eucalypts in abundance (well not so many now). The nearest i've been to Eucalyptus is watching 'Skippy' as a kid. ....

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That is very true, BD. If I go out into the bush (forest), only about 10 minutes from home, the vast majority of trees are eucalypts, but we don't think we make any plywood from gum trees (what we call eucalypts). In fact, very little plywood is made in Australia now.

But eucalypts are the most widely planted plantation tree in the world, and over 95% of that is outside Australia.
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/...tbl1_284907376

Additionally, there are over 700 species of eucalypts. Our forests are much more varied than Europe. Those different species range from very soft, comparable to cedar, to very hard, harder than purpleheart.

Virtually none of us have any experience with eucalypt plywood, and without information on the species of eucalypt we cannot even make an informed guess.

Most of us use eucalypt (Tas oak) tongue and groove timber for the beds in our utes and trailers.

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Originally Posted by GraemeCook

In fact, very little plywood is made in Australia now.

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We still make a fair amount of it, it's just all pine.

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Originally Posted by elanjacobs

We still make a fair amount of it, it's just all pine.

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A couple of years back I was chasing several sheets of 12 mm & 16 mm (pine) structural ply from Big River. The ply packs they had in stock were marked with origins in Chile, Peru & Australia. The imported ply marked as CD grade was more like BC grade Australian made pine plywood.

Big River's blurb states "Manufacturing operations are located at Grafton and Wagga Wagga in NSW, where a range of hardwood and pine resources are processed into timber products, including plywood for formwork, structural and decorative applications."