Square Logs


       When I visited lumber mills and lumber retail outlets in Japan, I was
     impressed with the way the Japanese handle logs. By contrast, we appear
     to butcher and mutilate our timber. They treasure, enhance, and beautify
     it. I saw Japanese technicians study a log for hours before they decided
     how to cut it. When they did cut it, the waste material would fit in one
     hand. Many Japanese lumber mills cut only one log a day. They make more
     profit from that one log than some of our mills make on hundreds of
     trees.

       Now the Japanese are going even further. They have decided that round
     logs have more value when they are turned into square logs. That way the
     largest amount of waste -- that lost in trimming a round log until it is
     square, and then converting it into two-by-fours or whatever -- is
     eliminated.

       Scientist Yoshinori Kabayashi of the Nara Prefectural Forest Experiment
     Station near Osaka invented and developed a process that "cooks" round
     logs until they are square. The technique is startlingly simple. In his
     specially designed microwave "oven," the temperature of the log is raised
     to 250ÆF, thereby making the round log so pliable it can be massaged into
     the desired square shape. The log is allowed to cool to room temperature
     while still in the press process. Then it is heated again to the same
     temperature. The process does not damage wood fibers, but actually makes
     them stronger, denser, and less subject to warping or splitting. The
     specific gravity of the square log, its hardness, and its resistance to
     abrasion are all superior to that of the raw log. The pressure required
     to achieve the square profile is surprisingly low -- as low as 150 pounds
     per square inch. The log retains its square shape when released from the
     oven and the conversion pressure.

       During the squaring process, as the logs are compressed, a considerable
     amount of water is ejected, usually about five quarts from a
     three-foot-long cedar log. The resulting log is firmer and denser; it has
     been bumped into a higher-grade quality. After the process, the quality
     of a cedar log approximates that of the more expensive Japanese cypress.
     According to a Canadian expert, that could turn a $70 log into a $210
     product. How's that for value added? According to Kobayashi the
     possibilities do not stop there. Crooked, misshapen, and distorted logs,
     which in our forests today would be discarded or relegated to the chip
     pile, can be straightened and squared.

       Because of its size, the microwave oven used in the laboratory process
     has been used to test only short sections of logs. Such an oven
     constructed to handle commercial lengths of timber in sixteen-foot
     lengths is estimated to cost about $150,000, a relatively minor expense.
     The implications could be industry-shattering. If the Japanese find it
     economic to supply all of their 300,000 sawmills with factory-produced
     industrial models of this equipment, they could substantially increase
     the value of any log. Competing companies around the world would be left
     behind.

       The Japanese may agree to export their revolutionary log compressor --
     at their price, and after they have supplied their own country -- to
     friendly countries first. For now, though, the Nara prefectural
     government is not allowing anyone else to use the patent. It appears that
     Nara officials want companies in their prefecture to receive first
     opportunities. "After one or two years," says Kobayashi, "it will
     probably sell licenses for the technology outside the prefecture."