More than 50 members of the Timber Trade Federation met in London last week to finally lay to rest the confusion in relation to certain types of structural plywood.
Nick Boulton of the TTF’s National Panel Products Division (NPPD) said: ‘There seemed to be confusion among our own members and the construction trade in general and we wanted to get people together to ensure we are all singing from the same song sheet.’
The TTF says that to achieve compliance with Approved Documents to Regulation 7 of the Building Regulations, plywood shall either meet the accepted National Standard requirements of BS5268 part 2 or achieve an Agrément Certificate or European Technical Approval.
Plywood that is listed within BS5268 part 2 is suitable for load bearing structural applications. Currently such plywood can only be sourced from Canada, Finland, Sweden and the US. However, only the grades of plywood listed in BS5268 part 2 are approved for load bearing applications, and not all plywood from these four countries necessarily meet this requirement.
Plywood that has been produced to the American manufacturing standard PS195 is increasingly available in the UK. While this has been manufactured to an internationally recognised standard and has independent third party quality assurance, it is not listed in BS5268 part 2 and is therefore not automatically suitable for load bearing applications in the UK.
A number of panel products including some plywood have achieved BBA Agrément Certificates for specific end uses. For this reason these products do not have to be listed in BS5268 part 2 in order to meet the full requirements of the UK Building Regulations.
In the case of OSB, the surest way of knowing that the product fits into a load-bearing class is to ascertain that it has been manufactured in compliance with one of the load bearing OSB classes in BS EN 3000 – this will in any case have to be ascertained at a later stage when CE marking becomes compulsory. This may then be followed by selection testing and calculation procedures to ensure suitability for the particular intended use.
The TTF is investigating how the correct use of various forms of plywood can be publicised.
NPPD chairman Malcolm Cowley said: ‘We want to make sure there is as much accurate information as possible for use both by the trade, the construction sector and the general public.’
