We recently issued a very interesting podcast episode where Geoff Rhodes told the incredible story of MDF (Series 2, Episode 7) and how it arrived in Europe and grew into the product range that we see today.
Modified timber is nothing new – we also released an episode about plywood (Series 1, Episode 5) that focuses more on where plywood is heading today as it’s an incredible product.
I recently visited the Battle Of Britain Bunker at Uxbridge in Middlesex and saw where that crucial moment in the survival of our nation was mostly directed and it was an extremely moving experience; I thoroughly recommend it.
Then even more recently I read of Colin Bell, who at the grand age of 105, has published a bestselling book titled Bloody Dangerous, an account of flying on bombing raids across Germany in his ‘wooden wonder’.
Colin seems to be a remarkable man in many ways and his underlying theme seems to be positivity. Just to have survived what he did is amazing, let alone to then live to well over 100 years old.
So, what’s this ‘wooden wonder’. Well of course, it was the De Havilland Mosquito, the fastest plane in the sky at the time and all made of wood – actually mostly plywood!
Colin clearly saw the Mosquito as a very trustworthy and reliable plane. He indeed mentions that he flew a Spitfire and found there was nothing it did which his Mosquito couldn’t do just as well.
What tends to be forgotten is how technically clever the Mosquito was. We’re not talking about string and Balsawood. It was highly engineered and the techniques used to construct all of the different elements are impressive. Just one example is how the internal veneers had holes punched out of them to make the plywood lighter, but arranged in ways that meant the holes didn’t overlap and lose any strength.
Born of necessity, because all of the other ingredients for aeroplane construction were already fully utilised, wood was the answer and the thousands of skilled woodworkers across the UK were there, ready and waiting to bring the materials together, to create the ‘wooden wonder’.
So, who knows what new wood innovations are going to arrive in the coming years but they surely will and they’ll help us win the battles that we face across the world.