Bonding Performance of Adhesives with Lamina in Structural Glulam Manufactured by High Frequency Heating System

The bonding performance of two types of wood adhesives, namely phenol-resorcinol-formaldehyde (PRF) resin and melamine-urea-formaldehyde (MUF) resin for glued laminated timber manufactured by high frequency (HF) heating was evaluated. The HF heating system consists of HF oscillator with dielectric heating system for curing adhesives, and hydraulic press system for clamping glued laminated timber. The designed frequency and output power of the HF system was as 5 MHz and 60 kW, respectively. To verify dielectric heating mechanism under HF oscillation, the heat loss factors of laminae and adhesives were measured. The results show that it is possible to selectively heat adhesives for their curing due to the remarkably higher loss factor of the adhesives than those of wood laminae. The temperature of adhesive in the bonding line reached up to the set temperature within a few seconds by high frequency oscillating, which advanced the curing of adhesive afterwards. The bonding performance, such as shear strength of bonding line, water soaking delamination, and boiling water soaking delamination of PRF resin met the requirement of Korean Standard (KS), however the MUF resin did not meet the KS requirement of boiling water soaking delamination. These results indicate that the HF heating system is successful to manufacture glued laminated timbers with PRF resins to meet the bonding requirements.