Effects of density, temperature, size, grain angle of wood materials on nondestructive moisture meters

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of density, temperature, size, and grain direction on measurement of moisture contents (MC) of wood materials non-destructively. The MC of different sizes of solid wood, glulam, and CLT from larch (larix kaempferi, 560 kg/m 3 ) and pine (pinus koraiensis, 430 kg/m 3 ) were measured using the dielectric type and resistance type meters. The specimens were conditioned in the environmental chamber to be equilibrium moisture content (EMC) of 12 % and 19 %. When density setting in dielectric type meter was increased from 400 kg/m 3 to 600 kg/m 3 , the MCs of specimen (S-L-100-E) were decreased from 13.4 % to 11.3 %. However, when wood group (WG) setting in resistance type meter was changed from WG1 to WG4, the measured MCs were increased from 9.2 % to 12.3 %. When temperature setting in resistance type meters was changed from 0 to 35 ℃, the MC was decreased from 17.0 % to 13.0 %. The MCs measured by dielectric type meter for larger specimens (S-L-100-E_11.3 %, G-L-240-E_11.7 % and C-L-120-E_12.8 %) were higher than those of small size specimens (S-L-30-E_8.7 %, G-L-150-E_10.3 %, and C-L-90-E_9.7 %). The MCs measured by resistance type meter for larger specimens (G-L-240-E_11.6 % and C-L-120-E_13.3 %) were also higher than those of small size specimens (G-L-150-E_10.4 %, and C-L-90-E_11.8 %). The resistance type meter was not affected by the grain direction but the dielectric type meter were affected by the grain direction. The MC measured by resistance type meter for G-L-120–E perpendicular to grain direction was 11.5 % and the measured MC parallel to grain direction was 11.3 %. The MC measured by dielectric type meter parallel to grain direction (12.1 %) was higher than that measured perpendicular to grain direction (10.7 %).