Glued laminated timber, which is popular today, is characterized as the best material for building a wooden house. Many companies specializing in this type of construction recommend preferring KB to other materials, motivating this choice with its high environmental friendliness, good strength and other mechanical characteristics.
Building a house is not a cheap pleasure. A mistake made when choosing a material can be fatal. Therefore, before you start building a house, it is worth figuring out whether the design bureau is really good?
Resistance of KB before cracking
It is believed that KB is a material not prone to cracking. One can only partly agree with this conviction. Yes, a package of lamellas assembled with perfect precision will not crack. However, the build process itself is not automated and is done manually. That is why it is sometimes not necessary to talk about the quality of the material, and, accordingly, its resistance to cracking.
A package of lamellas, assembled with the slightest deviation, is under the influence of internal forces bending the wood. Therefore, you won't have to wait long - after a short time, the vaunted design bureau will certainly crack.
House from KB is not afraid of shrinkage
"Experts" in wood construction say that houses made of laminated veneer lumber do not settle down over time. It is not true. Houses from the design bureau give significant shrinkage - about two centimeters per one meter of construction in height per year for the first two years after completion of work.
If the average height of a one-story house is about 4 meters, then in two years the house will shrink in height by 16 centimeters! Calling this figure insignificant and not worthy of attention will not turn out to be.
High environmental friendliness KB
There is no need to doubt the environmental safety of wood. However, the adhesives that are used in the manufacturing process of KB are so saturated with formaldehydes that there can be no talk of any environmental friendliness of this material.
There are still harmless adhesives and impregnations, but the cost of construction using a truly environmentally friendly design bureau will grow exponentially and become unjustifiably expensive.
For these reasons, you should not use KB in the bathroom. When renovating an apartment, a building mosaic is ideal for bathroom design.
Houses from KB "breathe"
The most impudent myth about KB. The air exchange that KB can provide can be compared to air exchange in a house with the best plastic windows. This effect is obtained due to the presence of several adhesive layers in the lamella package, which are not able to pass air.
Walls do not require additional sealing
Such a hopeful, but such a harmful myth! There are no seamless joints, no matter how high-quality the material is and no matter how accurate the calculations are.
In addition, the changes in geometry, provoked by weather conditions, have not been canceled. Therefore, in damp but warm weather the seams will be "closed", and in dry frosty weather they will "open". It is in these "open" not insulated joints that heat will leave the house.But for high-quality wall insulation, you will have to use a special type of insulation - self-expanding tapes.
Durability KB
The last myth about KB says: “KB is many times more durable than solid logs”. In fact, the term "KB durability" means the quality of the glue used. It is they who determine the life of the design bureau.
As for buildings made of solid logs, even without proper care, they can stand for several hundred years. And if you maintain a good condition of a house from a solid log, protecting the wood from damage, moisture and pests, then you don't have to worry about its durability.
Here it is - the whole truth about KB. Do you need such a house? The choice is only yours.