etween Louisiana.Pacific and herits of the structural panel each fnd Louisiana-Pacific with its wafenruood Oriented Strand Board gains industry respect

By H.R. Hutchins Potlatch Corp.

Ai.T*[".l;{T:J:3:i,:":ff"'"J; structural building panels and three points consistently lead the list: performance, cost savings and minimum claims.

Builders nationwide more and more are pointing with growing satisfaction to a new structural panel that delivers on all three points, and more. The product is oriented strand board (OSB), an engineered structural panel designed to perform. Unlike the random wafers in ordinary waferboard, the strands of wood in OSB are oriented at right angles, layer by layer, for greater strength and stiffness.

An industry leader in the introduction of this innovative structural panel is Potlatch, a diversified forest products company with extensive timberlands and manufacturing operations nationwide.

Potlatch was the first major forest products company to bring osB into the marketplace with the l98l startup of a 150 million-sq. ft. (3/8" basis) production facility at Bemidji, Mn.

Introduced under the imaginative tradename of Oxboard, this new fivelayer, structural panel quickly gained the attention of builders throughout mid-America. Today it is considered the premium OSB on the market.

In 1983, a second Potlatch Oxboard plant began production at Cook, Mn., giving the company annual pro- duction capacity of more than 300 million sq. ft. (3/8 " basis).

Why Oxboard? This new structural panel carries an American Plywood Association performance rating, which means it can replace plywood for sheathing, subfloor and roof decking at a price competitive with plywood. But more important, Oxboard is superior, performance-wise, to plywood and ordinary waferboard. Oxboard doesn't have knotholes or core voids and it never delaminates.

Rudy Trone, a Minneapolis, Mn., builder says it best, "Oxboard does everything plywood can do, and more.tt

"It spans the same distances as plywood. Each panel is uniform, dimensionally stable and without voids. And Sturdl-Floor rated panels are tongue-and-grooved to eliminate the need for blocking," Trone adds.

The strongest arguments for Oxboard and OSB come from the industry's builders and materials dealers themselves. Testimonials on perfor-

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Story at a Glance

On this page, Potlatch presents Oxboard's features and bene. fits, including dependability, cost savings and minimum claims. .highlights inctude their leelings as to its .,greater strength" in independent tests.

DESIGNED to compete head on with plywood and other structural panels, manufabturer Potlatch claims its panels beat the competition in strength, stiflness, weight and dimensional sta0rlrlv.

NARR0W strands of wood, seen here in raw form, are aligned in layers during the manulacturing process. Alternate layers of 0SB are perpendicular and bonded with ohenolic resin for strength.