AWPB takes good care of your customer

I ONG BEFORE "consumer probtection" became abuzz word, a few individuals in the wood preserving industry began to realize that the quality of their production was an absolute necessity. So in 1971, they took action that led to the formation of the American Wood Preservers Bureau.

The original board of governors determined that the Bureau's function was not to replace the treating inspection companies already in place, but to utilize them in ways to provide full consumer protection. The board also realized that to serve treated wood customers efficiently, AWPB would need a statistical system of quality control. For that purpose, they adapted the quality mark system used by the American Lumber Standards Comittee. In addition to the quality mark program, AWPB went a step further and created a central laboratory to ensure real third-party consumer assurance of quality in pressure-treated wood products.

With this system in place, the Bureau is at work today monitoring quality-marked materials at treating plants, wholesale yards, retail loca- tions and even job sites. The field team, headed by Donn Keefe, takes some 1500 samples per year and ships them to the AWPB laboratory in Arlington, Va., for inspection.

Story at a Glance

Third-party consumer assur. ance of quality for pressure treated wood products.. .1500 samples analyzed each year.. exacting equipment and proce. dures guarantee product.

As the samples are received at the laboratory, they are sorted, logged and labeled before being put into a forced-air circulating oven and baked about two hours until they are "bone dry." Then the samples are weighed and ground and put back into the oven to remove any moisture they might have absorbed during the grinding process. Next the ground samples are pelletized to prepare them for analysis by the X-ray spectro- meter. It takes only 20 seconds for the spectrometer to produce a precise printout covering up to five elements in the wood. Samples that are nonconforming are then double-checked through a method incorporating a highly advanced atomic spectrometer.

LAB0RAT0RY functions at the American Wood Preservers Bureau headouarters in Arlington, Va., are under the supervision of Byong l. Min, v.p. and technical director, who has the responsibility of assuring the continuing integrity of the AWPB quality mark.

Because the analysis is so important to the treater and consumer, information about non-conforming samples is telephoned immediately to the inspection agency.

Consumer acceptance and industry dependence on the AWPB quality mark and laboratory testing progr.rm are evidenced by the record membership of over 300 plants, producing a record 2.2 billion board feet of pressure-treated lumber in 1983. Particularly strong are the production statistics for wood foundation lumber, which showed the best improvement per category in 1983 (see bar-graph illustration).

As a result of the efforts of a few farsighted individuals who originated and createtl AWPB's independent third-party control system, consumers today can purchase qudlity marked pressure-treated lumber with complete confidence in the treatment. Pressuretreated lumber sales are recording alltime highs, and in the future look to grow even stronger.