Fantastic New Wood Fireproofing Process

A new process for making wood fireproof is said to be so efiective that ncit even the heat of a furnace can overcome it.

If it works as well as its developers say, it could bring about great savings in property. More immediately, it could expand the market for a developing new product, commercially treated wood.

Its inventor, Dr. Menaehem Levin of the Israeli government's Fiber Research Institute, 'says it will work. He built fires under two identical model houses of beaverboard and stood back to watch. The model treated with his potassium bromine solution was unafiected; the untreated model collapsed and was burned to a crisp.

The American Wood Preservers Institute in Washington, D.C., took note and immediately began to ask questions, mostly technical. If other woods stood up as well as the treated beaverboard, then here was something with promise. If the process costs as little as Dr. Levin claims, then here was o'something that could be economically significant."

Dr. Levin says his process works on plywood, Masonite, beaverboard, cardboard, rope, even newspaper. He's tried it. And he says it costs about $25 to treat one ton of timber products. Present methods cost about $40.

Levin, a 46-year-old scientist who in his younger days was a leader of the Stern Gang which terrorized British police, says his method is different because it alters tho chemical structure of wood. Technically, it introduces bromine into the lignine molecules which envelop cellulose fibers. The bromine-treated lignine prevents combustion, permanently, without changing the wood's appearance.

It prevents rotting, too.

"Methods of protecting wood from fire have changed little since the days of ancient Egypg" Levin said after his successful experiments. "Timber is still soaked in various saline solutions. But the salt absorbed adds 25 per cent to the weight of the timber. Since there is no chemical reaction with the wood, these salts are easily washed out by rain or diluted by dampness."

The potassium bromine methgd, he said, adds about four per cent to the weight of timber. And it produces a chemical change.

The Wood Preservers Institute has asked for more technical information and would like to see results of experiments based on United States testing standards. If successful in the U.S., the Levin method could boost use of treated woods, which now comprise less than one per cent of the lumber market.

Wood could return as a competitor / against steel studding, metal ceiling materials. and in other structural uses where wood has lost ground to other materials.

Levin and his stafi have been working on the potassium bromine process for four years. Their research was stimulated by the fact that Israel possesses vast amounts of bromide in the Dead Sea. Their process has been registered for patents in the United States pnd other countries.

Areq Housing Picture Stoble

Another year as good as 1963 or l9M -coupled with a slight dip in the California housing picture-has been predicted.

In a forecast also pinpointing expanded activity in the San Francisco Bay area and a small downturn in Sacramento, the nationwide Los Angeles-based San{ord R. Goodkin Research Corporation states that: in the city of Los Angeles, the firm projects a'three per cent dip in housing; in the San Francisco-Oakland area, the housing starts will be up two per cent; in Sacramento, down one per cent.