Interactive effect of surface densification and post-heat-treatment on aspen wood

Surface densification technique can be used to enhance mechanical properties of low-density wood at a relative low temperature such as 145 °C. However, the final dimensions of densified wood products are not stable when exposed to cyclic weathering. Post-high-temperature heat-treatment could assist in solving this problem through the modification of chemical components in wood. This study examined the interactive effect of surface densification and post-heat-treatment on aspen (Populus tremuloides). Thickness swelling and other selected properties of heat-treated surface densified aspen were compared to untreated aspen. As expected, the heat-treatment significantly improved the dimensional stability of surface densified aspen and reduced the mechanical properties to some degree. However, the mechanical properties of heat-treated densified specimens were still greater than those unheat-treated undensified ones.