Cedar Altay: characteristics and application in construction

After a permanent stay in the "stone jungle" every person wants at least some time to stay in nature. Not surprisingly, most of the country houses and bath houses are built not of cold concrete or stone, but of wood. Those who have the opportunity to spend sky-high sums of money prefer the Altai cedar. There are many reasons for this, because this material has a lot of advantages for both construction and man.

Using cedar

Houses made of this wood have a lot of advantages:

• High level of ecological compatibility. Cedar secrete a large amount of oxygen, which is enriched in negative ions.
• Antiseptic properties. The wood of Altai cedar contains essential oils that saturate the atmosphere with phytoncides, which kill all microbes in the house or bath. Thanks to this, the air becomes practically sterile.
• Increased frost resistance. Wood tolerates sharp changes in temperature conditions. Even at -55 ° C, ^the cedar retains all its useful properties.
• Resistance to insects. Because of the aroma of essential oils released by the tree, there will be no mosquitoes, moths, midges and other pests in the room.

Thanks to numerous advantages, Altai cedar (the photo of the bath from it is shown above) was very popular with the construction of houses in the Siberian region.

Interesting facts about cedar

It is worth noting several features of this lumber, which will be of interest to those who are planning to build a house or a sauna from this tree:

• For suburban construction, only northern timber is usually used.
• In the process of glued timber production it is customary to use only mature trunks, the age of which is not less than 220 years. At the same time, their diameter can reach 2.5 meters.
• Altai cedar has a solid, homogeneous structure and a pleasant pink tint. Wood is easy to process and looks good in any interior.
• In houses of this tree sleeps more tightly. In the morning people experience an incredible influx of energy. Baths of cedar are considered the best, as with the rise in temperature, more phytoncides are released from the wood, favorably affecting health.

Characteristics of wood

In addition to the obvious useful properties, the cedar of Altai cedar has excellent performance characteristics:

• The density, which is 410 kg / m ³ . The most interesting thing is that this figure rises when the humidity is much higher.
• Strength. The strength limit of the Altai cedar is up to 40.6 MPa for compression, about 65 MPa for bending and 90.2 MPa for tension.
• At the maximum water absorption, the moisture content of cedar can increase up to 220%.
• Due to the special structure and content of various organic substances in wood, this material is relatively light in weight. Depending on the variety, it may be between 360 and 570 kg / m ³ .
• In addition to phytoncids, cedar contains vitamins C and A. There are more than 17% protein in the core of the tree. It also contains starch, fiber and oils. The estimation of this material by chemical indices is 5 points.
• According to its mechanical properties, the cedar is similar to fir and spruce.
• The lateral surface of the tree is thinner than its end part by approximately 40%. If we evaluate the hardness of the cedar according to the Brinell scale, it is classified as soft material (4 HB). However, do not confuse this parameter with the strength of the tree, which is quite high in this breed.
• The thermal conductivity of the material is 4.3 kW / h, and the fire resistance index does not exceed 1.5. Thanks to this, a house made of Altaic cedar can be considered a safe place.

Nevertheless, despite the huge number of advantages of this building material, he has one minus - he practically does not occur in free sale.

Why the material is hard to reach

There are several good reasons for this.

The tree is listed in the Red Book, so it is strictly forbidden to cut it.

There are no railway access roads in the Altai, so the unloading of sawn timber becomes impossible. The tree is transported only by trucks, which makes transportation extremely expensive and long.

According to the law of the Republic of Altai, cedar is prohibited to be exported in logs, boards, timber and carriage.

The wood of this breed can rightly be considered one of the most expensive. Just so build a bathhouse or a country house, using this material, will not work.