Evaluation of the visual stress grading standard on French Spruce (Picea excelsa) and Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) sawn timber

In this paper an evaluation of the visual grading standard for softwood sawn timber was made. In order to do so, visual grading according to EN 518 and theoretical grading according to EN 338 and EN 384 (measurements of MOE, MOR and density) were applied to lumber. Two batches of 111 and 102 French boards were graded, respectively, of Spruce (Picea excelsa) and Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii). For the visual grading the most discriminant criterion was noted: knots, cracks, wane, etc. Finally, the results of the two grading methods were compared, and it was shown that the visual stress grading gave quite low results for our two French species.