Update: Engineered Lumber

Twenty-five years ago, when I first swung a hammer on a framing crew, “engineered lumber” consisted of roof and floor trusses, plywood, and particleboard. Today, the palette of engineered products has broadened considerably, adding not only new materials, but buzzwords such as laminated veneer lumber (LVL), oriented strandboard (OSB), parallel strand lumber (PSL), among others, to our vocabulary. As architects and engineers push the design limits of these manmade beams and boards, carpenters and contractors have had to become familiar with sophisticated construction and fastening techniques By now, most of us are familiar with wood I-joists and LVLs, and OSB sheathing has become a staple of much residential building. Many of these engineered products