Technologies Developed

The standard steam heated timber-seasoning kilns with boiler and complement of boiler operating staff and kiln operators are not economically appropriate for all situations. Drying of timber can be appreciably accelerated compared to air seasoning and at appreciably reduced seasoning costs compared to conventional steam heated kilns using solar seasoning kiln. Solar kiln are based on greenhouse principle. The solar kiln is normally operated during day light hours only. A single passed force air-drying arrangement is incorporated making use of the dry air available on warm summer nights. Forest Research Institute has now developed a modified solar kiln design having a charge capacity of 250 cft for one-inch thick plank. Read More..

 Use of curved wood in furniture and housing is prevalent and is of key importance in many industries in India especially in those that manufacture furniture, sports goods, boats, ships and several decorative and utility articles. Steam has traditionally been used to soften wood for bending. Tests carried out earlier have indicated that only a few Indian timber species are amenable to steam bending. The steam bending technique has also limitations such as bending at sharp radius of curvature is not possible, long period is required for plasticization and drying of stock after bending etc. The recent work carried out at Forest Research Institute, Dehradun has shown that the above-mentioned limitations can be overcome by using vapour phase ammonia plasticization technique. This technique has enabled a wider choice of species for production of bentwoodcomponents for a variety of commercial products.  Read More..

• Vacuum drying of timber is a new field of wood science in India. The technology has been commercialized in few developed nations.
•  The vacuum kiln is costly affair as on date for Indian entrepreneurs due to absence of such indigenous equipment in the country.
•  The technology is useful in the sense that it takes shorter time period to dry timbers to desired moisture content with lesser drying degrades compared to traditional technology of steam kiln.
• The Forest Products Division of the FRI has designed and developed a convection heating based vacuum kiln for wood seasoning. The kiln is capable of achieving avacuum of 200 mm of mercury with in 22 minutes. A lot of popular wood having 98 % moisture content could be dried in this kiln in 18 hrs 25 minutes only to a final moisture content of 11.2 % without degrades.  Read More..

Propagation of bamboos through seed is not a practical approach due to rare availability and less viability of seeds . The gestation period of most of the bamboos is 30-70 years. Seeds also lose their viability within 6 months and hence cannot be stored for long period. Research into innovative and rapid methods of propagation are thus urgently required to meet the infinite requirements for industrial plantations. Plant Physiology, Forest Research Institute, Dehra Dun has developed technologies for clonal propagation applicable to many bamboos. Of these, macroproliferation is the most feasible, simple, farmer’s friendly and cost effective technique.  Read More..