While furniture making in general has been traditionally regarded as labor-intensive industry, the making of metal furniture has immense potential in terms of its growth and as a value added industry. Granted that the technology and designing of metal furniture in Korea are still behind the standards enjoyed by the developed nations of the world, still its future here is promising when we consider the comparatively short history of its industry, Korea depends on imports from abroad for almost all the natural resources she needs for industry. Metal (especially iron) industry is, however, one field where she has some advantage over other nations. Korea is a major producer of iron and her technology in this field is competitive in the international market. When viewed from the points of environment and ecology metal furniture has good points, as metals are recyclable when they are discarded and collected properly according to their reusability. This adds to the merits its industry has here as this country, with her limited natural resources, has yet to solve the pressing problem of disposing ever-increasing waste matter from homes and factories.

This study was carried out to investigate the wood properties for development the proper uses of lesser-known tree species. The tested species are Kebambang(Pentace sp.), Bawang-bawang(Dysoxylum alliaceum Bl .), Garu buaya( Gonystylus brunescens A. Shaw)grown in Indonesia. fundamental wood properties such as anatomical, physical, mechanical and chemical properties and characteristics related to wood processing were examined. The results are summarized as follows : The woods of these species are diffuse porous, coarse textured, and interlocked grained. The heartwood of Kebambang is distinguished clearly to the sapwood, but the heartwood of other species are not distinguished clearly to the softwood. The woods of Kebambang and Bawang-bawang have the moderate weight density and the low strength properties, but Garu buaya has the high weight density and the high strength properties. The woods of these species has high shrinkage. The sawing characteristics of Kebambang are excellent but the other species are moderate. The machining characteristics by planer and drying characteristics of these species are moderate. These woods has poor characteristics in bending processing and decay durability. The wood of Bawang-bawang has high content of the extractives and lignin.

This study was carried out to analyze the ultrasonic properties of sound board which was glued with various adhesives and to evaluate which adhesive is the best for the acoustic radiation of the musical instrument. The results are as follows: 1. Animal glue is the best adhesive for the sound board with respect to the acoustic radiation ratio of the musical instruments. Epoxy resin and polyvinyl acetate resin are the next group, urea formaldehyde resin and Hot melt are the third group, polychloroprene(CR) resin is the lowest. 2. Epoxy resin, animal glue and Titebond(PVA) give the highest shear strength and the highest wood failure relatively Hot melt and polychloroprene(CR) resin do not meet the standard because of low wood failure.

Woodceramics are new porous carbon materials obtained by carbonization of wood or woody materials impregnated with thermosetting resin in a vacuum furnace. This study examined the electrical properties of woodceramics made from thinned logs of Cryptomeria japonica as a use for electric articles. The summarized results were as follows: 1. The volume resistivity of woodceramics decreased with increasing density of woodceramics made from 3 type board. And the volume resistivity of woodceramics made from non- steamed board was somewhat higher than steamed board. 2. The consumption of electric power of woodceramics decreased with increasing density of woodceramics and resin contents made from 3 type board. And the consumption of electric power of woodceramics made from non-steamed board was somewhat higher than steamed board. 3. When the woodceramics were coated by silicon, the consumption of electric power increased about 7%.

This work was done to investigate problems of cashew coating in a wooden-art industry such as ritual vessels and to improve a curing property of cashew film. The main problem in the cashew coating industry was a small-scale business, insufficiency of facilities, lack of knowledge about cashew resin and painting, and lack of a technology of productivity improvement by accelerated drying time of cashew film. In present, cashew coating for ritual vessels mostly used the petroleum as a thinner. The time of set to touch of cashew film thinning with petroleum on glass plates was increased with the increasement of the thinning proportion, but retarded from 3 to 11 times compared to that of an exclusive thinner according to thinning level. The addition of 20% aceton to petroleum contributed to the high reduction rate up to about 60% at the thinning level of 100%, which was effective to accelerate the drying time of cashew film. Even though only the petroleum or the petroleum-aceton(20%) mixture was used as a thinner, it did not exhibit any distinguishable differences in crack and appearance of cashew-film coated on Frexinus rhynchophylla after 5 cycles of soak under the vacuum-drying treatment.

일반적으로 도막의 강성은 목재의 강성에 비해 낮으므로 도장된 소재의 강성이 백골재에 비해 낮아질 것으로 짐작할 수 있으므로 본 연구에서 는 바이올린용 소재 인 유럽산 가문비 나무와 단풍나무에 투명 래커와 전통옻칠을 도포한 후, 진동모드를 해석하고 공진주파수를 비교함으로써 수종별 도료 종류에 따른 음향특성의 변화양상을 분석하고자 하였다. 분석결과, 도장전후의 기본진동모드는 동일하였고 양 수종 공히 도료의 종류에 관계없이 도장재의 공진주파수의 감소가 확인되었으며 가문비나무의 경우, 모드가 증가할수록 주파수 감소폭이 증가하였으나 옻칠이 투명래커에 비해 그 감소폭이 적었다. 단풍나무의 경우에도 상위 모드에서 더 큰 주파수 감소를 나타냈지만 옻칠과 투명래커의 주파수 감소폭이 일정치 않았다.

This study was to measure formaldehyde emission and bonding strength of plywoods manufactured with urea-melamine formaldehyde adhesives, which were made from three different mixing ratios of urea and melamine, and with four different formaldehyde/urea-melamine molar ratios of 1.0,1.1,1.2 and 1.4. The results were as follows 1. Amount of formaldehyde emission was the lowest at the first method of molar ratio(F/(M+U)) 1.0. Amounts of formaldehyde emission of experimental manufactured adhesives were lower than that of commercial adhesive. 2. Bonding strength of dry specimen was the highest at the first method of molar ratio(F/(M+U)) 1.4. Dry bonding strength of molar ratio(F/(M+U)) 1.4 was similar to commercial adhesive. 3. Bonding strength of wet specimen was the highest at the second method of molar ratio(F/(M+U)) 1.4. Bonding strength of wet specimen used by the third method of molar ratio(F/(M+U)) 1.4 was almost equal to commercial adhesive.

This study was carried out to investigate the effect of grain and veneer thickness on drying rate, required energy consumption, and drying defects such as checking, end waving, and burning during a far-infrared radiation drying process of decorative veneers of hard maple and beech. Most of the veneer could be dried from green to in-use moisture content within 30 to 360 seconds. The drying rates were significantly affected by veneer thickness, but there was little difference between edge-and flat-sliced veneers. The formation of checking during drying test was none or very slight. The percentages of the veneers defected by checks were higher in the flat-sliced veneers than in the edge-sliced veneers. The maximum end wavinesses in the flat-sliced veneers were almost 1.6 to 3 times larger than that in the edge-sliced veneers. All veneers were fee from burned marks during drying test.

Pinus $rigida{\times}taeda$ and Liriodendron tulipifira have been planted in this country for about 20 years. They are known as a relatively 13st-grown and useful species. The physical properties such as green moisture contents, specific gravities and dimensional shrinkages were examined with natively grown timbers. The kiln-dry schedules were developed with 30m thick boards by using an oven-fast-drying method. In both species the green MC's of sapwoods were higher than those of heartwoods, but their discrepancies were small. The green specific gravities of Pinus $rigida{\times}taeda$ and Liriodendron tulipifera were 0.48 and 0.41~O.42, respectively. The developed kiln-dry schedules were proven to minimize drying defects for the hoards of 30mm thickness and various width.

Ginkgo trees have long been planted in Korea as roadside trees and ornamental trees, but the wood was seldom used except some utilization for small artifacts. Soaring prices of imported wood and future uncertainty about long-term supply of foreign woods have stimulated research on value-added utilization of less-utilized domestic wood resources such as Ginkgo wood. The properties of Ginkgo wood were investigated to determine its utilization potential in this study, and the results of anatomical, physical, and mechanical studies were presented with chemical compositions.

This study investigated the effect of steaming on fixation of compression set and the effect of these treatments on mechanical properties of heat-compressed wood specimens. To determine the effect of steaming after compression set, wood specimens were compressed for 100min at 180f and then steamed for 20-100min at $120^{\circ}C$. Swelling tests were used to evaluate recovery of compression set. Bending, compression, and Brinell hardness tests were carried out for evaluating mechanical properties. Compressed wood steamed for 100 min at $120^{\circ}C$ showed 1.9% recovery of set, increases in bending and compressive properties, and no hardness change. We concluded that almost complete fixation of compression set in wood can be achieved by steaming compressed wood.

Today's world situation which is changing rapidly has affected conditions of furniture industries in Korea. Apart from the governmental assistance, companies are seeking for their own way to strengthen competitiveness in the international market by using the cultural identity as value added of their products. Accordingly, this study presents a furniture design process which refers to the identity of Korean furniture based on characteristics of it's traditional style. Also it could show the way to innovate quality of export furniture products.