Questions about grade, thickness or a board that failed on site usually get answered faster with a photo and a few measurements. Use the channels below and keep the sheet edge, stamp and moisture reading in frame where you can.
79036 Moloto Burgs Suite 690
Nhlanhlamouth, NW 7531
Drop-off for sample offcuts and failed panels is by arrangement, so call ahead before you load a full sheet.
027-448-6750
info@buildexplywood.com
Email works best for cut lists and photos. Phone is quicker for stock and grade checks during the day.
Messages sent after hours are read the next working morning. Cutting plan questions usually take a day or two to work through properly.
For a board that swelled, delaminated or cupped: a close photo of the edge, the grade stamp if it is still readable, and roughly how long it sat before the problem showed.
For a cut list: sheet size, thickness, grain direction you need, and whether the panels are going into a kitchen carcass, shelving run, van fit-out or formwork.
Questions about plywood usually come down to wording. A supplier says "exterior", a forum says "marine", a cutting list says "18mm structural" and none of them mean quite the same thing. Below are the definitions and limits we work with on this site, so a post about a delaminating sheet or a shuttering pour is read the way it was written.
Terms like marine, structural and shuttering describe how a board is expected to perform, not a single fixed recipe. Glue line, veneer species, void content and thickness tolerance all shift between mills. When a post names a grade, it is naming the job it suits, not a guarantee about the sheet in your rack.
A WBP bond resists repeated wetting and drying better than interior glue, but it says nothing about the face veneer, the core gaps or how the edges were finished. An unsealed WBP sheet left in coastal air will still take on moisture. Treat the glue line as one variable among several.
When we suggest a thickness for shelving, a kitchen carcass or a van floor, that figure assumes a stated span, load and support spacing. Change the span and the number changes with it. Use the notes as a starting point for your own drawing, not as a substitute for one.
Yards and merchants around Gauteng, KZN and the Western Cape come up because a reader asked or a board was bought there. No placement is paid for, and a mention is not an endorsement of every sheet on their floor. Stock changes between deliveries.
Photos of a failing sheet or a tricky cut list may be worked through in a later post. Send them in and they may be published in edited form, with identifying details removed. We cannot diagnose a board from one image, and a written answer here is not a site inspection.
A Highveld winter and a Durban summer pull a sheet in opposite directions. Moisture content readings, sealing schedules and storage advice on this site assume South African workshop conditions. If your site sits outside that, adjust the numbers before you cut.
If something on a page reads as a hard rule when it was meant as a working note, that is worth flagging. Corrections get folded back into the relevant post rather than left standing.
Straight answers on board grades, sheet handling and where to take a question next. If your situation is not covered here, the contact page is the right place to send a photo or a cut list.
Look at the edge, not the face. Marine sheets should show tight, evenly laid veneers with very few open voids, and the glue line reads as a thin dark band rather than a thick smear. Structural ply can carry small voids and still do its job in a sub-frame or a load-bearing panel. If the yard cannot tell you the glue class, assume it is interior and plan accordingly.
For carcass sides and fixed shelves, 18 mm is the working standard because it takes confirmat screws and hinges without crushing. Long unsupported shelf runs over about 900 mm will sag in 18 mm, so either add a mid support or step up to 25 mm. Van fit-outs and shopfitting panels often use 15 mm with a frame, which saves weight without losing rigidity.
Most likely the board was interior-bonded and the edges were never sealed. Water gets in at the cut edge first, swells the core, and the veneers lift. Shuttering ply is built to survive pours, but it still wants a coat of release oil and should not be left stacked flat in standing water. If a sheet has already gone, send a photo of the edge and we can usually tell you which bond failed.
Yes, especially if the board has been stored in a cold garage or a coastal yard. A sheet that reads high will shrink as it dries, and joints cut tight on day one can open up a week later. Let the board sit in the room where the finished piece will live for a few days, then check with a meter before you commit to a cut list.
That is exactly the kind of thing this notebook is for. Send the panel sizes, the sheet format you plan to use, and whether grain direction matters. We work through nesting layouts for 2440 x 1220 sheets and post the ones that are useful to other builders. Offcut sizes worth keeping get noted too, so the leftovers do not end up as firewood.
The contact page is the fastest route for a specific board, a supplier question or a photo of a failed sheet. If you want to know how we handle the details you send in, the privacy notes cover that in plain language.