Northwest Specialty Woods

P.O. Box 665

Elma, Washington 

98541  

 

Phone:  (360) 482-6724     

TOLL FREE:  (877) 693-4682 

FAX:  (360) 482-6725 

    

E-mail:  nswinc@techline.com

 

"We create fine wood products so that you can create fine products with wood."

Figure 1:  The Munger Kiln

 
The Munger Kiln is a wood drying kiln that was originally constructed by the owners, Chris and Charlie Munger of Northwest Specialty Woods using a lumber drying unit and an insulated shipping container.  They cut, mill, and lay-up various woods for musical instrument (piano, etc.) sound boards, guitar, mandolin, and ukulele sides and faces.  For such a critical use they needed the ability to dry lumber of various species to very exacting tolerances. 

After doing a market availability analysis, Chris and Charlie realized several things:

1) commercial kilns are expensive

2) a refrigerated/ insulated shipping container would provide the ideal dryer structure (with it’s R-30 insulation, stainless steel interior skin and double sealed doors)

3) commercial drying units are available for purchase separately for building installation. 

So they custom built a kiln unit that would meet their needs and would be less expensive than commercially available units.

It has been in use almost constantly for four years for hardwoods (maple, walnut, apple, alder, etc.) and softwoods (spruce, hemlock, fir, etc.) relying on the Nyle the system’s automated functionality and the supplied drying tables to begin with to produce the desired lumber water content.  But knowledge and experience has been gained from use that has provided for refining of these tables and has completely satisfied the needs of Northwest Specialty Woods.

 

 
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Webmaster:  Pamela Erickson

nswinc@techline.com