Influence of Heat Treatment and Tannin Impregnation on Boron Depletion and Wood Durability
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear authors,
Article is well written and scientific value of this experiment is relativelly high.
Abstract: I tis usual another form in this journal, it is possible to write all parts together without mentioning of Results, Highlights… etc.
Introduction:
Not focused on your research, but other works using preliminary impregnation and then termal treatment were done in last years. Maybe to mention these works can improve this intro.
Materials and Methods:
Some comment for conceptualization and methodology. It is not fully standard for scientific work use only some kind of tests for one kind of wood and another for other. Reviewer opinion is, that comparison of results and their discussion is better using all kinds of treatments and tests for all kinds of material tested. Maybe better will be prepare two articles in this case…
Discussion: to improve discussion, nice can be to find and compare your results with another works focused on increasing of biological resistence of wood using boron or pure tanin impregnation and works and tests using commercially fixated boron in wood.
L272: Termites really do not like woods containing tannins – this is possible to find in European standard EN 350 and maybe also in ASTM standards deals about natural durability of wood.
Conclusions:
L-293: Please more clear define „wood“ because in your research this was not supported by achieved results. For each kind of results i tis necessary to add SYP or YP.
L299-300: This sentence is speculative in this part and better in discussion section.
With Best Regards
Author Response
Article is well written and scientific value of this experiment is relatively high. Thank you
Abstract: I tis usual another form in this journal, it is possible to write all parts together without mentioning of Results, Highlights… etc. It was dealt with
Introduction:
Not focused on your research, but other works using preliminary impregnation and then termal treatment were done in last years. Maybe to mention these works can improve this intro. We appreciate the comment, but we argue that we covered many research developed since early 2000's in the topics of wood preservation and thermal modification, which gives the reader complete background to understand the topic.
Materials and Methods:
Some comment for conceptualization and methodology. It is not fully standard for scientific work use only some kind of tests for one kind of wood and another for other. Reviewer opinion is, that comparison of results and their discussion is better using all kinds of treatments and tests for all kinds of material tested. Maybe better will be prepare two articles in this case… We thank you the comment. The AWPA E10 standard recommends to test a new preservative for brown-rot and white-rot fungus in a hardwood and softwood species. In addition, we didn't use species as source of variation in the analysis. They were analyzed separately. Ultimately, we think that the results obtained can be easily interpreted with only one manuscript.
Discussion: to improve discussion, nice can be to find and compare your results with another works focused on increasing of biological resistence of wood using boron or pure tanin impregnation and works and tests using commercially fixated boron in wood. We included a work from Yamaguchi et al. 2002.
L272: Termites really do not like woods containing tannins – this is possible to find in European standard EN 350 and maybe also in ASTM standards deals about natural durability of wood. The only ASTM standard that deals with termites is ASTM D3345. It does not indicates the use of tannins. The authors do not have access to EN 350 standard. We used AWPA E1 protocol in this manuscript, which does not endorse the use of tannins.
Conclusions:
L-293: Please more clear define „wood“ because in your research this was not supported by achieved results. For each kind of results i tis necessary to add SYP or YP. It was dealt with.
L299-300: This sentence is speculative in this part and better in discussion section. It was dealt with.
Reviewer 2 Report
Line 39: Why borates? Are there other avenues of research that could improve decay resistance of HT wood
Line 43: Should say outdoor, exposed conditions. Borates perform well outdoors provided they are protected by building design or durable coatings.
Line 70: Do you mean heartwood instead of sapwood? I presume these were pure sapwood blocks.
Line 76: Why are there no DOT only or DOT/Tannin controls? With this experimental design, it’s not possible to assess the impact of impregnations without heat treatment. Perhaps they would be as effective?
Line 130: How long were the test blocks incubated with either fungus? Were the blocks added on top of the mesh-lined feeder strips after they had been colonized by the fungus?
Line 233: Were the specimens exposed to T. versicolor leached or unleached? Why not both?
Line 233: For G. trabeum it appears that the HT tannin alone is sufficient for control.
Line 233: Why did the tannin increase the mass loss in HT YP?
Figure 6: Adjust y-axis so 10 is maximum (rating scale doesn’t go to 12)
Line 295: Change fungi to fungus (only one brown rot fungus was evaluated)
Conclusion is unclear and should be rewritten. Discussion of low price and environmental profile not substantiated by paper.
Author Response
Line 39: Why borates? Are there other avenues of research that could improve decay resistance of HT wood. It was dealt with.
Line 43: Should say outdoor, exposed conditions. Borates perform well outdoors provided they are protected by building design or durable coatings. It was dealt with.
Line 70: Do you mean heartwood instead of sapwood? I presume these were pure sapwood blocks. It was dealt with.
Line 76: Why are there no DOT only or DOT/Tannin controls? With this experimental design, it’s not possible to assess the impact of impregnations without heat treatment. Perhaps they would be as effective? The idea was to quantify heat treatment's ability to prevent boron from leaching when using tannins. Previously research was done on "normal" wood and tannins. But, the potential of heat treatment had not yet been investigated.
Line 130: How long were the test blocks incubated with either fungus? Were the blocks added on top of the mesh-lined feeder strips after they had been colonized by the fungus? It was dealt with.
Line 233: Were the specimens exposed to T. versicolor leached or unleached? Why not both? Specimens were exposed to T. versicolor, however statistical analysis showed no interaction between treatments and leaching period. It is stated in the manuscript.
Line 233: For G. trabeum it appears that the HT tannin alone is sufficient for control. Ok
Line 233: Why did the tannin increase the mass loss in HT YP? We included the reason why in the manuscript. Thank you
Figure 6: Adjust y-axis so 10 is maximum (rating scale doesn’t go to 12). It was dealt with
Line 295: Change fungi to fungus (only one brown rot fungus was evaluated). It was dealt with.
Conclusion is unclear and should be rewritten. Discussion of low price and environmental profile not substantiated by paper. We changed the conclusion to what we understand was unclear. Regarding the low price, we argue that tannins have a cost of $26 per kilogram, which is cheap. It also comes from sustainable and renewable sources which makes its environmental profile being low.
