/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>>8640498
OP here. You mean like a slice of a log?

Pic related would never hold up without falling apart because of the difference between the radial and tangential shrinkage of the wood when the tree is felled and dried. Wood shrinks much more tangentially (the 'rings' of the wood) than radially (a straight line from the center of the wood to the bark) as it dries, putting tons of compression towards the center of the log and inevitably it splits itself apart from the stress.

This is why it's important to mill trees into lumber soon after it's felled, why wood laminations generally hold themselves together better than a big solid chunk, and why when you're choosing 2x4 lumber you should avoid ones where you can see the pith (or the "core" of the wood) in the end grain.