Solar Cooking Archive Discussion Forums

efyl · Joined: 31 Jul 2008 Posts: 1

I have built a few solar cookers in the past and am about to build a new, lighter weight box cooker for myself, as well as solar dryer for a friend. I have access to plenty of thin, lightweight plywood from a furniture factory and I've been hoping to use it. One of my friends though recently has raised concerns as to the use of plywood as a material in devices which will contain food. He told me about his experience of leaving a load of plywood in his station wagon one hot day and how it was weeks before the formaldehyde smell was gone.

My question is, is it safe at all to use plywood for these applications? Is there anything I can coat the interior with to make it safe? I've always let solar cookers heat up a number of days before cooking food in them, in case they were off-gassing. Recently I've read though that there are two types of resins used. Some plywood has "urea formaldehyde resins" which apparently emit more formaldehyde than those with "phenol formaldehyde resins". I don't know if it's possible to identify which resin a particular piece of plywood has.

Any advice on this material choice is appreciated.

- Eric