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Pacific Lumber Inspection Bureau (PLIB) has launched Light Framing, its third online grader training course and the second of a planned three-course syllabus designed to provide comprehensive grader training based on the National Grading Rule for Dimension Lumber (NGR).
Like its other online offerings, Light Framing is based on the in-mill grader training PLIB has offered for decades. To replicate the live training experience, PLIB’s online courses offer a wide range of learning activities, making extensive use of hundreds of close-up images, video captured from in-mill scanners and instructional videos led by PLIB’s experienced grading supervisors. The ultra-realistic learning environment helps users recognize and accurately measure and assess every grade-defining characteristic.
PLIB’s Light Framing course opens with an introduction to Light Framing grades, followed by lessons covering each of the primary characteristics used to determine grade—checks, splits, shake, pockets and streaks, skip, wane, warp, slope of grain, knots and holes, and unsound wood. The course then covers manufacturing standards and additional characteristics addressed only in the Interpretations; guidelines intended to clarify how standard grading rules are to be applied when graders encounter lumber with unusual characteristics.
Each lesson provides detailed instruction on the applicable grading rules, measurement methods and allowable limits. Knowledge checks at the end of each lesson reinforce the information covered, solidifying the learners’ understanding of the content.
3D imagery and videos shot at PLIB member mill grading stations provide learners with opportunities to apply the grading rules in realistic, practical in-mill situations.
Light Framing is the third grader training course offered at education.plib.org, PLIB’s online Learning Management System. Foundations of Lumber Grading, a prerequisite to all the NGR Grade courses PLIB offers, was released earlier this year and STUDS was launched last month. A fourth course, Structural Light Framing and Joists & Planks, will be launched in the coming weeks, completing the NGR curriculum.
Foundations provides knowledge required for successful completion of ensuing courses, including in-depth training on all the features and characteristics that impact lumber grades.
“The Foundations course gives learners a clear understanding of how and why lumber grading came to be, and it teaches them how to identify, measure and evaluate the various characteristics that impact lumber grades—crucial background for anyone training to become an in-mill lumber grader,” explained Erik Wilson, PLIB’s executive vice president.
“With our extensive use of photos and videos of real-life lumber and grading, our courses provide the most realistic learning environment possible in an online setting,” Wilson continued. “Those who successfully complete them are well on their way to becoming expert graders.”
PLIB’s online training courses accommodate a wide range of learning styles with a variety of different content delivery methods, including instructional videos featuring PLIB grading supervisors, hundreds of photos depicting characteristics found in real lumber, and interactive three-dimensional models derived from actual in-mill scanner data.
The four-course NGR grading curriculum will culminate later this year with the launch of Structural Light Framing and Joists & Planks. Once complete, PLIB’s NGR grading courses will be available individually or in bundles. Registration fees include personal copies of necessary course materials such as PLIB’s Grading Rule Book(s) and PLIB’s new STUD/Light Framing Dry Erase Training Wrap.
To learn more about PLIB’s education and training offerings, visit plib.org/lumber-gradingmarking/education-and-training/. To enroll in a course visit education.plib.org/all-courses/.
The Pacific Lumber inspection Bureau (PLIB) is a private, non-profit 501(c)6 member-based quality control inspection agency. Organized in 1903, PLIB provides lumber grading and grade stamping services as well as certifications for heat-treated (HT) lumber, ISPM 15 wood packaging, Glulam, Mass Timber panel products, Wood Trusses, CE Marking, and WUI registration services, to over 450 manufacturers of structural and non-structural softwood products in Europe and North America.
Headquartered in Federal Way, Wa., with a Canadian division based in Vancouver, BC and field offices in Washington, Oregon, California, Florida, British Columbia, Latvia, the Netherlands, and Germany, PLIB is accredited in North America by the American Lumber Standard Committee (ALSC), the Canadian Lumber Standard Accreditation Board (CLSAB), and the International Accreditation Service (IAS). The agency operates across the U.S. and in Western Canada and Continental Europe.
In 2019, PLIB merged operations with West Coast Lumber Inspection Bureau (WCLIB) and the American Institute of Timber Construction (AITC), extending PLIB membership to all former WCLIB and AITC members, while also retaining all WCLIB and AITC trademarks and programs.
