Posted By Eric Burt
Geoff

MDF is made by a company called Kronospan which has a manufacturing plant in Chirk, Nr Wrexham in North Wales.

You could try giving them a buzz and they may supply you with some info.

A few years ago there was suspicion that the formaldehyde in the glue was causing ill-health, and I seem to vaguely recall that the University of Liverpool had a problem with this in a refurbished building.

About 5 years ago there was a scare which originated in America about the use of MDF, but it was largely ill-founded.

Good luck!



Eric

Posted By Philip McAleenan
Geoff,

a couple of links for you that may be usefull:

http://www.gpmu.org.uk/hs/health/msg00009.html
formadehydes are main constituent, and are classified as carcinogenic,

http://www.lhc.org.uk/me.../pubs/factsht/46fact.htm
fact sheet on woodbased boards

http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/iacl88.htm
HSE document on formaldehydes in foundries

http://physchem.ox.ac.uk..._formaldehyde_resin.html
MSDS with links to other MSDS for constituent parts


http://www.environment-a...5385/swen065.pdf?lang=_e
waste regulations, adhesives,


http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/pubs/725.pdf
US Govt. document on formaldehyde


hope these are useful

Regards, Philip

Posted By Dave Westhead
Geoff,
Sorry for the full name, typing error.
Dave

Posted By Geoff Burt
Thanks all for the responses, it's given me plenty of leads.

It's an interesting one.

A furniture factory takes in sheets of MDF, cuts them to size and embosses, for example, the fancy shapes on the fronts of wardrobe doors.

This is done by placing a resin & hardener adhesive on the MDF and covering with a paper/plasticy ready made coating (bit like kitchen wallpaper), and putting this on heated metal templates in a power press. The paper/MDF is moulded into shape with a combination of the heat and pressure.

My feeling is there is far more risk from the press and the heat but feel a little uneasy about the urea formaldahyde - hence the question.

Geoff