D.R. Johnson Wood Innovation Works with New Cross Laminated Timber

D.R. Johnson Wood Innovations: Quality Wood Products Since 1967

D.R. Johnson Wood Innovations, located in Riddle, Oregon, sees strong potential for engineered wood products in modern construction, where concrete and steel have long been the materials of choice. One newer product, cross-laminated timber (CLT), shows particular promise and is already changing the way architects and engineers design high-rise commercial buildings.

“We’ve entered into the CLT market and our panels are proving to be more than capable alternatives to traditional building materials in construction applications,” said COO John Redfield in this 2017 interview. “CLTs are opening up doors into commercial building projects and provide design options for engineers that weren’t previously available to them. The CLT project pipeline is very promising.”

“Yep, we have dedicated personnel manufacturing V1 Grade Cross-Laminated Timber Panels on a daily basis,” added Plant Manager Don Mitchell. “We have already extended our USNR Panel Press Length, added a Hundegger PBA CNC Machine, and have conditioned our manufacturing space to optimize panel production. We are geared up to handle multiple mass timber projects that may be under construction at the same time.”

In the Beginning

D.R. Johnson Wood Innovations has built up a lot of expertise with laminated wood products. “Riddle Laminators was founded in 1967,” Redfield explained. “The founder of the company, Don Johnson, started it up.” The company made glued laminated beams under the Riddle Laminators name until January 2015, when it added D.R. Johnson Wood Innovations as a DBA (doing business as) name.

“Don founded Riddle Laminators as an entity on its own,” Redfield added. “I’ve been here since 1999.”

“We’ve made a lot of curved beams, utility poles, utility cross-arms, and the like. You tell us what you want and we can make it.”

“All of our engineered wood products are made project-specific, custom,” said Mitchell. “We don’t manufacture any stock products.”

Moisture and Quality Control

Quality control is a big concern at D.R. Johnson Wood Innovations. “That’s where moisture meters come into play because certain beams/panels take certain moisture and if you have too much you can have problems with your products,” Mitchell explained.

“We’re definitely tracking the moisture on that wood. It’s got to be down around 12% ± 3%,” Redfield said. “Moisture meters are an important part of our operation. We need dry wood to put our beams and CLT panels together.”

Moisture meters are used in every step of the production process, as Mitchell explained. “We have a moisture meter outside where we pre-sort our lumber, we have one in-line that we also check our lumber on, plus handheld ones, so there’s a lot of moisture checking going on.”

“You make a good product and people will buy it, whether it’s a good market or a bad market,” Redfield observed. “If you make a bad product or a not-so-good product you might sell in a good market, but in a bad market they’ll look for the guy with the good stuff, so you create your own opportunity by putting out a good product.”

“The folks who own this company say ‘let’s do it right and make sure our customers have a quality product and we’ll have return customers.’”

Wagner Meters Plays Its Part

Wagner Meters products have worked reliably at D.R. Johnson Wood Innovations for many years. At the time of this interview, one of its Wagner in-line systems had been in service for more than 25 years.

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Larry Loffer

Larry Loffer is a senior technician at Wagner Meters, where he has over 30 years of experience in wood moisture measurement. With a degree in Computer Systems, Larry is involved in both hardware and software development of wood moisture measurement solutions.

Last updated on October 9th, 2026