The Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF) partnered with the Queensland Facility for Advanced Bioinformatics (QFAB), a consulting unit of the Queensland Cyber Infrastructure Foundation (QCIF), to develop QTimber.

DAF senior forestry development scientist Dr Susan House said QTimber was a digital tool for looking up the rules, specifications and restrictions for using construction timbers in Queensland.

“The new web-application is an essential resource for every business specifying, treating or using timber in design, building and engineering,” Dr House said.

“It is a digital version of the publication Construction Timbers in Queensland (CTIQ) which is a significant resource for the timber industry.

“CTIQ is a reference document for the Building Code of Australia and holds critical information about using the right timber for the job, depending on where in Queensland you are building and what you are building.

“QTimber allows you to select from a list of approved timbers when you input your location and type of building project. It also shows any conditional restrictions or preservative treatments that may apply to the project.

“You can look up the wood properties, performance information and use specification of any Australian-grown or imported timber”.

Previously, CTIQ was only available as a PDF in two volumes that is inconvenient to consult. The web-application makes this information user friendly and accessible through smart phones and tablets.

Dr Xin-Yi Chua, QFAB’s Head of Informatics and the developer of the web-application said bringing the CTIQ resource into an online environment will increase user accessibility and improve usability. Additionally, the large data set is maintained in a database making it easier to keep the information updated and current, as informed by industry developments.

The site will be hosted by QFAB using QCIF’s QRIS cloud infrastructure.

The QTimber project was funded by the DAF through the Queensland Forest and Timber Industry RD&E fund and advised by Timber Queensland and representatives of Queensland’s timber industry and businesses.

QTimber is available at qtimber.daf.qld.gov.au