As a plywood manufacturer in China, we often receive inquiries of different plywood. From our own experience, an often misunderstanding is that some people might don’t know the difference of fancy veneered plywood and melamine plywood.
The main difference of these two plywood lies in the board surface. But it is more than that.
Here is the list of the main differences:
Surface Material Difference
| Melamine Paper | Fancy Natural Veneer |
|---|---|
 |  |
Melamine plywood is plywood coated with paper which is impregnated with melamine glue. Its name is from the glue on the paper. The paper is often called melamine paper. And the melamine paper is usually coated on both sides of the plywood.
Veneered plywood is plywood laminated with precious natural veneers. The surface is sliced or cut veneers from precious hardwood logs. Not a man-made surface material. Because it is more expensive than melamine paper, the veneered plywood is usually laminated only on one side of the wood panel.
Production Difference
Melamine plywood surfaces are whole piece of paper. Workers just need to lay two pieces of paper on the raw plywood. After a hot press, the paper is lamination is done.
Fancy veneered plywood surface are usually made with wood strips. This requires a lot of labour work and fine polishing. There would be some overlap between the veneer strips during the manufacture process. The overlap need to be polished away by the workers.
Price Difference
Fancy veneer faced plywood are generally more expensive than melamine faced plywood or MDF. They have similar plywood core but the surface price and labour cost are very different.
Fancy veneer plywood labour cost is more than double of a melamine board.
When the plywood is raw, you can easy tell that the raw plywood is fancy veneer plywood. But It is not easy to tell the difference visually if the veneer plywood is painted or lacquered.
One method is that the melamine plywood comes with emboss and matt effect while veneered plywood is simply smooth.
Having more questions about these two? Or you need a plywood similar to these?
Contact our sales and ask question freely!
