Donnacona Fiberboard Identification & History
Donnacona Building Wall & Roof Sheathing, Insulating Board

POST a QUESTION or COMMENT about Donnaconna fiberboard building sheathing: how to identify fiberboard products, fiberboard uses, and the question: does Donnaconna fiberboard contain asbestos?

Donnaconna fiberboard insulating sheathing identification guide:

In this article series we provide fiberboard product names and we describe the components, properties, and applications of various fiberboard, hardboard, and insulating board or sound deadening board products. We also answer questions such as do Celotex or Homasote or other fiberboard and insulating board products contain asbestos? fiberboard water resistance, fiberboard recycling.

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Guide to Donnaconna Fiberboard & Insulating Sheathing Board & Plasterboard Products

Significant in thei history of Donnacona board, W.E. Hale's patent for wallboard described using fiberboard in construction (Hale 1870) and in the very next year, Cobb's patent described using a soft board made of straw in place of wood lath as a plaster base (Cobb 1871).

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By 1910 in the U.S., the manufacturer of fiberboard made these products available to builders and homeowners for use as a sheathing product that was used on wall exteriors, wall and ceiling interiors, and even as roof sheathing. In my personal experience, low-density fiberboard roof sheathing was a bad idea.

Identify Donnacona Board Sheathing & Acoustic Panels

Question: special precautions when demolishing Donnacona insulating board?

Gerry said:

We are renovating an over 50 year old home here in Newfoundland Canada.

The interior walls do not have drywall but instead have what is referred to as Donna Cona board mounted onto fully walled horizontally installed wood planks of what is referred to here as wall board. The board has been painted over many times.

The Donna Cona I believe falls into the fiberboard sheathing category. It looks very much like the photo in the "What is Fiberboard Insulating Sheathing?" topic however without any darkened damage. Given the age of this product should we be concerned about dust from its removal, breakup or cutting?

This Q&A were posted originally at FIBERBOARD SHEATHING

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Reply:

Gerry,

Yes Donnaconna board, properly-spelled Donnacona, was a fiberboard type product, often used for soundproofing or as an insulating board.

Donnacona Insulating Board was made in Canada from wood fibres and was used for lining, insulating, sound deadening, as a plaster base, and for exterior and interior finishes. In various buildings Donnacona board also appears in special applications as bulletin boards, tack boards, and occasionally sculpted or cut into other forms.

It was manufactured by the Donnacona Paper Company, Ltd., whose mills were at Donnaconna, P.Q. ,Canada and sold in a range of sizes shown in the table I'll include below, - retrieved 2019/10/10 original source: archive.org/details/H.BeechamCo.Pty.Ltd/page/n17

Donnacona board was sold in 1/2-inch and 1-inch thicknesses and in textured, rough-cast, and what the company called burl (sanded) finishes.

Donnacona insulating board was also sold by H. Beecham & Co., Pty., Ltd., 624-660 Lonsdale St., Melbourne AU selling in Victoria and Tasmania and cited below.

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If your Donnaconnaboard is light coloured or greyish it is the non-water-resistant version of this insulating board typically used indoors at interior partitions, ceilings, or the interior side of exterior walls;

if your Donnaconna board is dark brown, almost black, it's an asphalt-like coated board that was designed to be water resistant and would have been used as exterior wall sheathing.

About removing or breaking up Donnaconna board or any fiberboard sheathing, in my OPINION it's smart to avoid any high levels of construction demolition dust as often, even if the material itself doesn't contain a popularly-scary ingredient like asbestos, fine particulates of wood material, insect debris, or occasionally mold all can be respiratory irritants and can occasionally be more seriously harmful.

So steps to keep dust down are always smart.

With those caveats made, in my experience, most fiberboard insulation products do not shed a lot of fine dust or particulates during removal or breaking up as long as you are not attacking the material with a power saw, grinder, sander, etc.

When we're talking about wood-fibre or paper- based sheathing boards, asbestos is not normally a likely ingredient. See details

at SHEATHING, FIBERBOARD ASBESTOS CONTENT

Shown above: one of several examples of Donnacona insulating board installations given by H. Beecham & Co. in 1939 and cited in detail below.

Gerry, I would be grateful to see photographs of your material showing its texture, back-surface colour (since the front has been painted, the material edge, and importantly, photos of any stamps or markings that identify the product.

Do keep me posted, and thanks for asking.

Other readers: Watch out for nantou . co and also ufazonu . info at their subdirectory /donnacona-board/ are counterfeit websites pretending to offer information about Donnacona board and in some cases offering also to sell a modern version of donnaconna board but actually marketing modern foam board insulation. Those websites have plagiarized a number of our InspectApedia.com fiberboard photographs and is cited at the Web Theft Hall of Shame found at webthefthallofshame.com

Donnacona Board History & Research

Photo of Donnacona blackote Fiberboard from a British Columbia home built in 1965, provided courtesy of InspectApedia reader John Vere.

Donnacona INSULATING BOARD [PDF] for Building, sheathing, insulation, sound absorption, decorative finish, catalog, (1939) H. Beecham & Co., Pty. Ltd., 624-660 Lonsdale St., Melbourne, C.1, Australia.

This document and the illustrations above were digitized by the Association for Preservation Technology, International, Australasia Chapter, Building Technology Heritage Library, from the collection of Miles Lewis Melbourne and funded by the Vera Moore foundation, Australia.

Retrieved 2019/10/10 original source https://ia800902.us.archive.org/15/items/H.BeechamCo.Pty.Ltd/H.%20Beecham%20%26%20Co.%20Pty.%20Ltd.pdf
Historical notes:

Donnacona was one of several Quebec towns built by and/or named for the Donnacona paper mill established in that province. Donnacona's first paper mill was built at the mouth of the Jacques-Cartier River where that river joins the St. Lawrence.
The Donnacona Paper Co., at one time a subsidiary of Price Brothers, was later purchased by Howard Smith Paper Mills, Ltd. (1953). Smith continued to market Donnacona Insulating Board Products. The company's insulating board was described as "non-inflammable" (perhaps through chemical treatment?).

The company and its mill passed through multiple owners until owner Bowater, already in debt, merged with Abatibi-Consolidated in 2007. The mill closed in January 2008, ending the employment of 240 people who had produced commercial grade paper and at least earlier, Donnacona board as well.
Chief Donnacona (died c. 1539 in France) was the chief of the village of Stadacona, located at the present site of Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. French explorer Jacques Cartier, concluding his second voyage to what is now Canada, returned to France with Donnacona. - Wikipedia 2019/10/10

In 1535 Cartier and his crew made their maiden voyage from Brittany, France, to the St. Lawrence River. The Iroquois Indian Chief Donnacona, leader of the village of Stadacona, first met Cartier with open arms but became suspicious and ultimately mistrustful of Cartier when he observed that Cartier and his men went heavily armed while the Iroquois did not.

Cartier wished to take a native chieftain back to France to exhibit him at court and in France and Spain as "visible token and proof of the reality of his discoveries; and he had fixed his mind upon Donnacona as the most suitable person for this purpose." (Abbott pp. 258-262)

Chief Donnacona was kidnapped and carried to France by Jacques Cartier ca 1535. Donnacona died in France ca 1539.
Abbott, James, American History, Volumes 1-2
Greene, Meg, Jacques Cartier: Navigating the St. Lawrence River, The Rosen Publishing Group, 2004 - Canada - 112 pages

Reader Comments, Questions & Answers About The Article Above

Below you will find questions and answers previously posted on this page at its page bottom reader comment box.

Reader Q&A - also see RECOMMENDED ARTICLES & FAQs

On 2021-09-12 by inspectapedia.com.moderator - Properties of Donnacona Blackote board

@John Vere,

Above on this page we discuss this fiberboard.

In our Table of Insulation Values of Materials at

FIBERBOARD

inspectapedia.com/insulation/Insulation-Values-Table.php#Fiberboard

we include example R-values for this material. Donnacona board is representative.

You'll see that your fiberboard is rated at around R-1.2.

More important may be its role in blocking air leaks that can swamp even High-R value materials.

On 2021-09-11 by John Vere - Donnacona Blackote on a 1965 British Columbia Home

Our house built in 1965 is in the Interior of BC and the whole exterior is sheathed in this 3/4" thick black fiberboard. I discovered this when I drilled a 4" hole for a dryer vent.

They had built a sunroom off the south side in 1974 and I'm just remodeling.

When I removed some wood paneling from what would have been the outside of the house at one time, I finally got a good look at it. It is marked "Donnacona Blackote "

I was wondering if it has any R value at all? The house is only 2x4 and we have re insulating as we go room to room. Also seems this stuff is not very fire proof.

...

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Donnacona Fiberboard Identification & History
Donnacona Building Wall & Roof Sheathing, Insulating Board

Guide to Donnaconna Fiberboard & Insulating Sheathing Board & Plasterboard Products

Identify Donnacona Board Sheathing & Acoustic Panels