If wood is stronger than metal for building homes, businesses, and skyscrapers, why can people chop it in half but not metal?

This is a common example that engineers and material chemists love, but this is only part of the story.

Individual wood fibers are roughly as strong as mild steel. The problem is that while steel exists as roughly a whole uniform crystallin composite, wood is an aligned fiber bundle held together by a cellulose matrix called cambra. This cambra is only as strong as, well wood.

Let’s look at this another way. First off, I feel that most people understand that steel is a very strong material as long as you heat it to a point of property change (around 400F for those that care). On the other hand let’s take something very strong like carbon fiber strands. But, they are only a few inches long. And to bind them all together, Jello. You could correctly point to this object stating that it has strength characteristics that among the greatest in material science. But, in practice the fiber lengths are so short that it really comes down to the strength of the Jello, not the carbon fiber.

Wood has a similar comparison. It also explains why it is so easy to chop into pieces. While steel, you still need to chop through those crystal bonds. Good luck with that.