Great to put a face to the user name sir! Who are you? A pic to place a face to the name! Nice saw BTW. Own one myself. BTW...those lenses dont look too scratchy!
Green (the variety, not fresh cut) is stringier IME. White ash splits clean for the most part. Of course with most of the ash in encounter being dead its a non issue.
Every camera I have ever owned. Every pair of glasses. Even my cornea. My safety glasses, routinely. All either are or have been scratched. It’s a thing with me. Oh - and I did post my dumb mug in that thread. Figured I’d double down here
So, this was yesterday: We have had what Eric Wanderweg would call a Dead n’ Down “cedar” (read: juniper) junking up the bottom woods since we moved in and yesterday was its date with destiny, that is, Mr. Stihl.
Time to break out the brand spanking’ new MM. Instructions say the margin of error is 3%, so I’m calling every reading at +3 to be on the safe side. This will be nice wood to use judiciously.
If there was ever any doubt the wood I cut up-thread is ash (there wasn’t), check this out. Ahem. I said “check” this out. All the cut surfaces started cracking overnight. Amazing.
Eric Wanderweg gets a hat tip for excellent advice. We’ll wait a bit to burn this since it’s at a “adjusted” 20.5% moisture - plus you can see the outside is still damp. But it’ll be challenging. I’m really curious. Meh it’s too warm out anyways, especially for ash.
The big surprise? This is red oak (pin, to be specific, I think). Mr. Cottonwood and I felled a few of them back on 10-08. I expected a higher reading on the MM.
This oak (I think) has been laying around since we bought the place. I was surprised it’s not drier. It’ll get there. Maybe it has a comparatively high reading because it was lying on the ground for all that time before we moved in. Well, that’s it for now. Thanks, as always, for reading.
In my experience dead ash dries fast. Being on the cusp on dry, it shouldn’t take long. A month from now and it’ll be noticeably drier. You can also leave wood inside the room you’re burning in (not too close to the stove/insert) for a couple days prior to burning it. The fire will suck any remaining moisture right out of it.
Starting to look like an actual FHC house - except for the T-posts. I couldn’t talk The Wife out of them. That’s the back of the pile - mulberry and oak. Some pretty small pieces there, but there’s a reason. We have a small insert, only 13” deep. And I wanna be like the grown-ups and load N-S. Means more work and small splits, but ok.
The front of the stacks: All the ash I cut is split. Time to go get more. Couple days before I’ll be able. It’ll be there.
Nice inventory! Nothing wrong with t-posts, especially for the shorter splits. Trying to crib 13" splits wouldn't work out too hot once your pile got above a couple feet high. What you're doing will work out just fine (and be less effort too). Where I'm at it's too rocky for t-posts, hence the cribbed ends. If I don't crib then I use vertical pallets with 45 degree braces to stack up against, which works but looks wonky IMO. I'm digging your railroad tie/t-post setup
I have a customer who took a cord of barkless black locust i had bucked to 16" and cut them in half so he could do the same. I now sell him my BL nuggets and shorts.
Thanks! It is work, especially getting everything up and running. But we all agree that the reward is so so so worth it.
