People just seem to have trouble dropping that old skool mentality when it comes to seasoned firewood. And it's a shame, because if they seasoned it properly, the rewards would prove to be amazing.
I have a buddy who heats a fairly decent sized shop with a big Fire Chief furnace. He grew up in a household burning wood. I nag him all the time about getting wood ready. Send him pics of the stuff I had done on any given day trying to get him to not think that October is when you should worry about getting wood in, to no avail. His dad was always good about having stacks around the house when we were younger. I honestly think it is just laziness. It's frustrating for me when he's whining and asking for help to get enough dead standing wood this time of year to get through winter. I resist helping, hoping that maybe it will sink in...but 4 years now and it still hasn't. He currently has enough I'd say until maybe mid January? What he does have has come mainly from me or by my helping him to get wood. I cut down 5 ash trees for him on his property about 2 months ago. That is the majority of the wood he has on-hand. Gathering wood is hard work and I think many will procrastinate just as long as they can get away with to not have to put in the work. Some folks be like: I don't have nearly enough wood, but it will be ok somehow. Me: I DON'T HAVE NEARLY ENOUGH WOOD!! I'm happily burning stuff that I split in fall of 2015 currently and doing my best to pile it on. One way or the other, firewood is money in the bank. So long as you don't run out of storage room, you can never have too big a pile.
No. The smart ones (like me) do not do that. I cut mine just as if it was going into an indoor woodstove. 20" long, split to not more than 4" diameter pieces, and dried in stacks under a roof. MC ranges from 12% to 18% on my splits or it stays out of the boiler. My dealer even included a moisture meter as part of the boiler install package. I do not understand why some folks simply can't follow instructions.
That's the prevailing "wisdom" around here, too. Most owb owners actually cut right off the pile that's stacked next to their boilers. Sad to see - I did that our first year here (moved in on Halloween) and it was hell. Never going back. It's taken me a while, but I've almost got two years ready, and always keeping an eye out for more. Hoping to get on the three year plan by next fall.
I live in area where we burn mostly softwoods pine and douglas fir being the majority of it. You can cut softwoods in may get it split up and stack it where the sun and wind will get to it good and what was green in may is pretty much dry by oct. Two years is much better on the larch and doug fir. I cant imagine trying to burn hardwoods that only have 3 months drying time. I have some elm thats got three years seasoning and its what i burn when it gets sub zero.
Im so lucky here. I have access to a spot where a fire went through about a decade ago. There still plenty of standing dead tinder dry pine that was killed but didnt burn past the bark. Some trees have just enough scorching on the wood that you can detect what happened but no real burning of the wood. We're not desert here, but we're no tropical rain forest either. Quite often theres only a few inches of snow on the ground all winter. I just went out and cut one last truck load last week to top up for this winter. I have about 2 cords of birch piled in the yard for next winter, but thats it for yard space. Im so envious of guys who have room to store 20 cords at home.
You guys would laugh at me then something fierce because I burn green wood right off the stump. I got a super insulated home and found that most of the time I do not need a roaring hot fire to keep my house warm, in fact you would laugh at my pot bellied stove that heats my rather large home. What I dislike is starting a fire every day, or burning more wood then I need, so in my house, a fire that just barely burns is perfect; the fire stays lit and the house stays comfortable. There are tricks to it of course, like using the low moisture content of the home itself to dry out the wood before it is burned, cutting and splitting the wood small so that when I am burning (4) sticks of wood for a roaring fire, they are (4) sticks 8 inches long and 4 inches in diameter..the equivalent of (2) sticks of regular firewood, and burning the right type of low moisture content wood. So in the end, I am just as warm, but on half the wood consumed. It is the same with outdoor wood boilers; around here most people spend $10,000 on them because it is cheap fuel, when honestly they could heat their home with a pot bellied stove if they just took that $10,000 and put it into insulation, new windows and doors and saved themselves a lot of labor on putting up cords of firewood. But a new outside wood boiler, and a huge stack of wood is cool where as R-30 walls tucked behind drywall is not. Now part of why I do what I do is having a vast forest and equipment that moves volumes of wood granted. An hours worth of work, 3 processing steps, will net me a weeks worth of firewood. That does not seem great until it is realized one day dedicated to my own firewood will net 2-1/2 months worth of heat. 2 Days will get me through the heating season. There is the issue of chimney cleaning for sure, something I am aggressive about; cleaning my chimney every 2 weeks, but there again, if a person designs their chimney to be cleaned easily, it gets cleaned a lot because it is easy to do so. I would rather take 10 minutes to clean my chimney then spend hours doing other steps that net me the same warm house. I saw a person once post a photo essay of firewood from stump to fire, and in many ways, it was pretty neat, but also pretty sad because it took about 30 steps. Wow! So we have to be careful about being judgemental on the ways people do things because all this stuff is about perspective. When people laugh at me out loud for how I burn wood that is okay because I just stay mum, and wonder inside about why they put up cord after cord of firewood. Sure the outdoor wood boiler guys think I am silly on how I do things, but while pointing their fingers, I in turn think they are silly for not having insulation in their home! In the end, we are both as warm, just different ways of achieving the same thing. Just so everyone knows, I am ready should winter strike, but why use it if it is not needed? 6-1/2 dry firewood in my shed as a back up (I use 4 cord per year) Can and will burn coal when it gets super cold out 500 gallons of propane for the back up of the back up
With all due respect burning wet wood and losing a significant amount of heat to having to evaporate the water makes no sense what so ever. It's not about being judgemental it's about common sense.
I haven't noticed it going bad stored inside as much as it goes bad laying outside on the ground! I have a OWB so I guess I'm really an oddball as my wood is dry. Dad burns as well and has used wood as his sole heat source for 50 years. We've had as much as 180 cord stacked, split and stored under roof. Those numbers wood(pun intended) make those who gave you hard time, shake their heads. We ain't lazy!
I don't think that's laughter. Some of us actually give a damm about our neighbor's health and well being.
Well I wonder how you define "old school", when I first started burning wood in the 70's I bought a book and it talked about drying wood outside for one year and inside for one year to have great wood. I believe it had been written in the 50's or early 60's. The "New Shelter" magazine had a great article about creosote and how it's formed, I bought my first flue temp gauge (still use it) and never looked back. So this knowledge has been out there for a long time but some continue to ignore it.
Hey where you been?? Kevin, I know only a few of us get to Cord Corleone status here on here as to having 30+ cords. But Crime-In—Italy! I don’t think anyone on here stacks up to the likes of ya!
5 fractured vertabrae and shoulder surgery slowed me up but getting back to it now. Nice to have the wood ready as cutting was out of the cards for a while. So much dead ash around here rotting up as most don't want to do the work, such a sad thing to see it all happen. The white shed in the pictured was totalled out by the extreme weather and we've been hauling out of there. There was 80 cord in there and getting close to half gone now. Bugs and weather sure do make it hard.
Old school is based on using non epa stoves to generate the thought that using wet wood was ok just as long as it burned and kept the house warm. The mentality there was that if you got your wood cut in July or August and stacked it for the last 2-3 months of that Summer, apparently that was considered “ready to burn” as it was stacked and split. Aunt did this all the time. Not gonna reprimand her for it as shes been burning longer than I have but she still doesn’t take the initiative to truly get wood ready.
I baked the wood in a hearth grate on top of the stove, 1 load baking, the last baked load burning, the year we had only green wood. I love the smell of baked maple wood, and it helped humidify the house. I think I got almost double the creosote, but the fresh baked wood lit right off and didn't sizzle or foam. I have a pre EPA stove and a large flue, I did check the flue a few times to make sure the creosote wasn't a problem. Never going to be in that crunch again!
