As you all know that have been keeping up with wood situation, I am completely out of wood. As a result I've been on the hunt for bio-bricks. This hunt has been tiring and fruitless. As a result I purchased Redstone Fuel bricks from TSC. There were ok, but tSC did not have any pallets for sale, and I had to look elsewhere. I tried to heat the room with a 1500 watt space heater. However; the one I had would only keep the room around 64 during the day and drop in the 50's overnight when I would get colder. I purchased a Pelonis disc heater, and it did a better job. Though I was still not thrilled with running it 24X7. Yesterday while looking over Craig's List I found a guy selling Envi blocks. Which is the same manufacturer of Barefoot wood pellets. I drove right up there to pickup a ton, and I am happy to stay that the wood stove is back in operation. Hopefully this ton of Envi 8's will get me to the middle of March.
Our first year most of what we burned was scraps, from a pallet company, mostly pine. Some were as small as 3x3" and we hauled them to the car in laundry baskets and filled the trunk and back seat.
Glad you finally found some bricks. I hope your getting your wood supply together for next season. Good luck!
Look for a place that makes pallets or other woodworking for cutoffs. A pallet place by me charges 5 bucks a 55gallon garbage pail worth of mostly oak dry hardwood.
Good luck! Do what you got to do to get through this year. But get working on next years pile. If you do burn pallets just watch getting to many in there. They will burn fairly hot.
My first year burning I very nearly ran out of wood. My second year I cut a little more, but it was a colder winter and I did run out. I remember burning all kinds of scraps, and going out into the woods with a good bit of snow on the ground, cutting a load, splitting and burning it immediately. Definitely not fun. Glad you were able to find something! Most of us have been there at one time or another. As Backwoods said, you gotta do what you gotta do.
Reminds me of in March 1990 when just a couple wheelbarrows of wood were left after a particularly nasty Jan/Feb.Dad & I went to their neighbor's 60 acres of timber. We could cut any standing snags/deadfall on the property back then until the elderly couple passed away & their farm was split up/sold in the late '90's. Cutting in a bad ice storm no less - strong gusts,horizontal rain/ice hitting you in the face,about 1/8" ice coating everything.I fell down at least 3 times in the first hour,finally after another 30 minutes I said "The Hell with this!! " & we quit for the day with barely half of that big old 3/4 ton Dodge Power Wagon's bed stacked full. Went back the next day to finish what we started. Never.Again.
Let us know how these work out for you. I wish stove manufacturers would test their stoves with bio-bricks. I know they can pack some BTU's, but if there were guidelines by manufacturers to use them, I think it would give consumers more options, and also to burn a dry fuel.
I work in the chit all day. The last thing I want to do is come home tired and carry wood in ,,, even if its only 30 feet through the snow. Aint happening. Have set myself up good over the years making wood burning easier any way I can.
LOL that's why I cut 3-4 days every month year round in spare time,never want to get close to running out again.Especially important now I'm getting older.Zero to 90 degrees,light rain/snow isn't a problem but you wont see me out there if there's lightning,strong winds or deep snow. I get enough of that chit wading through the mud/snow & climbing ladders/scaffolding on construction sites on a regular basis. Doing tree work is my hobby & therapy,a way to forget the daily BS & keep in shape when construction has occasional slow periods.
Unfortunately, I'm working on hooking up the oil boiler right now. Figure I have about a cord of wood left and that isn't going to last long at these temps. Good luck with the bio bricks! It is going to pain me to make that call for an oil delivery.
I'm glad you found some Envi blocks, if you were around this area I wOOd help you with some firewood.
I am using more bags currently as I get use to these Envi 8 bricks. I am using 3 bags per day, and while they burned overnight the room was down to 60 in the am. Tonight I am trying a different method to see if I can get it to last over night with a 70 degree morning temp. 3 bags per day will get me 30 days worth of heat. Which is not bad. That would be the rest of Feb, and a good part of March.
Most of us have been there, boettg33.....and it sucks, but you do what you can. That's one of the big reasons I starting hoarding wood, keeping it top covered, etc. Knowing I'm nearly 5 years ahead and that I only really "have" to replace one years worth every summer is a great feeling.... As thewoodlands stated, if you were closer I'd help you out bud. Keep us posted on how things work out for you.
We all started somewhere. Just keep at it - most people aren't thinking about firewood until the fall and winter, so you could really clean up after some springtime storms. Just keep your eyes open and don't be afraid to ask!
boettg33, I ran out last year, not too far from it this season as well. Think I'll be fine when I get a few questionable loads thru the wood kiln... About pallets- know anyone at Lowes or HD? I know a guy in Lumber at Lowes here, I needed a pallet for loading firebrick on the truck- we walked out back and there were tons of 'em laying about- I said, "Y'all do anything with those pallets?" His response was sad, "we bust 'em and throw them out!" Make friends with someone at one of these places.... And as Chvymn99 said, don't overload the stove w/ them if you go that way. Eric VW
Update - I've been playing with different loads for overnight burns. The last few nights I've gone to bed early and the wife has loaded the wood stove. Only to find it out or just about out the next morning. Tonight she asked if I'd load it in hopes I can get it so that it's still running in the am. This might not be the proper way, but this is what I did. I moved all of the coals I could to the left side of the wood stove. Right next to the coals I put one brick and then stacked another on top of it. I then laid three more side by side on the bottom row. Furthest to the right, I stacked another brick to make it two bricks high. I watched as it started to go, and it was not moving fast enough. I put another brick right on the coals and added one more to the bottom row and moved over the one I put on the last one. Still with me? I'll put a rudimentary setup below. B B coals BBBB B B B coals BBBBB Finally: B B B B coals BBBBB With the final configuration, the brick on top of the coals was going while the first row had flames over it from the gases burning. I watched this for a half hour or so and watched the flames as the gases burned above the stack next to the coals and eventually that first stack caught fire and gases began to burn across the most of the top. Heat production with the stove throttled most of the way down is mid 70's when it's in the teens outside. So far I am liking this bricks.
It looks like with a little bit of effort you made a change that worked in your favor. I read your story and I'm sorry for your tough situation, I'm glad you found the bricks in order to get by for now.
