Did my stacks fall over? I noticed about 3 weeks ago 2 of my stacks were really leaning. About 1/3 cord each. Was working out of town that week and came home to find them on the ground. Was it because it was against the wall and it dried out and shrunk faster on the outside of the stack? Or , the ground was frozen when I stacked it and when it thawed the ground settled and let the stacks lean out? This was Whits Oak C/S 2 summers ago and stacked over this winter while it was pretty cold.
I'm guessing the ground moved. Frost heave went away on the outside of the stack...ground drops....stack is now leaning hard away from the wall.
My guess is a comb. of ground moving after frost and some shrinkage from drying. Looking @ the picture shows the grade to be slightly away from the bldg.
Yea I need spouting. 6" spouting is a little pricey. Not a big deal but they want down spouts like every 15 feet because the size of the roof. and I only put in one at each end. And the stack are in the way to dig it up and cut in more drains...Always something!
I didn't put any gutters. Best thing I ever did. Good two foot overhangs, doubled up perforated building drains buried under the dripline, sitting on gravel, covered with earth then gravel. They run under the yard, then under my tile bed (a natural shelf about 20 feet lower than the yard at the edge of the cliff was used for the septic and tile bed, so the drains were run on the shelf before fill was put in...). Water pours off my roof, and there is never any puddling of water. I have no worries about ice taking the gutters or building up against the roof. No leaves to clean out of gutter, No plugged gutters. No gutter maintenance. If I want rain water for watering plants, just put a couple of trash cans or trugs under the drip line.
Timely post, I actually tried to jack up the leaning side of one of my stacks with a floor jack last night but the pallet joist just started cracking. Going to have to re-stack a couple sections, not stable for any little ones to be playing near and it definitely won't make it 2 years until it gets burned. D'oh!
I like my overhangs also. I put 2' on the back and 3' on the front but the square is almost 16' high. Was never a big deal till i started stacking on the back side of the garage. The water is splashing back up on the stacks and i'm getting some ugly mold and weird stuff growing on the bottom 2-3 rows of wood in the stacks. I put in drains for down spouts when I built the garage and this past summer i extended them into the woods to get them further away. Guess its time to get the spouting done. Maintenance shouldn't be too bad on the back of the garage as its pretty open an that side but leaves might be a problem on the front side. There will be some leaves blowing around the front.
Whatever caused it TurboDiesel ... gravity dint help one bit... again... I hates that... sorry for the hassle...
Has happened to all of us. Just add one more time you handle the wood before it leaves the house as ash. a rain gutter would help some too.
1. It is bad to stack against a wall because of lack of air circulation. 2. Stacks fall over for reasons like #1. 3. Frost heave. 4. Gravity. 5. The Lord thought you needed more practice on your stacking skills. 6. Sometimes Mother Nature just does things like this to tick you off.
I would guess that the ground beneath the outside runner thawed before the inside one. That thawed runner sunk, the inside one didn't. Had our first stack tumble here a few weeks ago.
I think the splits tried to escape, but realized they had no legs after they jumped. It sucks, but it happens. Just another excuse to put a few cold ones back during the RE-stacking process.
I have had stacks do that before. I couldn't figure it out, but one thought came to mind. Could it be the outer side of the stack dryed a lot faster than the inner side and shrunk on that side of the wood? And since it shrunk on the outside, that's where the stack headed. It sounds like a far stretch, but something causes it to do that.
