The heritage is a beautiful stove...it works as advertised...5-8 hr burns depending on wood...does not really like wet wood...great fireshow also..Likes to cruise 500-570...had it over 600 no ill affects..enjoy..
We are enjoying the heritage much better than the clydesdale it replaced. I do not own the sea can. We have it at work and I wanted to give it a go and see if it would season my wood quicker. Less headaches with the wood out of sight out of mind. I will open the doors early in the am and again for an hour before leaving. Maybe do this just in the beginning stages to get some of that moisture out. Once the hot weather gets here leave doors closed all day. Curious what temps do I need to keep the mold away?
Install an exhaust fan on a timer and blow the moisture out every 2 hours. I helped a buddy bulld one these and found this method works the best. You MUST get the moisture out of the container regularly. With a wood fire stoking his kiln, we are getting green cut oak and hedge down to be,ow 20% in 3 days. Without an external heat source, your drying will be slower, but faster than doing nothing. They work.
I would just leave the doors ajar slightly and chain across the opening to the bars with a lock if you need security. It will still get hot enough to do the j0b, I'd think. If a couple varmints or cats get in there at night, so be it.
What's the floor like in the shipping container? Corrugated metal, flat wood, etc? Does it drain the condensed water? Can you see it dripping?
Replied to the PM but will report back here. Floor is metal. When I took a MC reading from one of the splits on top it was over 25%. So it was not ready. This container gets sun most of the day and it got pretty hot in there. Had lots of condensation on the ceiling. I would open the doors a couple of times a week in the AM for around 2 to 3 hours then close it up again for a few days. Towards the end of the summer I would only open it up 1 day. I also did the solar kiln and that worked much better. MC was around 20% and I burned this wood over the winter. Only problem I had with it was the plastic I bought was not a UV platic and had to be replaced mid summer. Not sure how long it was ripped up but my thinking is a couple of weeks.
thanks for the update, hamsey! Great info Glad you did the solar kiln and shipping container at the same time
You might have done better doing some venting of the container in the afternoon/evening when the air was at its warmest. Theoretically that would be when the air is holding the most moisture before it condensed out when things cooled overnight. Without a humidity probe in there it is hard to tell exactly what was going on.
