I've got a mess of shorties to get through next year. Been cutting my 24" splits in half since switching from owb to IS. Got em all piled up on one of the pallet farms.. Not looking forward to trying to stack them! But it needs to be done to get them dry. Most were reading high 20's MC when tested in September. won't list much of that in a big leaf filled heap, I think.
That is a very unusual hobby and good for your wife Katie to be that committed to it. As you can see by my avatar our home is from the late Victorian era and my wife and I bought it because of that. Despite everyone warning us the work needed for old homes we wanted a place with history and good bones. Even living here for 25 years and yes needing to do some restoration and repairs I would buy an old house again in a heartbeat. It came with an old Caloric oven that I know anyone else would have thrown out and replaced the second they moved in. I said when it is no longer functional we will get a new commercial type, but it refuses to die and it throws off some decent btu's. My wife and I are both cooks in our own right and it gets heavy use every day so I don't think its going anywhere soon. When I did my kitchen remodel /addition a few years back we even kept the oven to the surprise of our contractor. We returned the look of the kitchen to an earlier era of the house and went with a classic functional utilitarian feel.. Except for the stainless steel refrigerator and this 1950s oven it looks possibly from the 20's or 30's era with a "Shaws Original 1897" porcelain farmhouse sink (coincidently the year the house was built!). So I just took a picture of my stove and put a vintage filter on it. I know, real amateur, but thanks your hobby gave me this great idea! All's its missing is the timeless and lovely Katie taking out a fresh baked pie!
Ahhh short round. I have chunky monkeys and I throw them in the stove when I don't need a ton of heat. However, I don't intentionally cut them that shirt unless a knot, crotch, or the end of a "stick" ends up making a short like that. My stove takes 20" barely N-S, but it's better at 17". It definitely can't take 20.5 or 24" like I found the other day. . That's shagbark hickory, so yeah, it's going to get cut one at 17 and one at 7" or so.
I just loaded 3) 7x7x11ish pieces of locust N&S n boy does that take off n burn nice. I need to make myself intentionally cut a cord of the size stated above...i know i can get longer burn times this way..
By the way LodgedTree, your Brooks Railroad Station shot instantly reminded me of a movie I like starring Paul Newman and Lee Marvin called Pocket Money from 1972. True grit movies of the late 60's early 70's is my favorite era. Pocket Money is not a real world shakin movie like the classic Cool Hand Luke, but it is a good watch. Its from that same era when the anti hero genre was in vogue. Movies like Midnight Cowboy, Deliverance, One flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, The French Connection etc, etc all fit this bill. This movie is even anti climactic, but I always loved the final scene of the movie that has these two washed up and defeated lead characters waiting to depart from this run down town to try their luck somewhere else. It has a great theme song by Carol King that never really got any attention. Anyway, sorry to have hijacked this thread but being a visual artist and art teacher these things interest me.
I know it's a pain, but it is worth it. I remembered when I transitioned to the smaller sized splits I used to pile up the embers in the middle and book end the sides with two short splits N&S and lay the larger ones crossed over top like a bridge. It works like I said, but I never could get the wood to burn as efficient and that would also create shorter burn times and more coaling that would clog the whole chamber to where I was constantly needing to dig it out. Switching to all N/S orientation helps a lot and I don't miss the burning logs rolling into the viewing glass
Yep. I cut a bunch about 12" long so they would fit in the micro fireplace in the living room. Of course, I haven't lit a fire in there in 2 years, so they're going through my 30NC as we speak. They will stack. Just be neat about it and dont go 5 ft high.
I have occasionally cut some that short-11" works best N/S in our Drolet. I can really pack it in there and get a long burn cycle like that.
I cut more than half of my wood to 12-13" for N-S loading in my insert. It takes of quicker and I can load more in the stove that way.
We recently moved ourselves. We still have that house, and it is set up the same way, we are just in an old farmhouse that belonged to my Grandparents now directly across the road. The original house (the fieldstone foundation it sits on) was laid in 1800, but the house burned, and was replaced in 1930 with what is known as a Foursquare. These were kits Sears, Aladdin, and other companies sold in mail order catalogs between 1890 and 1940. As near as we can tell, ours was derived from a company called Sterling, but not an actual kit house as they had to change the size to fit on the existing foundation. (18 x 22) They also did not need a bathroom as all houses here, up until the 1950's had an outhouse...this is VERY rural Maine after all. It has come a very long way in the 2 months that we have lived here. The most costly changes were installing electricity (from 6 outlets to over 50 of them), and adding insulation. This meant tearing the walls out down to the studs, then rebuilding. We have a long way to go though Sadly, because this house is so tiny, we affectionately call it our Tiny House because it is only 1100 sq ft, we cannot make it original. We just need the space saving furniture of today. Still, since we have a sawmill, a quarry, and plenty of woodlot, we do as much as we can ourselves, from pouring concrete countertops, making homemade clapboards, to making items out of slate. Ultimately we hope to spend money on a few big items to really give this home character, like a slate farmhouse sink. How we do that, I am not sure. We have Sheldon Slate here in Maine, and I have talked with them, but goodness, that is a lot of money for one sink. I have done SOME stonework, including slate, but not in making a functioning, and watertight vessel like a kitchen sink. With a family of 6, that is the heart of our home.
No no no.....the issue is getting enough air to travel from front to back...being able to load N&S makes a world of difference..
When I was a kid my father was building things and people would tell him to come over and pick up this building material or that which they no longer needed. As we picked things up, he always took everything, and then latter on tossed out what he did not want. I asked him why, and he said people did not want you just taking the best stuff and leaving them with the junk they could not get rid of easily. It taught me a lot because my father has had so much stuff given to him over the years...nice stuff, all because he took the good with the bad. I say it on here all the time, "I had this kicking around, or that on hand", mostly because of stuff he was given. Funny how materials work like people sometimes too; take the good with the bad.
Yes I do and for the same reason as you. My Enerzone is not much bigger than yours. I also made a jig to put my splits in and cut with my saw. I'll try to get pictures later. It's raining at the moment and have a birthday party to go to shortly.N&S versus E&W is 2 different worlds with my stove.
LodgedTree I like how you talk about houses and share your knowledge of period architecture. I am very familiar with the American four square. To me it's synonymous with the late industrial revolution and a precursor to the modern day pre-fab. These homes dot the edges of many of our industrial towns here in the east coast region especially the northern zone. Anyway, my real interest is in the Victorian eras that span the mid 1800s to the early 1900s (my favorite being the Second Empire mixed with Italianate influences). I even inject architecture lessons on these various styles when teaching perspective drawing to my students. Some of them really respond enthusiastically to learning about the period and what it was like to live in these houses. Also being that many live in or walk by these old buildings every day (though often grossly renovated), they light up when they can recognize a building that is a beau arts or renaissance revival and many will show me pictures of their homes and ask me what the style is. These are inner city students I teach and it makes me happy when I see their enthusiasm, but then they complain the details are too hard to draw on say a Queen Ann turret or a mansard roof, so we often improvise and go with the modern boring glass and steel box that plague our cities Anyway, at least they get some context as to how things came to be the way they are. Nice "Little Red Riding Hood" photo! I'm glad you were able to utilize those beech trees somehow and they will at least be immortalized in that photo. As far as the themed photos like the Bonnie and Clyde for instance, if you are not able to get the props then maybe forget the literary theme and just make a period piece photo. For me personally I think a mysterious vintage scene would be better aesthetically and you would have much more freedom to be creative and improvise. I do get the draw of creating something with more cultural or iconic meaning and I'm sure it would be a blast to create, but your pictures are very good as little vignettes of Americana. Plus you never know how long your friend will have that 1930s car! Good Luck, I'm a big fan!
Well thanks and apologies both I suppose. here Foursquares are not nearly as frequent, more Federal Houses then Foursquares. I was not sure if you knew what they were so I expanded on that, and never meant to sound condescending on your knowledge of architecture; it obviously supersedes mine. I like Victorian Homes, and we looked at one up in Monson, a giant of a home that was built by the Slate Quarry Owner from that town. It had it all...turret, carriage house, 3 stories, massive wood/coal kitchen range, and since it was owned by the slate mines owner, slate sink, slate countertops, slate roof, yet it was done well. You might be able to see it on Google Maps, at #3 North Guilford Road, Monson Maine, the Green and White House. Sadly it was in really sad shape. Rot throughout, tube and knot wiring, an attempt to turn it into a bed and breakfast for the Appalachian Trail Hikers headed through the 100 mile wilderness, and as such, they destroyed the home by putting sprinklers and that crap throughout. Rot was everywhere. It would take someone paying cash for it and no way could it ever be financed. They wanted $150,000 at the time, but I don't have that money in cash. I wish I had, I would have bought it for Katie as she really wanted it. I am pretty sure Katie and I could take on such a project, but it would mean literally setting up the sawmill on site and sawing the lumber as it was needed. It is also 2 hours north of us though. Too bad... That area is really depressed. There is no jobs up there so normal houses were selling in that town for a mere $15,000. If you ever want to get out of NJ and in a nice Victorian in Maine, let me know, there are tons here.
"Well thanks and apologies both I suppose. here Foursquares are not nearly as frequent, more Federal Houses then Foursquares. I was not sure if you knew what they were so I expanded on that, and never meant to sound condescending on your knowledge of architecture; it obviously supersedes mine." No not at all, I was just trying to point out that I was happy to find another architectural enthusiast. Your points are all spot on and you definitely know a lot about construction so I was very happy to get that angle. By the way, with your knowledge of cement, have you thought of making one of those cast cement sinks? I'm sure you have, I think they are very cool and love the seamless way they connect and are part of the counter. To me stainless steel is also industrial and so I like to mix it in with older period styles. Anyway a simpler cast cement solution would be to just cast the counter with an opening to inlay a SS or even copper sink. Just a thought to get a similar feeling to the slate you and your wife seem to really be fond of. I just checked out that home and can see you and Katie have exquisite taste, but talk about going to the extreme of the where you are now living in a small house! Haha. The house you're looking at is a colonial revival queen ann beauty with some stick and renaissance influence putting it somewhere around or after 1890. I am only referring to the main front nearest the road, the buildings connected to back are from another era, possibly earlier, I cant tell with the street view alone. By the way I love the location and yard which is just manageable enough without being too large and it has buildings for mixed use possibilities while in a town setting. Shame the place has gotten depressed, but I would still fall in love with it unless like you said it was too run down to afford repairs. The mix of styles in the main home was often the case with the Victorian era which were almost always a mixed breed of styles as the client or contractor who built them liked a little of this or that they saw here or there. Some that were more modest farm houses with only a few identifiable accents and influences were known as Folk Victorians. So this is why saying a home is a victorian only describes a time frame as to when it was built, but "Victorian" is not a style, more a period where many styles from various European regions were paid tribute and revived. Hence the word revival in their descriptions like yours mainly colonial revival in its bones. Anyway, that house is very similar to a home we were looking at when my wife and I got married in the early 90s. It was in Passaic NJ (once an industrial mecca), and it was even larger than the house you were looking at without the additional buildings of course that make yours much bigger. It was so big though it was once a small residence hospital to care for aging people. It had 12 medical beds and then after became a boarding house. It was also a queen ann colonial revival with a three story turret and also in a depressed neighborhood and yes it was also $150,000. I was so close to buying it as in my youth I had dreams of grandeur that I could live in it while I restored it and like your Katie my wife Beth loved it. Its floors were the worst part as they were all sagged and crooked, some by over 4 inches from wall to wall! Must have been the weight of all those hospital beds and then the staff, but it sat on an incredible brownstone foundation that made the basement look like a medieval labyrinth! The final straw though was that it once had seven fireplaces that were all covered up and the only one left was converted to gas. Guess I had wood burning in my blood way back then because that act of carelessness to remove or cover every fireplace was more than I could stomach. It convinced me that though the house once beautiful, it was unfortunately not loved enough through the years and needed too much work for a neighborhood that would not ever pay it back or appreciate it. A few years later I drove to the spot to see what became of the house and the corner plot it sat on was empty. I later found out the house was condemned and torn down when it went abandoned and became an attraction for kids breaking in and vandalizing it and other questionable acts. I was sad but kind of relieved I wasn't the sucker who bought a house no one in their right mind would have invested in. This is the house in it's heyday after a woman entrepreneur at the time bought it and converted it to an annex hospital to serve the elderly who needed more live in care
I do and I don't. I mostly cut for us and measure with an 18" bar or use my hyper calibrated eyeball! But I also cut for the FIL, who will go through near 3/4 cord in the little Jotul in the cellar each season. So I'll always keep that in mind and recalibrate if I've been doing a lot of cuts for us.
