ReelFaster , As others have said safe to burn pine, never noticed a smell to the wood when being burnt dry and inside. Same for all wood unless, someone smokes up the house on a refill
Years ago I burnt some pine in my OWB that was not seasoned. It burnt fine but after three weeks I only had about a 2" hole at the top of the stack for the smoke to get out. Cleaned the stack and kept burning pine it was all I had for wood. Good thing I didn't have any neighbors close by as the smoke was wicked. Lesson learned.
I burn pine on a somewhat regular basis. I try not to burn much this time of year but still have some mixed in. It's good and dry though. I have about 15 evergreens to take down in the near future and anything big enough will get cut, split and stacked.
The black smoke and plastic burning smell is common when the pine is wet, in my experience. Burned quite a bit of it in the owb in my first year, having no other fuel. Stopped over at the elderly neighbor's house quite a few times to make sure it wasn't bugging her, but all was well. Thankfully the wind usually blows towards the side of the house with no neighbor most of the time. That's how I really learned about seasoning wood! I knew it intellectually, but not practically, y'know? Sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do, but I knew it could be done better. I don't think the odd piece of accidental unseasoned wood will do your chimney much harm if the rest of the stash is in good shape.
Pine is fine. It takes a lot less time to dry than, for example, oak. A great wood to put up your first year. Put up two seasons worth of pine the first year, a season of pine and a season of oak the second year, and whatever you like after that and you'll be on the three year plan and burning good dry wood the whole time. Can't do that if you start with oak. Even bone dry, if there is resin, it will burn with a black smoke like diesel. I try to separate out the resinous pieces (fatwood) to use to start fires. I believe I read it on this forum, so I will not claim credit: the reputation for pine burning down a house has nothing to do with pine and everything to do with poor burning practices. If you cut a mixed lot of wood in spring or (shudder) fall, as people used to do all the time in the past, you are going to be burning wet wood. The oak and hickory you burn will be really wet and line the flue with a ton of creosote. On about March or April, even fall cut pine will be reasonable dry. You put that in your fireplace and for the first time all year, the fire is hot enough to ignite all the crap put in your chimney by the "good" firewood. Then the pine gets blamed.
This. Thick pitch can act like melted wax and ooze before it burns. Water inside the wood will hiss out the ends.
Really great info fella's thank you and as always thanks to everyone!! When you mention resin, is that the same as sap? I just saw the other day exactly what you described in a melted wax substance kind of blobbed up in one area of the split. I was out this morning before work in the wood shed trying to find the piece that caught my eye but of course I couldn't locate it (maybe I burnt it ). I really like pine! As noted before down here in S.Jersey its very plentiful, people pass it over all the time, it drys quick, and it burns really hot and my stove being steel it heats up quick. Of course it don't last nearly as long as some of your hardwoods, but when am home and available to reload more often it's not much of a burden. When freshly cut the sap can be a pita when you have holes in your gloves like I did.....
The Difference Between Tree Sap & Tree Resin Resin and sap not the same. The resin will either be accumulated sticky stuff on the outside of the tree at a wound or it accumulates at branch points, in knots, and in the stumps of cut trees. Either way, when the wood is dry, the resin hardens and looks like amber. I said it burns like Diesel, but I think burns like plastic is a better description. It starts off solid and melts as it burns. Puts up a good flame with a lot of black soot/smoke at the top of the flame. When you find a piece of resinous pine, save it out for fire starting.
