I know a lot depends on the species of wood and drying time but is there a rule of thumb weight per square foot of 2 year old fire wood? The plan would be to build several racks. Store the loaded racks in the barn and bring them up to the house as needed. I just don't know how big I dare make them. My mini skid steer only has a capacity of 750 lbs.
If I were dealing with a fixed weight limit, I would build the racks to fit 750lbs of the densest wood you'll regularly process, and I would do the math based on wet wood in case I ever had to move a rack of wood that had not yet dried. That way you always know you're not risking the equipment. One man's opinion, your mileage may vary.
Most hardwood's are @ around 40# cu/ft. air dried. They say that there is only about 70-90 cu/ft of wood in a 128 cu/ft cord. Most wood has (iirc) about 7000 btu per pound but a cord of red oak weighs 3700-3800 pounds where a cord of pine is only about 2600#.
The density varies so much that there isn't really any rule of thumb. You can load on a lot more red maple by volume than red oak. Sycamore is a feather compared to black locust. Bark will figure in also. Its less dense, barkless splits are going to weigh in heavier. I'd say to pull some of your typical splits of what you burn, weigh and then figure out how many will add up to your limit. Then compare the size of your limit to one of the many weight/cord charts found on the Internet and see if your results are similar.
That figure (70-90 per cord) is tossed around the Internet a lot but is pure baloney. If it were true, then none of the other figures all the charts give would be correct. In addition, I would be insulted if someone tried to claim I had that much air in my stacks of wood. Even when I try to stack loose it could not be that much.
I tend to agree, but that's beyond my (mathematical) pay grade I guess if you cut at 14" and made a triple row 4x4x8 and split real small........ That reminds me, wasn't there a discussion (somewhere) along the lines of splitting actually making the cu/ft bigger or smaller, I can't remember which it is, but I remember thinking it was wrong. I think it was actually smaller, I don't know how you could split up a 24" round and stack it tighter than it grew
I think that is based on bigger spaces being present when stacking rounds vs splits. I'm not sure I agree with the logic, but I'm pretty sure that's what it is based on.
With round shaped rounds, hexagonal close pack will be the densest you can get. Think of that pattern as what you get if you had put a bunch of circles into a large square. It is not really rows so much as staggered rounds where each one is a bit higher or lower in the stack compared to the one next to it. If you want to actually see the pattern, take 7 rounds of equal size and arrange 6 of them tightly around the one in the center. It is the pattern that honey bees use when building a comb. You will almost never see that pattern in a wood pile but it is the theoretical tightest pattern that can be stacked for round objects. If you do what I see in so many stacks here on FHC and cut your splits into squares for better stacking, you can indeed stack closer than the wood was in the round because you can eliminate much of the air space that exists in a stack of round pieces. I don't know how well that would dry but it can mean more wood in less space.
Make a stack of wood that weighs about 70lbs on a scale (or about 35lbs if 70 is too big) then multiply that amount by 10 (or 20) that should give you enough wiggle room.
