A Salute to Firewood

Thanks for posting... listening to this in front of the fire coincidentally, recovering from a few 18-hour work days over some fruit and lunchmeat with the dog at my feet (speaking of zen).

lol @ 'foliage czar' and 'damper' as a safe word. Also, a mention of Hearth.com - nice!

Unseasoned wood was mentioned several times. It's like crude oil... sure it'll burn, but it's much cleaner/efficient if it's refined (seasoned).

Thoughts about burning dryer lint? Technically it shouldn't amount to more than fine bits of cotton, but bits of synthetic cloth and associated pigments might be a (slight) problem.

Thanks Otis for posting the link.

By way of a thank you, but totally unrelated to wood heating, I thought I'd post a link for you to my favorite Groucho clip.

Thanks for sharing Otis. I'm in the process of downloading the link on my smartphone right now, I'll give it a listen later.....

Love that quote in your signature, BTW! I couldn't agree more!

I salute my firewood stacks every time the propane truck passes my house without stopping and my electric bill comes in at under $40. for the month! Now, if I could just figure out how to burn wood in the summer to make air conditioning!

Steam turbine...

Adabiviak said:

Thoughts about burning dryer lint?

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It makes excellent firestarters. They're not pretty but very effective. Just hot wax and lint stuffed into an egg carton.

I was surprised at some of the advice given on the show by the Connecticut State Forester regarding wood seasoning. While he was unequivocal about the need to burn dry wood, his descriptions of how to accomplish that -- at least 6 months for most woods, and a little longer for oak -- were not very stringent. He also suggested that if you're late to cutting your firewood for next winter, you can just cut down a tree and leave it whole until the leaves dry up and turn brown, indicating the tree has dried itself.

Of course 6 month's seasoning is much better than none, and a felled tree will lose some fraction of its moisture as it dies, but rarely will either approach get the MC down where it should be. I'm divided on whether the State Forester did a good thing by suggesting baby steps towards better burning, or a disservice by describing practices that fall significantly short.

Ralphie Boy said:

I salute my firewood stacks every time the propane truck passes my house without stopping and my electric bill comes in at under $40. for the month! Now, if I could just figure out how to burn wood in the summer to make air conditioning!

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Maybe you can burn wood to cool your house. Just like a propane refrigerator. Or maybe a small scale steam generator to run the house and sell the power to the grid. I can see it now. A thread on hearth saying how many cords did you burn this summer to cool your house.

mtcates said:

Maybe you can burn wood to cool your house. Just like a propane refrigerator.

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That was my thought as well. There are enough great minds here on Hearth.com to come up with a plan.....Okay kids let's get goin' they's some inventin' what needs doin'

How about a Sterling engine hooked up to a compressor?