Which wood on top?

Yep, top down is the ticket in my non-cat, but not so much in the BK. I burn a small kindling fire down to coals, then a full load on top of that.

Been awhile since a started a fire.

When you ask which wood on top, remember that there are two different philosophies to start a fire. In traditional "bottom up" style, the kindling goes on the bottom, with splits on top but there is a counter-intuitive "top down" way, splits on the bottom and light the kindling on top. It's weird but it works, some would even say that it's better. Whichever way you go, I'd put the fast burning wood closest to the kindling.

TE

jeff_t said:

Yep, top down is the ticket in my non-cat, but not so much in the BK. I burn a small kindling fire down to coals, then a full load on top of that.

Been awhile since a started a fire.

Click to expand...

That's how I start my fires. Build a Jenga tower out of super dry pine and then place the splits on the lovely hot coal bed.

Don't really matter what wood I place ontop of that volcano.

Last fire I started way 8th Dec.

And I thought I had a tendency to overthink things!

I always load larger splits on bottom, filling in the top with mediums and smalls.
I have started experiments putting mediums on bottom and larges on top, but seems more tricky to find larges to fit on top. Less air flow up top also may make for slower firing at times getting stove back up to temp.
For start up fires, the criss cross method, or leaving large air gaps with small splits works well.
This is a sacrificial load, may throw some heat and get stove up to temp, but more for getting a good bed of coals for reload.

On a cold start in the Buck, I'll burn a few small splits to get up to temp and get some coals. Then I load with the coals more or less in the middle and burn the load from the center out. I'll put some Ash or Cherry in the middle to kick the cat off quicker, Oak and Hickory flanking that, then maybe a couple Ash or Cherry against the walls to kick it up at the end of the burn.