smell of burning wood?

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Mandoo

Mandoo

Member
Jan 8, 2008
102
Mid-Ohio
O.K. I have been pondering this question since last year when I was burning Cherry and Hickory. Now I see posts here that state hey I'm burning ______ (fill in the blank) and it smells great! What do you smell???? My old smoke dragon would back draft some foul smoke when the door was opened for a reload, It was horrible nasty campfire smoke in my house. Now I have a new stove with great draft and zero I mean zero smoke smell. If you walked in the house you would have no way of knowing I'm burning unless you looked at or felt the stove.

I'm sure most of you are in a similar situation so what do you smell what am I missing? Other than the coal type smell I get when I'm outside and the wind is right I can't say one wood has a better oder than another. BTW I do like the coal type smell and have to believe it means I'm burning a nice fire.

Thanks for the info
 
I guess we can only smell the wood when the stove door is opened for reloading or poking a piece of wood to move it around. Those of us who are pyros sometimes poke at our fires even when we don't need to . . . Also some wood gives off a distinctive smell even before it is burned. I have certainly noticed the smell from raw mulberry (uck!), locust, hickory, and cherry laurel.
 
I love the smell of sawing up pine logs......mmmm

But I really had to write and confess my current envy of your zero smoke smell stove......................
 
Opening the door quickly can pull a puff of smoke out into the room, especially if the air is on low. Also, if you have an insert or a ZC unit with a blower intake at the bottom it can sometimes pull some smoke in and blow it out the top when you open the door.
 
A couple ornamental fresh splits in the wood holder is the best it gets. The only smell at my house is the Oak coming out of the chimney. A good fresh split of Maple always smells good, and looks alright too.
 
I don't get much back puffing, but I like it when it's pine. The smell outside is wierd. It doesn't smell like wood, it smells sweet.
 
My house only gets a touch of smoke smell when I screw up.
 
babalu87 said:
My house only gets a touch of smoke smell when I screw up.
Click to expand...

I just did this! thought I would open the top real fast to throw in a extra log on top of my charred wood. Well lets just say the smoke detector is in fine working order and the wood still smells like burning coal to me.


Guess I'll get with a chemist and market "fresh burning wood in a can" just like the fake X-mas tree scent!
 
I love the smell of black cherry and found that it's more the bark that gives it off so I'll throw a few twigs, small rounds or a handful of bark chips in at start-up or re-load. By the time I close the door the whole house has this yummy aroma---better than incense.
 
I've found there are 2 types of smoke, each with a different smell -

1) When a bit of smoke comes out the front of my insert when I open the door. This smoke has that good old "wood smoke" smell. I actually like this smell.

2) The smoke that comes out of the chimney if I've turned down my air too soon, where I'm not getting good secondary burn. This smoke smells awful, and makes me want to gag. It doesn't happen often, but a few times I've turned my air down too soon, gone out to stack some wood on the deck, and had this awful smelling smoke dropping right into the area where I'm working. Each time I've had to run into the house to turn the air up before I get sick.

Is this what you mean?
 
Sometimes when I walk in from out in the cold, I get just a slight wiff of that woodstove is going smell; and it depends on what I am burning how exactly it does smell.
No matter, it is a wonderful welcome home!
 
Mostly we burn Fir,Cedar,Maple. If i really have to, I will buy alder. That alder is the only wood that I can smell when I come in the house from outside. Can`t say that I am particulary fond of that aroma!
 
Locust smells like *ss..not good
 
If I get dopey & forget to open the damper first to load.
I have caught a whiff of what smells like franks & beans cooking on a campfire.
Maybe I just assocoiate the smell with camping & beanie weenies? lol.
 
Girl said:
If I get dopey & forget to open the damper first to load.
I have caught a whiff of what smells like franks & beans cooking on a campfire.
Maybe I just assocoiate the smell with camping & beanie weenies? lol.
Click to expand...

BTW-
I burn mostly oak & maple
 
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