It's the wood, dummy!

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Berone

Member
Sep 17, 2007
132
Peekskill, NY
It seems that all new wood burners with EPA stoves or inserts have trouble and get told the same thing - "your wood isn't seasoned". I also started a thread asking about overnight burns and how to optimize them. Gotta' say "IT'S THE WOOD, DUMMY!!!" I got a load of kiln dried wood yesterday. Last night I got home to a glowing bed of coals that, for the first time since we got the insert, had flames dancing on it. I loaded up the insert before going to bed at 12:30 am. At 7:30 am when I woke up to use the toilet I listened at the top of the stairs and the fan was still going. That's a solid 7 hours at least. By the time I got to the fire at 9:30 the fan was off, but there were still a lot of glowing embers. Not throwing a lot of heat, but if it wasn't 40 degrees out I would have gotten it going with a little kindling. So to anyone fighting the green wood demon but not really believing it could make that big a difference, go to the grocery store or HD and pick up a couple of packs of KD wood. It's expensive (like $6 a bundle) but worth it to see what your stove or insert can do with the right fuel. There's a thread over in the Wood shed where I talk about the deal I got on the wood. (https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/50316/)
 
Yeah I heated with wood for thirty years before I passed through here and got religion on dry wood. It makes one hell of a difference.
 
I must say I agree. Unseasoned wood is the root of many problems. Funny how unseasoned wood always seems to "find" first season burners.

Al
 
ya get it at least a yr in advance minimum season it yourself so there is no problem. best way.....
 
BrotherBart said:
Yeah I heated with wood for thirty years before I passed through here and got religion on dry wood. It makes one hell of a difference.
Click to expand...
Amen, Brother.
 
I've got plenty for the rest of the season and I'll have some left for the beginning of next, so I'll be getting some more within a month or so for next year. Pitty the fool who buys his wood in November.
 
Everything I know about religion I learned from BrotherBart.
 
fossil said:
Everything I know about religion I learned from BrotherBart.
Click to expand...

*gulp*

*cleans my screen*

:lol:
 
I have been burning 2 days now so I am by NO means even slightly in the league with most on the site. I almost held off burning this year even though I got the stove, but I remembered my dad had some 3 year old oak in the back of the pile. I cut it to length and decided to try it. I also bought some bio bricks just to have in case of smoldering and to practice. My dad stopped by to see the stove burning for the first time today and the first thing he said was "There's no smoke coming out of the pipe?" I had a smile on my face thinking seasoned wood.

All I can say is my house is 74* and my kids are in there room with their pajama pant legs rolled up cause they are sweating... After watching truly seasoned wood burn in a stove, my load of 6 month split hissing birch will wait. I would sooner stop burning that fight bad wood.

I will wait a while to be really excited after some practice and learning more about burning. But all I can say is SEASONED WOOD.

From a Burning Newbie
 
“IT’S THE WOOD, DUMMY!!!
I like that.
I've been burning wood since 82, I never considered "is it seasoned"?
One chimney fire, heavy creosote build up, never put 2 & 2 together.
Got NG, & only burned on real cold days/weeks for years. Now NG got higher $, & incentive $ for updating homes, I got a new stove.
Lucky with the new stove, I had nothing but 3 + yr old wood, & it's burning great.
Few times it didn't : “IT’S THE WOOD, DUMMY!!!
I've learned allot on this site.
It's not difficult to take care of your wood "the Right way", you just need to know what "the Right way" is.
Great site, Great info here & a bunch of Great folks willing to share their knowledge, have fun & tell it like it is.
Doing it "Right" is much more fun, than just doing.
 
Ain't it the truth !
I've been burning wood that came down in a Dec 09 ice storm and I later split in June/July 09 - and honestly Ive been wondering if I picked the wrong insert, because the heat output has not completely been as expected.
Last weekend a friend gave me some 3 yr aged Red Oak. WOW, did it burn well and HOT !
Had the temp (top center of insert) up to 500F fast and the stove was really cranking out the btu's.
Obviously it's the wood. Lesson Learned ! Prep wood 2 yrs in advance. ignite, crack a cold beer, sit back and enjoy !
 
BrotherBart said:
Yeah I heated with wood for thirty years before I passed through here and got religion on dry wood. It makes one hell of a difference.
Click to expand...

1st COMMANDMENT - I vow never to burn unseasoned wood.
 
Doing The Dixie Eyed Hustle said:
fossil said:
Everything I know about religion I learned from BrotherBart.
Click to expand...

*gulp*

*cleans my screen*

:lol:
Click to expand...

I apprenticed under The Right Reverend Backwoods Savage at The Church of What's Burning Now. :coolsmirk:

Of course I had to learn how to check chimneys from his wife. I notice that he doesn't mention that anymore. :lol:
 
woodjack said:
BrotherBart said:
Yeah I heated with wood for thirty years before I passed through here and got religion on dry wood. It makes one hell of a difference.
Click to expand...

1st COMMANDMENT - I vow never to burn unseasoned wood.
Click to expand...

This could make its own thread. I think I will start one.
 
BrotherBart said:
woodjack said:
BrotherBart said:
Yeah I heated with wood for thirty years before I passed through here and got religion on dry wood. It makes one hell of a difference.
Click to expand...

1st COMMANDMENT - I vow never to burn unseasoned wood.
Click to expand...

This could make its own thread. I think I will start one.
Click to expand...
2cd commandment I will never use any flammable liquids to get my fire started in the stove
 
BrotherBart said:
woodjack said:
BrotherBart said:
Yeah I heated with wood for thirty years before I passed through here and got religion on dry wood. It makes one hell of a difference.
Click to expand...

1st COMMANDMENT - I vow never to burn unseasoned wood.
Click to expand...

This could make its own thread. I think I will start one.
Click to expand...

I was thinking same thing as I was writing it. Be our wood Moses and start etching those tablets, brother.
 
Okay, pent up rant coming on:

"ya get it at least a yr in advance minimum season it yourself so there is no problem. best way….. "
"I’ve got plenty for the rest of the season and I’ll have some left for the beginning of next, so I’ll be getting some more within a month or so for next year. Pitty the fool who buys his wood in November. "

2nd Commandment: Don't get smug and think people stupid because they didn't buy their wood before they bought their inserts.

The two dealers I dealt with provided zero information on fuel. ZERO!!! They never mentioned the importance of seasoned wood or what truly seasoned wood is. When I called them to see who they recommend as a firewood dealer they didn't have anyone. The success of the product is based entirely on what you put into it and they don't bother to educate their customers and cultivate a vendor that can supply what's needed? Once I started getting a clue the firewood dealers I called couldn't tell me what the moisture content of their wood was - they didn't even know what I was asking them. So I came here looking for answers and for every helpful post there was some arrogant post chastising me for not getting my wood sooner. THANKS!!! THAT'S HELPFUL!!!

Okay, rant over.

I'm very grateful for all the good advice I get here, particularly for the thread that led me to actually getting dry wood this year! Until I burned truly dry wood I honestly didn't understand what people were talking about.
 
Right now there's a bill in the Maine state legislature to use federal funds to retire and scrap old, non EPA stoves for newer efficient ones. I'm sure similar legislation is being considered in other states. No one, however, seems to be looking at the issue of the need for very dry wood to make these stoves operate properly. Long established habits on the part of wood dealers and individuals - "seasoning" for 6 months or even less - just won't work anymore. People who attempt to follow these old habits will wind up frustrated and quite possibly endangering themselves and their new stoves. Of course the ideal is to have your wood and store it for a year or two yourself. For many, though, this is not possible because of insufficient storage space and/or the money to buy two year's of wood at once. There is also a climate issue. I'm pretty sure that even two years of seasoning wouldn't be enough in humid coastal climates like mine to achieve the desired 20% or less moisture content. Kiln dried wood is probably the answer for many people, but I see little evidence of Maine or any other states encouraging its use by loan programs for dealers to build kilns, public education or anything else. The extra cost of a kiln dried cord probably scares many people off, but if they understood how much more efficiently their stoves would run and how much greater the usable btu output from a cord would be, things could quickly change.
 
+1 on seasoned dry wood over here. However, I must make a confession to the wood gods. There are days, when conditions are right where we can mix a combo of seasoned and "less than seasoned wood". I'm talking about those windy cold days when the wind makes a verturi on our chimney (which is not capped on the 8x12 flue). On these days I can burn less than perfect wood just to slow down the burn. This seems to have no effect on smoke or the cats performance-just stretches the burn out for us. The direction of the wind can really make a difference in the strength of the venturi as well-it affected geometry of the chimney and house.

As a side note, on those windy cold days if we burn my "top shelf" dry stuff the stove will cook you out of the room and go north of 82 degrees. So the mix with less seasoned stuff can bring this down to a comfy shorts weather 78 when its 17 outside.
 
BrotherBart said:
Doing The Dixie Eyed Hustle said:
fossil said:
Everything I know about religion I learned from BrotherBart.
Click to expand...

*gulp*

*cleans my screen*

:lol:
Click to expand...

I apprenticed under The Right Reverend Backwoods Savage at The Church of What's Burning Now. :coolsmirk:

Of course I had to learn how to check chimneys from his wife. I notice that he doesn't mention that anymore. :lol:
Click to expand...


My wife was finally able to get up off the floor but still can't walk straight because she is laughing so hard!

I have to go now because I am in the midst of making a new pulpit.




Seriously, it is amazing that so many will never think much about what they are going to burn until it is time to burn it. That just is not going to make it. Get 2 years ahead on wood and quit worrying about creosote. Do keep the chimney cleaned but you will find with good wood that you clean it a whole lot less and your wood will give you a whole lot more heat.
 
Because I wanted to see how much moisture there was in this black cherry that looked bone dry, I stacked quite a bit in my basement den (on cardboard) and stuck a dehumidifier in there. Humidity has been running around 25-30%.
In two weeks, my test piece of cherry has lots 3oz. of water. FYI, that is about 75ml.
That's a lot of water to send up the flue pipe. And it isn't done yet.
Moral- lookin' dry and bein' dry is two different things.


Looking forward to next year.
 
Yup... it's almost always the wood.
 
Troutchaser said:
Moral- lookin' dry and bein' dry is two different things.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I ended an argument with one of the wood dealers when he said "you can tell just by looking at it that it's seasoned".
 
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