I give up on Oak.

Oct. 2009 till now is 2 yrs. you just need 1 more yr. unless your splits are giant size. First yr. I burned 6 month Oak c/s/s/ real small kept my house warm without the help of my furnace, which was my goal for new stove.

Your in a wet area like me. And seeing similar results from Oak like me. Probably the nicest but rarest to find is Hickory. Its dries pretty fast and will make a nice hot fire. Osage Orange, or OO as I call it is real easy to get, is more dense than Oak and will season much faster.

If it takes that long to dry oak. How do wood sellers ever sell it and call it seasoned? I don't know of any wood sellers who sit on wood for 2 or 3 years before they sell it "seasoned". :smirk: I have never bought Oak and would be hesitant to do so. I have never had the opportunity to cut it. Don't have any available. Listening to all you folks talk about the process of getting it dry sounds like I will be okay without it.

For next years wood, I am having 5 face cord of White Ash delivered Saturday. I made a little money on a small side job and can afford to buy it right now. This will save me a lot of time that I can then spend with the family. I have cut and blocked about 5-6 face cord, of White Ash and Pine, part time over that last 4 or 5 days off of my families land. I am waiting to split and stack the wood when I have about 10 face cord blocked up. It will be nice to stack up that five face cord, that is already cut and split, that gets dumped in the yard right next to where I am going to stack it. :exclaim: I have to find another small side job.

Yep. I don't have room in my yard to let it sit long enough in this wet climate. I'll take a certain amount if the tree guy's dropping it off, but I prefer wood that actually seasons. Dry Oak does indeed burn like nothing else, but I'd rather reload Pine more often than wait 3 years for Oak

I used to split it and read in several places on the fresh splt and note the highest reading. Now I take four readings on the split face. One near each end and two near the middle. Then I average them. I think it gives me a better idea of the overall mc of the split.

I'm not really sure I know what the best way to get the most perfect average for the entire split, but the point is that measuring the wettest place on the split doesn't take into account the fact that at least part of the split has dried out quite a bit.

How did you measure yours, Dave?

I age my oak (red and white) as little as 18 months. I don't have a moisture meter and I just go by how it burns. Lites up fast, no smoke in the stack after the secondaries kick in. I get plenty of sun and wind where I have the stacks.

stejus said:

I age my oak (red and white) as little as 18 months. I don't have a moisture meter and I just go by how it burns. Lites up fast, no smoke in the stack after the secondaries kick in. I get plenty of sun and wind where I have the stacks.

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Thats my results with my Burr Oak, for the life of me I dont understand why some people have such bad luck with it. Has been my main wood for 30 years.

oldspark said:

stejus said:

I age my oak (red and white) as little as 18 months. I don't have a moisture meter and I just go by how it burns. Lites up fast, no smoke in the stack after the secondaries kick in. I get plenty of sun and wind where I have the stacks.

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Thats my results with my Burr Oak, for the life of me I dont understand why some people have such bad luck with it. Has been my main wood for 30 years.

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I have to agree with the 18 months. I run a furnace so I alway try to keep that in mind.(I can burn bricks) Full sun and lots of wind.

Must be drier here too cause I dont remember ever having to wait more than 2 yrs for any of my Red,Black,White or Bur Oak to be dry enough to burn well.Its roughly 70% of what I burn every year.

Close to 1/2 is ready within 18 months,the remainder either less or a bit more.That’s whether it was a standing snag,deadfall or the (rare) live one cut in spring or summer. Single rows sure helps a great deal,once its ready the shed gets filled first (about 4 cords roughly) any remainder stays outside uncovered.

We do get quite a bit of wind at times in the Spring & Summer,3-4 days in a row isnt uncommon.Fall & Winter are quieter,except for the occasional storm.

good thread...

i too love burning oak and usually burn it after it seasons for 1 year (split now, uncovered for winter and one hot summer, cover it in the autumn and burn it next winter. is there occasionally some moisture in it? hell, i don't care. it bakes my woodstove and heats my house. i don't own a moisture meter, and for me, maybe that's a good thing cuz then my wife would really be worried. i'd be out there probing every piece of firewood and sorting them based on moisture content.

OT

me and oak get along real well, white oak, red oak, and chestnut oak, split, sittin' pretty in the stack for 3 years, ahhhhhhhhhhh!

Much, much wetter here than where most of you are.

madrone said:

Much, much wetter here than where most of you are.

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You might get more rainy days (although not this year) but we get more annual rainfall I think. You guys get alot of mist on the west coast am I right. We get soakers.

daveswoodhauler said:

Funny, I usually never get oak...so when 2 oaks came down in December of 2008 at my grandparents I jumped on top of it.
So, the trees were cut in Spring of 2009, split and stacked single rows in October 2009. (In the sun)
OK, just grabbed a split out and resplit..checked with my moisture meter and it was reading 34%.....lol
Checked some maple and ash I have, and they were reading 18-20% when resplit.
I'm done with this oak stuff....it might keep a fire going a long time, but I don't have 4 years to sit and wait to let it get below 25% lol
Maybe its just this northeast climate...telling my wood guy next time that he can keep all the oak for someone else.
Burn on folks

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Are you keeping the rain off?

Nothing dried in New England or the Northeast in general this year.

You are so correct mech. Up here in New England it is all snow and rain... Oh ya what's that song?

Most of what I burn is red and white oak. I've found 2 summers of drying to be ideal, although I've burned it as soon as 6 months (one summer, which I hope never to have to do again). There is no question that it needs to be in a decent drying location. Otherwise I can see needing to wait 3 or more years like some people say. Of course, size of split matters a great deal. I don't leave many much larger than about 4"x6", and the average length is about 18".

Yer correct, of course, Oak is just no good. Being the nice guy I am, I'll help ya . . . gather up all that oak and drop it of over hear. I'll get rid of it 4 ya.

In my opinion you have to top cover oak to get it to dry. i have tried it covered and not covered and there is no comparison I'm not sure I could even get it dry with out a top cover.

ive given up on everything non-oak im down to 15 cords of 3 year old oak right now. Love the stuff! secret is never cover the tops and let nature do its thing for 3 years.

daveswoodhauler said:

Wow, lots of posts on this one.

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lol all over the place too. Love it/hate it. Top cover as soon as its split/don't top cover it at all. 18 months good to go/never dries. Oak seems to have a lot in common with recent politics.

daveswoodhauler said:

Wow, lots of posts on this one.
I take 3 or 4 splits and resplit them...take a few measurements from the middle of the splits...most come out within 1% or so of each other.
I top cover as well all my stacks, but I guess my issue is that perhaps ne side of the stack gets full sun, but not the back side. (Just don't have too much room in my yard to have the sun hit each side without being in the dog house)
Oh well, I'll just leave the oak to the side and put it away for next year...I'll post back here in Nov 2012 and see if its in the 25% or below range, lol.

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I takes along time, but it is so worth the wait.

Split it as soon as you can, stack it covered on top and off the ground, if you can put a vapor barrier on the ground under your shed or drying rows, all the better.
I can cut green oak in the summer, split and stack in the shed the following spring, and burn it starting in November. No hissing, popping, or creosote problems, and I don't own a moisture meter.
I live in the northeast and burn 95% oak. The biggest thing that helped me was removing the pallets that were used for a floor in my shed.
I covered the ground with heavy plastic and built a framed floor covered with plywood. Most people don't realize the amount of moisture that comes out of the ground.
Sure there is benefit to airflow but reducing the humidity directly under the split and stacked wood works wonders.
I don't bother to stack drying rows after splitting and then move it all again in the fall to my shed, it all goes in the shed by the end of April to dry for the next burn season.