Burning softwoods in modern stoves

[guest5234]

Someone posted this on another woodburning site I am on, anyone agree or dusagree with what he thinks.




quote.
And about buring softwoods? What kind of stove matters a great deal. The problem with their tars and resins is greatest with a controlled burn airtight stove. In a stove that burns very hot with plenty of oxygen the most of the tars and resins will be burnt too. For some examples --- the outside stoves (heating plants) being sold over here can handle softwood as a large periodic fire reheats the thermal store. You don['t run these strapped down. And should be no surprise, but those masonry stoves that are traditional in the lands of the tiaga; they'll handle softwoods with their much higher firebox conditions.

 

[begreen]

In old smoke dragons, if the stove was choked down before the wood had fully outgassed, this is sort of true. You can see it in smoke billowing out of the chimney and by the creosote deposits. But that is not a good way to burn, even in an old stove. FWIW, in the West, most all of the wood is softwood. We burned in older pre-epa stoves for years without serious build up issues. But we never choked down a fresh load of wood and let it smolder. With our old Resolute or the Jotul 602, you could look at the chimney and would rarely see any smoke 15-20 minutes after reloading the stove. And the (interior) flues stayed quite clean.

 

[Slow1]

I don't have enough experience to give a comparison of old vs new since I have only burned in EPA stoves. However, this year I have been burning some soft eastern white pine since the shoulder season started. So far my experience has been excellent. I have not inspected my chimney but I have no reason to believe it is particularly dirty as I have not seen any smoke up the stack during my burns. I have looked up the connector pipe a little bit (I can do so by lifting the lid on top of the stove) and it looks no different than it ever has burning the hardwoods last year.

So what do I conclude from this? Only that well dried softwood can be burned cleanly in my stove and it heats things up which of course is the objective so I'm satisfied. It certainly doesn't hurt that this wood is the least expensive around here (free and often times partially processed to boot). And being a cat stove I am burning it somewhat 'strapped down' but then again, that is what the cat is for - however I do like to keep some flame in the box just for the show if nothing else. I've had crystal clear glass and reasonably long burns (about an hour/split I'd say) burning as I do with this wood.

 

[begreen]

Modern EPA stoves have hotter fireboxes. If the wood is dry, this is a non-issue with the current generation EPA stove unless the stove is run incorrectly into a very cold flue.

 

[Highbeam]

I burn 100% softwood. Well, evergreens and low btu deciduous woods like alder and cottonwood. Any wood will make creosote when "strapped down" but modern stoves do not allow you to run strapped down so this is no longer an issue.

 

[BrotherBart]

Headed for our first freeze and second fire tonight. The two year dried pine and poplar are staged beside the stove awaiting their fate. I burned good dried pine from October to late December last year and the dust in the chimney was indistinguishable from the dust from dry oak.

 

[precaud]

The two year dried pine and poplar are staged beside the stove awaiting their fate.

A moment of silence is in order
For these brave pines and poplars.
And in the silence, one was heard to say,
'Tis nobler to be transformed in the belly of an EPA-compliant stove,
Than to rot on the floor of a forest.

 

[precaud]

And about buring softwoods? What kind of stove matters a great deal. The problem with their tars and resins is greatest with a controlled burn airtight stove.

By using the phrase "airtight stove", the author is dating themself... that was one of the buzzwords of the 70's and 80's. They are not referring to modern low-emissions stoves, most of which are specifically designed NOT to be airtight. And the air systems must be carefully designed to ensure clean combustion.

That said, some stoves do a better job of burning softwoods than others. But mostly it's up to the user to make adjustments when burning softwood to slow down the gassifying process.

 

[John the Painter]

I burn some softwood here and have no problems.With newer stoves you pretty well have to remember the golden rule. Dry wood=Good Wet wood=Bad

 

[Backwoods Savage]

I've burned with old stoves, new stove, air tight stoves, steel stoves, cast stoves and soapstone. I've never been afraid of burning softwoods in any of them. When I was a young lad we used a lot of pine for the wood cook stove so I knew pine was not bad in a stove. We occasionally burned some in the heater stoves and never had a problem. But then, we never had a creosote problem at home. It was a dirty nasty job cleaning the soot from the stove pipes every summer but all we ever had was soot. Some of the neighbors burned a bit differently and had much different results; some with nasty results.