COLD WOOD

[nshif]

Do any of us really live where its that cold outside? after all its not Siberia

 

[BrotherBart]

Do any of us really live where its that cold outside? after all its not Siberia

I think Eric Johnson lives in Siberia:

"One time when it was 40 below, I boiled a pan of water on the stove and then got the kids away from the TV long enough to demonstrate what happens when you toss a boiling pan of water out into -40 temps. It kind of explodes. Neat. Another time a colleague came back from a trip to Japan and gave me a liter of Sapparo beer in an aluminum bottle with a screw-on cap. After I finished the beer, the kids and I heated the vessel up on the gas range, put the cap on tight, and tossed it out into the cold. Pretty cool implosion. We’re talking redneck Mr. Science, here.

Before I had the luxury of a garage, it was pretty entertaining to take the battery out of our Mazda 626 every night when it was cold, so that we could get to work the next morning. One morning it was so cold out that the pressure in the propane tank disappeared. No morning coffee that day."

 

[begreen]

Yes, and Willhound lives way north of him!

 

[jpl1nh]

Yeah, I admit to being that anal too. I think warm wood burns more readily than cold wood. Yes the stove warms it in the room instead of warming it in the stove and I'm sure it takes the same amount of BTUs either way. But with a cat stove I too would be concerned about thermal shock. I load up my stove for the morning, then go and bring in whatever is necessary to refill the wood holder to full putting the new wood behind the already warm wood. I work very hard at keeping snow and rain off my dry wood because I certainly would prefer not to put wet wood in my stove.

 

[North of 60]

@-40 to -50F Ill gladly take it from inside the house. That is if Ican get it in before the cold snap. And I mean "SNAP" :bug:

 

[Gooserider]

I keep the wood in a shed so as to prevent significant amounts of snow or rain, but also bring in about a day or two's worth at a time - this is not normally enough time to let any bugs wake up and start exploring, but does let the wood warm up some and reduce the risk of thermal shock to the stove. I would say the big threshold on thermal shock is whether the wood is above or below freezing, as even "seasoned" wood has some moisture in it, and there is a big energy requirement to melt any frozen moisture, but once melted the energy requirement is pretty linear.

Gooserider

 

[Jags]

On a "typical" 0 degree day, the difference in temp from outside wood vs inside (say 70 degrees) is.......70 degrees. Now setting snow, moisture aside, does anyone really think that throwing 20 pounds of wood that has a 70 degree differential into a 600 pound stove that is purring at 500-600 degrees is gonna make a darn bit of difference? I suppose that if you had a bunch of fancy electronic testing gear, it could be measured, but to us humans, I doubt that it could be detected for over 5 seconds, if detected at all. I know that when I toss cold splits onto the fire, they basically ignite on contact.

But I do totally understand the "convenience" point of view.