Kiln vs Seasoned Wood

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Markie123

Member
Jan 12, 2018
28
Orange,Ct
Is the price of Kiln wood worth the purchase versus buying seasoned wood. What would be the pros and the cons of the two. I would like you guys opinion.
 
Not to me. I would buy green at the cheapest price going and stack it for a couple of years.

But how much of a price diff are you talking? Likely the main variable is how 'seasoned' the 'seasoned' stuff actually is. But if it is truly adequately seasoned, I don't see much advantage to kilned. Unless there is a bug angle to this.
 
Also dont assume the "kiln dried" stuff is actually dry. Most of it is just run long enough to kill any bugs not long enough to actually dry it.

The same goes for seasoned wood most of it isnt ready to burn either
 
Why purchas kiln dry wood now.. your in the northeast.. burning season is almost over. Purchase the seasoned wood or green wood and season it yourself.. not shore why your going through the expense of kiln dry wood at the beginning of April.. can you tell me the purpose.. are we missing somthing...
 
There is a firewood processing company around here who sells KD off cuts. Their business is those 1 cubic foot bundles you see in the store. 700 cords a year, 1 cubic foot at a time. Part of their biz model is using off cuts from the logs or really ugly pieces as fuel to run their kilns. At times, they have too much of this and sell it cheap - I think something like $220 or $225 per cord. Round these parts green cords are around $200 and "seasoned" are 240. So oddly enough the price is inbetween. I picked up 2 cords last winter as a way to get ahead on my wood, that put me in a nice place where I've always got two years of wood CSS. Or more.

I've burned through about 1.5 cords in both a Hearthstone H2 and, after I got it installed, the Froling wood boiler. What I can say about burning this KD wood is:

1) too small - that is too much surface area,
2) very dry, unlike other's comments to the contrary. I split open a piece when it arrived and got a single digit number. It's probably come up a bit since then.
3) PITA to stack. All odd shapes. Ended up making a pallet crib two by two pallets, with pallet vertical ends and threw a bunch in the middle after stacking a row on the outside to hold it all in.

So, FWIW It was very hard to control the burn when burning this in the H2. Yea, the stove is old and has some air leaks, but I've been on top of them and the behavior of the stove with this stuff compared to, say 18% red oak (2 years CSS) was night and day. Full size KD splits might be better, but if the KD is really KD, it's really dry. Requires a really tight appliance to burn it without running away.

My 2 cents...
 
There is a firewood processing company around here who sells KD off cuts. Their business is those 1 cubic foot bundles you see in the store. 700 cords a year, 1 cubic foot at a time. Part of their biz model is using off cuts from the logs or really ugly pieces as fuel to run their kilns. At times, they have too much of this and sell it cheap - I think something like $220 or $225 per cord. Round these parts green cords are around $200 and "seasoned" are 240. So oddly enough the price is inbetween. I picked up 2 cords last winter as a way to get ahead on my wood, that put me in a nice place where I've always got two years of wood CSS. Or more.

I've burned through about 1.5 cords in both a Hearthstone H2 and, after I got it installed, the Froling wood boiler. What I can say about burning this KD wood is:

1) too small - that is too much surface area,
2) very dry, unlike other's comments to the contrary. I split open a piece when it arrived and got a single digit number. It's probably come up a bit since then.
3) PITA to stack. All odd shapes. Ended up making a pallet crib two by two pallets, with pallet vertical ends and threw a bunch in the middle after stacking a row on the outside to hold it all in.

So, FWIW It was very hard to control the burn when burning this in the H2. Yea, the stove is old and has some air leaks, but I've been on top of them and the behavior of the stove with this stuff compared to, say 18% red oak (2 years CSS) was night and day. Full size KD splits might be better, but if the KD is really KD, it's really dry. Requires a really tight appliance to burn it without running away.

My 2 cents...
That's good wood to have in hand, nice and dry although the price is right. If it's the place in thinking of, I'd buy some every year to be in their good graces but build up my own pile to get it seasoned.