The weekend weather finally got cold enough to light the Insert. I bought a Lopi Freedom last February, but due to the mild winter I didn’t get to use it much. My splits were sized (and seasoned) appropriately for my old smoke dragon, so I had limited supplies of suitable wood. Over the Spring and Summer I shortened my long splits, and prioritized hickory that was C/S/S in Feb 2011 and some Cherry from Dec 2011 that was already reading about 18%. Maybe I expected too much, but I was a little disappointed. The hickory was slow to start, and loading N/S resulted in blackened glass. Neither wood maintained secondaries for more than a few minutes when the air was turned down and I felt that I needed a lot of air just to keep the fire going. I was more impressed with some red oak, also from Feb 2011 which I was not even planning to burn this season, it lit easily, and burned hot and long even when the air was turned down low. Is this the nature of hickory, or the lower shoulder-season draft, or a combination of factors?
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