first fire in newmac furnace last night, need advice...

[CowboyAndy]

I got a fire going in the new newmac forced air furnace last night just to get used to it. I finally got one going, but it took me 45 min. I tried the "teepee" method, but if I used regular paper it would go out and if I used newspaper it burned out before lighting the kindeling. Any advice?

 

[jebatty]

While I don't know anything about your furnace, I use the following method to start wood fires, whether it be in the stove, my Tarm boiler, or the campfire.

Start with small kindling, 3-4 layers loosely criss-crossed, any bypass damper open, firebox door ajar, any draft fan on. I use the top down fire starting method. 2-4 newspaper rolls, knotted, laid in a bunch on top.

When this is burning well, add small splits to fill the firebox about 1/4 full, and let this get burning well. Total time to this point should be no more than 5-15 minutes.

Now fill the firebox. I put smaller splits in first, and then larger and heavier ones at the top, going from smaller to larger until the firebox is full. Maybe do a little slight angular loading of some pieces to maximize air contact with wood.

Once a fire has been going, and so long as it is not out, generally you just can add wood as needed to keep the home fires burning.

 

[cricco]

I use a hand held propane torch.

 

[matt701]

I use the fire starter bricks from walmart ($9). I think you get about 32 of them in a box and I break them in half and it works a lot better than paper, will burn about 15 minutes and get your fire going. Just put one of them under your tepee and open the ash door or damper all the way until your fire is going pretty good.

 

[jebatty]

Help me understand a good reason to buy fire starting anything when a person can start a fire in the wood stove/furnace/boiler for free with a couple of rolled newspaper knots? Why use a propane torch when a match works? Is it lack of a skill that can be learned in one minute? or laziness? or ignorance? or do too many of us still have too much money not evaporated in the financial meltdown that we can afford to burn it up?

Maybe I'm "cheap" or maybe I am one of the few that still think a penny saved is a penny earned. Regardless of the consumption and spend culture that permeates US society, I will cast my vote for common sense, frugality, savings, and investment.

 

[matt701]

I can start 72 fires for $9 which to me is worth not messing around with newspaper (Which I would have to subscribe to get). I used newspaper for a year until I found the fire starting blocks. I guess everyone has their own opinion and I don't think there's any need to get personal or throw insulting comments around.

 

[jebatty]

I don’t think there’s any need to get personal or throw insulting comments around.

My comment certainly was not intended as such, and I am very open to the thoughts of others. See the following post for a follow-up:

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/25031/

 

[Huskurdu]

Someone showed me a little trick with dryer lint, paper egg carton and old candle wax.....you put the lint in the egg carton holes then melt the wax in a pan and pour it over the lint. They light easily and burn for quite a while. My friends use these all the time to start fires at the campground......I always wondered what to do with the lint in my belly button!!???

 

[Nickolai]

I too have a newmac, it's a wood/oil combo and I just fired it up for the first time a couple weeks ago. It's a bit of a pain to light, I've messed with the damper, and had the fan on/off...I found that the best way was to just start with really small bits of wood and I also use the egg carton/lint combo, i find it works excellent. But my furnace is finicky to say the least.

 

[CowboyAndy]

Well, here we are 2 weeks later and things have changed a bit...

After doing some research on firestarting, I discovered the "top down" method, where I put 3 bigger logs/splits on the very bottom, then 4 or 5 smaller peices with a small gap in the middle, then a few pieces of kindling across, light a brick and voila!

 

[henfruit]

birch bark is the best fire starter there is. burns very hot,and catches every time.

 

[Duetech]

With my wood furnace I used thin strips of oak or resinous pine slivers and selected "ideal" pieces of firewood for making kindling. There may be another problem with the fire though and that is moisture and draft. Wood size has been mentioned but more indirectly but it sounds that there is reluctance in the stove itself as far as draft is concerned. If the draft is balky and the moisture in the wood too high and the pieces too big for quick ignition there will be a slow fire. In my current situation, a boiler with a combustion door, just below my arm pit, that's high for my vertical challenge and my arm is too short to reach the kindling pile. To make things worse most of my kindling is now chunks of dried bark collected from where I make my splits. Paper won't work unless I burn a lot of it so I use ignition aides. I don't feel I've done ancestral "rite" wrong. I bet cavemen would have used a Bic if they had one. If I feel guilty I guess I can get a sharp stick start a campfire and roast a brat. At least that way I can feel primitive. You know something that goes along with my looks?! Ugh!! ...Cave2k

 

[glacialhills]

I use a few sheets of un coated paper I receive daily in my mailbox. It's so nice of the credit card companies to send fire starting paper to me every day. The fine print/terms paper is tops. I hope now that they have stopped lending to anyone(biggest lie that cost us billions) I wont have to find another source. But luckily I just seem to keep getting them.....sheeeew thank goodness.

 

[laynes69]

I get paraffin from work thats in 5 gallon buckets for free. I mix shredded pine cone and sawdust. Compress them and cut in squares. They are free and can burn up to 45 minutes at a time.