This will be my first winter burning wood so forgive me for the novice questions! My buddy just lost 6 maple trees last night to a hellish wind storm. I have read btu charts and I know that maple is far from oak but isn't free wood (other than pine) always worth taking? It splits easily, everything cut to 18", it is as easy as driving 1 mile and throwing it on the truck. Thoughts?
Is Maple good to burn?
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Excellent free wood !!
Don't miss a stick of this......... ;-)
You'll like how it burns I think.
Robbie
Don't miss a stick of this......... ;-)
You'll like how it burns I think.
Robbie
If they just came down last night, I figure its ready to burn NEXT season, very good wood but takes a while to season.
myzamboni said:
Nada damn thing. Three cords of it are just waiting to keep my office warm this winter.
castiron said:
Wish my wood customers would believe this. They are convinced that your house will burn down if you throw 1 stick of pine in the stove.
In the land where hard woods are plentiful many believe that softwoods are the worst thing you could put in your stove, as did I before I came here.
What kind of Maple? Sugar or Black is right up there with Oak as far as BTU's go. The other so called soft maples like red and silver have less btu per cord but still heat the house. Go for it!
Free wood is good wood, and there is nothing wrong with maple of any sort. We have lots of swamp maples in our yard that are slowly coming down as I decide they are to rotten in the base for safety - it's not as good as Oak, but is still good enough that I would consider it almost as good. If paying for wood, I'd prefer to pay for oak, but willingly pay almost as much for maple.
However if he just lost the trees, you should figure it is NEXT winter wood, not this years. At best don't think of burning it before Feb or so, and then only if you get it cut and split ASAP and follow very good drying practices.
Pine is faster burning, and has fewer BTU's per split, but if it's seasoned properly and burned in a modern stove, won't produce any more creosote than any other wood (some folks will even claim it's cleaner because it burns hotter)
Gooserider
However if he just lost the trees, you should figure it is NEXT winter wood, not this years. At best don't think of burning it before Feb or so, and then only if you get it cut and split ASAP and follow very good drying practices.
Pine is faster burning, and has fewer BTU's per split, but if it's seasoned properly and burned in a modern stove, won't produce any more creosote than any other wood (some folks will even claim it's cleaner because it burns hotter)
Gooserider
All I have on my 3 acres is white pine. I would love to split and burn it, but have heard over and over ....and over..to almost never use it. From what you all say, as long as I get the chimney swept every season I can burn it ?
Boy some people are spoiled. Pine & spruce is our golden wood. Birch if we can find it. Poplar for spring & fall. Pine heats my house most of the winter. If I can heat my house with it in our conditions I think your maple is going to be A OK. 
11 Bravo said:
Exactly, lots of folks on the Hearth burn pine or spruce because it's what they have. You should get your chimney cleaned every season no matter what you are burning, so I would say that even more key than the sweeping is to make SURE that the wood is well seasoned and properly dried as that is the secret to preventing creosote - you have to get the stove up to secondary combustion temps and keep it there, which is much harder to do if you are wasting a lot of your heat in drying out the wood.
Gooserider
I just picked up some African Fern Pine (Podocarpus gracilior). It seems to be much harder than the run-of-the-mill (no pun intended) pine. I have no idea how it will burn, but I'll find out next year.
11 Bravo said:
The best way to burn it would be to mix it with hardwoods. When you do burn softer woods you want to watch the temps of the stove, that stuff burns hot and fast.
I think pine has a bad rap around here, because it takes off and burns so fast and hot that most people choke down their stove too soon and that produces more smoke and more creosote, especially in pre EPA stoves. It's more of an operator error than the wood. Burn what you have available.
Maple is one of the best woods there is. Soft Maple (silver and red) are wonderful since they split easy and season in a year. Hard maple (sugar) is a high btu wood that doesn't split quite as easy as the soft, but has more BTU/lb. Again, season's well, and is relatively easy to split. Free maple is almost a good as free ash.
On the Pine front... I find that knowing when to burn pine is helpful. I tend to burn it in the early evening when I can tend the stove more often. I like pine to get a fast fire in the morning and the early evening, as it tends to have a shorter coal stage than the hardwoods. Shorter coal stage means less coal buildup during periods of high heat requirements, so you don't have a huge coal bed prior to overnight loading.
If all I had was pine, I'd look to be burning it in a high mass large stove like a large Soapstone stove.
From all I've read, today's stoves burn pine so completely that creosote isn't a problem I burned about 1.5 cords of pine last year and the chimney cap doesn't seem to have any more buildup than the previous year when I burned no pine. You do have to be careful, as I've had several fires with pine that looked like the stove was going to explode. The stove seems no worse for wear, but you can get some pine that essentially releases i't's wood gas very quickly and can over fire the stove.
If wood is free... burn it.
On the Pine front... I find that knowing when to burn pine is helpful. I tend to burn it in the early evening when I can tend the stove more often. I like pine to get a fast fire in the morning and the early evening, as it tends to have a shorter coal stage than the hardwoods. Shorter coal stage means less coal buildup during periods of high heat requirements, so you don't have a huge coal bed prior to overnight loading.
If all I had was pine, I'd look to be burning it in a high mass large stove like a large Soapstone stove.
From all I've read, today's stoves burn pine so completely that creosote isn't a problem I burned about 1.5 cords of pine last year and the chimney cap doesn't seem to have any more buildup than the previous year when I burned no pine. You do have to be careful, as I've had several fires with pine that looked like the stove was going to explode. The stove seems no worse for wear, but you can get some pine that essentially releases i't's wood gas very quickly and can over fire the stove.
If wood is free... burn it.
Absolutlely Not
You shouldn't burn it at all. You should just give it to us to burn for you ;-P
Seriuosly, It's great wood, especially for the price.
As for the Pine banter, I have used it for years with no trouble at all.
You shouldn't burn it at all. You should just give it to us to burn for you ;-P
Seriuosly, It's great wood, especially for the price.
As for the Pine banter, I have used it for years with no trouble at all.
I'm a bit of a hardwood snob, and when I bought loads of logs, I would get pretty bummed if they contained much red (soft) maple. If you look at the charts, it's far below the best species, such as beech, red and white oak, hickory, ash, yellow birch and hard (sugar) maple. However, I agree that free wood is the best wood, and any hardwood is probably better than any softwood. Not that there's anything wrong with softwood, if that's what you have to burn. It all depends on where you live and what you have available.
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