kindling wood with lead paint and varnishes on it

[SmokeyCity]

Buddy of mine is a contractor and we trade work for materials. I fix his computers and he gives me a lot of scrap wood. This summer he dumped a bunch of of hardwood and pine floorboards that have paint on them. I cut them up into 1 ft pieces and split them into big slivers for kindling splinters to lay over my crumpled newspaper balls to light my Englanders. He has an old Vogelzang box stove smoke dragon and he burns this stuff all the time and talks about how it really burns hot because of the paints and resins/varnishes that are all over this old flooring. Probably a lot of lead on this wood as well as varnishes and resins.

I like it for kindling because this wood is as dry as a bone and lights up like paper. Occasionally I'll burn a load of big pieces of this stuff and admire the colors that the secondaries display. Like northern lights with pyrotechnics thrown in.

I'm wondering whether the paints and coatings on the wood might be damaging the stainless steel tubes in my Englanders.

Am I hurting my stove by using this stuff as kindling? Am I killing people in my neighborhood with the exhaust coming out of my chimney?

 

[Nick Mystic]

I'd imagine it would be difficult to detect the amount of heavy metals you're emitting into your neighborhood burning this stuff the way you describe. Assuming you are burning a hot fire and are getting clean exhaust out your stack I would think you are polluting less than if this wood ended up in a landfill. Or in your case, it would likely be burned in your friend's smoke dragon where much more emissions likely occur. As for stove damage, I doubt a stove with secondary burn tubes is going to be damaged. I've read comments on how such wood isn't such a good idea to burn if you have a catalytic combustor in your stove as it can damage the combustor. I would do more research on this, however, before I took it as gospel for the small amounts you're talking about.

 

[Simonkenton]

If there is significant lead in that wood, you are creating toxic ashes. I burned a bunch of pressure treated wood 18 years ago, back then pt wood was made with arsenic.
Five years ago I wanted to put a garden in that spot, but I got smart and had the soil tested. It is positive for arsenic in high amounts.
We don't know how much, if any, lead is in that wood but I would be careful with the ashes.

 

[BurnIt13]

Good point on the lead in the ashes. I will be in a similar situation soon as I'll be pulling up the old floorboards that are under my carpet. I planned on burning them but I don't want my kids playing in the dirt where I throw my ashes if they have lead in them.

Your local home depot/lowes sells lead test kits. They are available even cheaper online. You score the paint and put a q-tip thingy on there. If it turns color it has lead in it.

Not all old paint had lead in it.

But I'll echo the OP's original question: Does burning painted/varnished material actually damage the stovepipe like many websites say or is it just a wives tale? Kind of like how burning pine = going straight to hell.

 

[thechimneysweep]

You won't hurt the stove any, but your exhaust will contain lead vapors, which are poisonous.

Lead melts at 621 degrees (F). When lead is molten, it releases poisonous vapors at a progressive rate as temperatures are
increased. Toxic levels of lead vaporization are believed to occur at temperatures above 1800 degrees (F). The secondary burn in
your stove occurs at about 1100 degrees (F), which would produce lead vapors at around half the toxic level. This means a
healthy adult who catches a breath of your chimney outflow won't likely keel over dead on the spot.

The problem is, lead builds up in the human body. Repeated exposure to even non-toxic amounts of lead vapor will eventually
result in buildup to toxic levels.

The bottom line: If you burn that wood, your family and downwind neighbors are at risk of eventually suffering from lead
poisoning.

 

[DougA]

I would test the paint for lead also. Been a long time since there was lead in paint but well worth testing first.