bought a house during the summer and was very excited about the wood burning fireplace in the basement but during inspection noticed cracked flue liner pieces. I wanted to go the wood stove insert route eventually but now i have made it a priority. Will not need this year as it is already spring in Virginia but hasn't stopped me from scrounging as much as I can to start to prepare. Just wanted to say hello, have been exploring the forums for a couple weeks now.
Wood Collection so far...
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bought a house during the summer and was very excited about the wood burning fireplace in the basement but during inspection noticed cracked flue liner pieces. I wanted to go the wood stove insert route eventually but now i have made it a priority. Will not need this year as it is already spring in Virginia but hasn't stopped me from scrounging as much as I can to start to prepare. Just wanted to say hello, have been exploring the forums for a couple weeks now.
Welcome to the forums, glad you joined up! Looks good, nice scenery too. The splits are split pretty thin, not too thick, was there a specific reason for that, maybe so they dry out faster? Or did it just turn out that way....
New to the whole splitting wood thing but trying to get varying sizes. Usually and quartering log, then splitting the quartered piece in half and then splitting once more leaving me with a triangular piece and a rectangular piece. One the big racks have mostly oak with some pine in bottom left corner. And the one up against the brick I am guessing is tulip poplar which I scored over the weekend. Very light and easy to split.
Just keep in mind the smaller splits will burn faster than bigger ones, good idea to mix them up no doubt. I always split kindling, quarter splits and then bigger pieces, they all burn and they all serve their purpose. Looking good !
Ctwoodtick
Minister of Fire
+1.
I think that you were smart to split varying sizes, as you did, given that you will be burining wood that has been drying for one year at first. I have limited space for my wood stacks and at max I can be about 1 to 2 yrs ahead. This forces me to consider how thick to split the denser hardwoods. A ten inch thick split of oak will likely not be dry enough with my set up, for instance. The lesser dense hardwoods are good to go in a year, but I happen to rarely split thicker than 6 or 7 inches anyway. With being a bit south of here, your climate may dry the wood out a bit quicker than me.
DuaeGuttae
Minister of Fire
Welcome.
I just wanted to say that your brick house can help you dry your wood. Our back gets southern and western sun, and we have racks built that allow us to stack wood on almost every non-door and non-window space (small yard in suburbia). We also have smaller stacks on sides and by a fence, but our house racks are our best. The eaves protect from a lot of moisture, and the sun-warmed bricks bake the wood. Softer woods (maple, cherry, tulip, definitely pine) season over a summer, and oak takes two seasons. We don't split huge splits, but as we're getting further ahead we are splitting larger. We've just been processing some pine and deliberately left it pretty big because it's on our best sunny rack, and we don't want too many super dry small pine splits.
Your setup looks very nice. It's good that you're getting wood in place and reading here before getting your stove.
CentralVAWoodHeat
Minister of Fire
Welcome to the weird world of wood burning in Virginia! Lots of species of wood, strange fluctuating temperatures and new learning experiences all the time. You'll never get bored and will always be tweaking your techniques. Case in point, we thought spring was here but next week looks like warm days in the 40's and 50's but in the low 20's at night. I thought we were done burning but it looks like there will still be a fire in the stove each night.
Your stacks look good, now keep up the good work!
Thanks all for the input. I have alot of work yet to do. Stove shopping and trying to figure out how much wood I will need for next burning season. Don't plan on heating the entire house with wood heat being as the stove will be in basement but it should help out heating the lower level and making our electric heating bill a little less cringe worthy every month.
his wood looks about the same size as my splits. I split small so it dries faster. And I have never had an issue I find with the smaller splits I can easily pack the stove much tighter so I fit more weight in each load Packing it tight also limits the amount of airflow which can also extend the burn time.
But if that is all poplar it will burn up fast for sure. That is one of the woods that I dont bother to cut. That and elm but for different reasons.
Finally. Somebody who did not put the cart in front of the horse! Congrats. Good job CSS. Keep it up while you iron out the rest of the details. If you have more than you need after the first year you will then know what it took. if you run out your _crewed and won't know. Keep stacking! And welcome here.
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