Fireplaces & Firewood

[Safari Dave]

When I was a junior in college, a friend and and I cut enough fire wood to pay for a week-long skiing trip!

There was customer who didn't want it split, because he enjoyed doing it for exercise, but he paid us, just the same.

A Fiskars Splitting Axe is a marvelous tool!


However, different logs require different splitting tools.


It's worth it to have several options, until you have can afford to have something that can split anything!

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Being able to split, otherwise "unsplittable" forked logs is easy with a hydraulic wood splitter.

And, if you can't get gasoline, get a whole bunch of manual tools. As far as manual tools go, there is no "silver bullet," different woods/logs require different tools for best results.


I enjoy manually splitting logs, with my Fiskars, as long as I don't have to chase pieces of wood through the forest.


An old tire can fix that problem:

 

[Tintin]

Locust is just an ok wood for making Self bows.

IMHO . In the U.S., Osage is the King of bow woods. English Yew is second and Pacific Yew is third. I’ve made bows from Mulberry, Locust, bamboo backed cherry, yew, on and on.

A bow can be made from any wood but It just needs a different design, lesser woods need longer and wider limbs. And they are still not as efficient as Osage or Yew.

Left is pacific yew. Bamboo over cherry. Then static tip rawhide backed Osage

Sturgeon backed Cherry. Snake backed osage.

Love the bows.

Also very impressive 'thread creep'

I never would have envisioned a fireplace thread would end up with a display of beautiful bows!

Well done.

 

[Altitude sickness]

I agree it was quite a left turn at Albuquerque. The topic of not burning locust because it’s too good of bow making wood came up. I like to demonstrate my bonafides on the subject. That I am not throwing out BS :>)))

 

[Tintin]

It's some of those 'left turns' that make this place what it is.

 

[Fatback]

Down here in South Georgia, I mainly burn oak, cherry and pecan wood. Try to season it for at least a year before burning it.

Due to the last couple years of hurricanes in our area, there has been no shortage of downed trees to cut up. Like many, we love having a fire and it does a pretty good job of keeping our great room nice and warm on damp, dreary days.

Had some pretty cold weather, for us, over the Thanksgiving holiday and we pretty much kept a fire going.

 

[thriller]

Locust is just an ok wood for making Self bows.

IMHO . In the U.S., Osage is the King of bow woods. English Yew is second and Pacific Yew is third. I’ve made bows from Mulberry, Locust, bamboo backed cherry, yew, on and on.

A bow can be made from any wood but It just needs a different design, lesser woods need longer and wider limbs. And they are still not as efficient as Osage or Yew.View attachment 729733

Left is pacific yew. Bamboo over cherry. Then static tip rawhide backed Osage
View attachment 729734

Sturgeon backed Cherry. Snake backed osage.
View attachment 729736
View attachment 729737

That snake skin one is awesome! In fact they all look great!

 

[Rimbaud]

It's a great book.

View attachment 729885

A Reverence for Wood was recommended to me by a woodworker friend. Fun read, and worth reading, too.

 

[CJW]

A Reverence for Wood was recommended to me by a woodworker friend. Fun read, and worth reading, too.

I'll look into it.

 

[rookhawk]

Hello chaps.

Winter is well and truly upon us here in WI, so my mind has turned to firewood.

My fireplace is mostly an aesthetic thing. I like the appearance, the smell, the noise, and the coziness, but realistically it isn't a primary heating source. It's a fairly large, totally open grate fireplace with an excellent draw. To be perfectly honest it's probably pulling as much heat up the chimney as it's putting into the room. The advantages of old, brick built Tudor-revival style houses.

I muddled through the last couple of winters purchasing bundles from the gas station on an ad-hoc basis, which worked fine, but this year I'm thinking I want to use my fireplace a bit more regularly and should probably buy some wood in bulk.

A few questions to those with more experience with that.

Firstly, how much is a reasonable quantity to last a season, assuming a couple burns a week, call it 4-6 hours each? I'm thinking a 1/4 cord should be sufficient? This is WI, so I'm using it now, and I'll still want to use it in late March.

Do you have specific recommendations on type of wood I should consider? Oak seems a default choice, but open to Cherry, Hickory, or whatever if it's worth it. Again, smelling nice, looking pretty is as important as actual heat output, but it does need to chuck out enough to make the room feel cozy. I'm happy to do some tending of it, but something that'll last a little while without stacking on more logs would be welcome. Price isn't really a factor, I'm not using much and there doesn't seem to be meaningful differences either way.

Where are you guys storing your wood, and do you have a recommendation on a storage frame or similar? I can set something up in the basement, or outside, and am happy to spend a few hundred bucks for a convenient solution. I'll probably buy kiln dried stuff for the most part, so bugs etc shouldn't be an issue if storing inside.

Cheers!

We use our fireplace in frigid Wisconsin with some frequency. We go through about a face cord a year. We never buy firewood because we always have enough downed trees on the property to buck up and split each year.

My favorite is Cherry because it burns clean, smells great, and I can also use it in my smoker for a delicious BBQ flavor.

Oak is another great wood for your fireplace. So is Maple.

Things to never burn: Basswood, Cottonwood, any conifers or softwoods, Walnut, Piss Elm, Popple (quaking aspen), weeping willow.

There are plenty of local firewood suppliers that will deliver wood for you. I seem to recall a face cord runs about $300-$500 delivered.

 

[DaddyFlip]

There are plenty of local firewood suppliers that will deliver wood for you. I seem to recall a face cord runs about $300-$500 delivered.

I hope you mean a FULL cord at that price.

 

[Flbt]

I have not been in a house that used wood in years.
But y’all talking 1/2 and 1/3 cords even in fl we went through a lot of wood
In the houses and camps that used fireplace.
My grate grandfathers house had 3 fire places a potbelly stove and a wood cook stove.

But I guess the difference in the amount of wood use in fl. Was they normally were the only heat source . And most of the old house that were like that were clap bord ruff cut lumber with no insulation at all.

Any way we burned about any hard wood that fell
I like the way pecan and wildcherry smell together

 

[rookhawk]

I hope you mean a FULL cord at that price.

Sadly, I don't think so. There are restrictions on moving wood between counties and more expense for delivery and stacking. It can be expensive in WI.

I just checked. A cherry face cord, not including delivery is around $250.

 

[DaddyFlip]

Sadly, I don't think so. There are restrictions on moving wood between counties and more expense for delivery and stacking. It can be expensive in WI.

I just checked. A cherry face cord, not including delivery is around $250.

Goodness! I just checked three services around me for FULL cords:

• $340 delivered (won't stack)
• $420 delivered and stacked
• $500 delivered or $580 delivered and stacked

Everyone on FB is advertising $60-$120 a face cord with several having more than one cord available.

 

[CJW]

Sadly, I don't think so. There are restrictions on moving wood between counties and more expense for delivery and stacking. It can be expensive in WI.

I just checked. A cherry face cord, not including delivery is around $250.

Oak, maple, birch, or a mix will run $230-300/full cord in WI. I've paid $250 delivered the last two years. Cherry would be much more specialized but practically no one will seek out only cherry just for firewood. Face cords run $80-100. Popal/Aspen will be $200 or so per cord.

 

[CJW]

Things to never burn: Basswood, Cottonwood, any conifers or softwoods, Walnut, Piss Elm, Popple (quaking aspen), weeping willow.

Assuming it's properly dried, I'm wondering what you think is wrong with each of those species. Are you speaking of open fireplaces specifically?

The pitch from the conifers I understand but big pines can have a lot of usable wood and even if there's some pitch, with a good hot fire, especially when mixed with dry hardwood is fine. Discard the fatwood or use for firestarter.

 

[rookhawk]

Assuming it's properly dried, I'm wondering what you think is wrong with each of those species. Are you speaking of open fireplaces specifically?

The pitch from the conifers I understand but big pines can have a lot of usable wood and even if there's some pitch, with a good hot fire, especially when mixed with dry hardwood is fine. Discard the fatwood or use for firestarter.

Just out of an abundance of caution. A lot of people defer chimney sweeping for decades. If you're paying good money for wood, rather than splitting your own and using up a bit of the nasty stuff in a blend, you might as well get good BTU hardwood that burns clean.

 

[CJW]

Just out of an abundance of caution. A lot of people defer chimney sweeping for decades. If you're paying good money for wood, rather than splitting your own and using up a bit of the nasty stuff in a blend, you might as well get good BTU hardwood that burns clean.

Free, paid for, low BTU or high, softwood or hard, it all can build creosote and needs to be dry before you burn it. I'm sure there are plenty of guys selling, "well seasoned" hardwood firewood that's rocking a 50%+ moisture content too.

The softer, lower BTU woods are great for getting fires going and shoulder season.

You definitely need to be careful with what you burn.

 

[375Fox]

Free, paid for, low BTU or high, softwood or hard, it all can build creosote and needs to be dry before you burn it. I'm sure there are plenty of guys selling, "well seasoned" hardwood firewood that's rocking a 50%+ moisture content too.

The softer, lower BTU woods are great for getting fires going and shoulder season.

You definitely need to be careful with what you burn.

Burning hot prevents creosote too. I try to limit closing the damper except before bed so I can have coals in the morning. I’d rather control the heat with amount of wood than the damper. I haven’t cleaned my stove pipe in years. There’s no buildup.

 

[baxterb]

I certainly miss burning oak back home in Va. We would cut it a year ahead and always had a great supply. As a matter of fact we used a Riteway wood stove to heat our 2600 sq ft log house we built. My dad would load it up on his way out the door, then again when he got home. I never remember being cold.

 

[Betterinthebush]

Rutland makes a creasote remover.

Pitch in a scoop every month once a month. The chimney, regardless of construction (terracotta flu or SS), Interrior pipes, stove walls, firebrick and fireplace walls with clinging creosote tar will dry and flake rendering it inert until spring shutdown cleaning.