Moisture meter

  • Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.

    We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.

    We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
  • Hope everyone has a wonderful and warm Thanksgiving!
  • Super Cedar firestarters 30% discount Use code Hearth2024 Click here
Status
Not open for further replies.

archer292

New Member
Hearth Supporter
Jan 3, 2008
72
LI NY
I have an extech m0210 which is not by any means an expensive meter. I just read the "Am I being taken for a ride" post and read how 40% is a live tree???? I have red oak that has been split and stacked in an HH for months and the moisture reading after splitting it again is at 42 %. The meter manual claims accurate to 44% but will read well over. Is my meter bad????? Can someone give me an idea of what freshly cut oak should read??
 
archer I don't know jack about those meters but I remember when you did your HH's and that wood has to be ready to burn imo. Here's what ya do, have an established small camp fire going and place one of your questionable logs on it and observe for moisture coming out the cut ends and also look for popping sparks.

Try that with a couple/3 of your HH logs over 90 minutes or so if there's no leakage or spitting/poping sparks you're good to go this winter.

Why hell, LI is almost tropical compare to CNY.
 
oak will take a year or more to season
 
^whoops. You're right I forgot about that.
 
Hey savage, I wound up with three of the HHs and was just charging the camera to take some pics to post in the new HH thread. Believe it or not I tried the fire test yesterday with horrible results. Smoke!!!!!! that's it, just smoke. The wood in the third one came from a guy who had it sitting for a year in log form. White oak, I split it and stacked it just after the other two. I figured it would be good to go this up comming season. I just split a piece and took a reading, 54% in the middle. Red oak cut a year later is topping 47%. PAUSE!!!!

I just went back out cause as I was reading my own post and I started to think that the numbers were way too high. I read the manual and I had been testing the wood parallel with the grain and the instructions state to do it perpendicular in several locations and avrage it. I knew I read something about the direction of the grain but that was a while ago and so I figured the pins went in a lot further parallel so that must be right. Wrong!!! The new results were, white oak averaged 42% and the red 36%. Better but not what I was looking for.
 
I just got my cheap two pin wood moisture meter today from Harbor Freight (item#96472). I was checking some Pecan wood that has been split since last winter and it tested at 22% after being re-split and tested in the middle.

What is a moisture level that is burnable in the new EPA stoves?
 
I go by what I read here and 20% seems to be the number. I don't remember seeing an actual number printed in the owners manual for my insert but I could be wrong.
 
Damn that's some sad news archer...you have to get on the ball and score some seasoned wood fast. Old stoves would burn unseasoned wood a little better than the newer stoves...but the thing is ya don't get any real heat out of it. The newer stoves I dunno.

Anyway look on the bright side...next year you'll be golden.
 
BJ64 said:
I just got my cheap two pin wood moisture meter today from Harbor Freight (item#96472). I was checking some Pecan wood that has been split since last winter and it tested at 22% after being re-split and tested in the middle.

What is a moisture level that is burnable in the new EPA stoves?
Harbor Freight has this model on sale this month. I got mine for 10.99 minus a 15 percent off coupon. Ends up 9.34 plus tax, not bad. Tried a few measurements just quickly and the readings did 'make sense'. But I'll have to spend a lot more time, splitting pieces open to check inside. I also need to learn how important it is to stick the probes in a quarter inch like the manual says. That is not going to happen with my seasoned Oak unless I drill little holes as some others have done. The stuff is nearly hard as rock. How important is it to do that?
 
"I wound up with three of the HHs and was just charging the camera to take some pics to post in the new HH thread."

What is /are the "HH" 's and where is the HH thread? Hoop Houses???
Found it -sorry -my bad.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.