Can wood be "over" seasoned?

[North of 60]

My manual for the stove targets 12 to 18% MC.

I just downloaded a PDF of the BK manual. On what page would I find that? Just curious and don't really want to read the whole thing.

You got me looking, couldnt find it and then tried to pull the rusticles out of my head where I got it from. Its in the BK 101 Video.
(broken link removed to http://blazeking.com/video1.html) @ minute 5:12 it discuses MC. The video itself is good but didnt give the noncats a fair chance by comparing to old smoke dragon's. But the even heat output is spot on along with using dry low MC wood.
Give the vid a try. Its still useful to understand the black beasts.
Cheers

 

[ohio woodburner]

i just had to look up what my VC manual says about what wood to use. I know Dennis will like this. It states "avoid burning "green" wood that has not been properly seasoned or cordwood that is more than two years old". Well hell i'm almost four years ahead, guess i'll have to burn it in my outside fire ring. :roll:

 

[Backwoods Savage]

i just had to look up what my VC manual says about what wood to use. I know Dennis will like this. It states "avoid burning "green" wood that has not been properly seasoned or cordwood that is more than two years old". Well hell i'm almost four years ahead, guess i'll have to burn it in my outside fire ring. :roll:

Just goes to show that not all of us know what we are talking about. :cheese:

 

[StackedLumber]

Dennis you need to post some more pics of your wood what a thing of beauty . . . that's some serious wood porn

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Dennis you need to post some more pics of your wood what a thing of beauty . . . that's some serious wood porn

Here is some on the end of the porch (part of the carport).

We'll be burning some of this wood this winter:

Cuttings from last winter. Split and stacked in April.

More of the same.

Just getting started with the splitting:

Yes, that is wood under that white stuff.

The log splitter is covered with a gray tarp in between the wood stacks.

Just about finished with the splitting:

Where the wood ultimately ends up.

Trying to figure out how to notch it before felling it.

Hauling some up to be cut up.

How'd this get in there?

 

[StackedLumber]

good stuff dennis . . . of course you had to have one of your sitting at the vertical splitter . . .I'll leave that one for another argument in a different thread! Please keep the pics of the white stuff to a minimum it's coming way too soon (yesterday it was 22 up here frost didn't leave till after 11!)

 

[BrotherBart]

Anise Star Extract? Carob Bean? Carrot Oil? Chocolate? Chamomile Flower Oil? Fig Juice Concentrate? In cigarette smoke?

Sounds like health food to me. What brand? I want some. :lol:

Seriously, I think inhaling wet oak smoke would be safer. ;-)

I smoke to get the benefits of the fig juice concentrate.

 

[BrotherBart]

Wood is not a fuel like oil or gas or ethanol. It won't burn at all in its native form.

Ya got about as much chance of lighting crude oil as you have lighting that big oak tree in the yard. In fact a better chance with the tree.

 

[Battenkiller]

Give the vid a try. Its still useful to understand the black beasts.

Good video, but a lot of hype. Their stoves are 4 times more efficient than any non-catalytic wood stove? C'mon. So a BK has 80% efficiency and a Jotul Oslo only has 20%? Boy, that must piss off all the Oslo owners when they find out they are using 4X as much wood as they need to. And since a new Jotul stove is supposed to be twice as efficient as my stove, the BKs must be 8X as efficient, so I can go from 6 cord/year to 3/4 of a cord and heat this place the same? I'd be all over it, but I ain't buying it.

I also find it kinda humorous that they are recommending wood that is substantially drier than 95% of people are able to achieve. I don't think that one summer in ten will get my wood down below 15% around here, this year was a fluke. Thankfully, I don't have to depend on that or I'd never have dry enough wood.

Note that the video said not to burn wood larger than 8-10" in diameter. They put some pretty honking big pieces in those stoves to get those extremely long burns. With splits that large, you will have no problem burning extremely dry wood at all, even with the air wide open. FWIW, I was burning cherry that was about 12-14% MC all morning long with no problem, even in my non-cat dragon. Splits were large, however, about 6" in diameter. When I left for the afternoon, I put on three nice pieces of very marginal hickory. They went right to flame on the hot coal bed. When my flue temps got to about 500º (less than 10 minutes), I shut the bypass damper, waited for the flue temps to stabilize, shut down the air most of the way, and went shopping. They were still burning nicely when I got home. In fact, the place got so warm and we had to open the front door for a while.

You are only gonna get "X" amount of BTUs out of a pound of wood not matter how dry it gets. Heating this place all day during a cold snap in Jan with only 3-4 splits... it just ain't ever gonna happen.

 

[btuser]

My stove has been burning hot lately, mostly because of the windy days but it got me thinking that maybe, just maybe, I had some really dry wood. So I whipped out the ol' moisture meter and went to the stack, starting with 3yr old oak and ending up with the stuff I split last April. April's maple came in at 20%, 3yr old oak read 6%. wet ends of the splits reading at 37%. I figure, whow, I'm set and maybe a little over-board. Then for kicks I stuck the two prongs into a puddle and got a reading of 37%, which let me know I don't really know.

 

[Lumber-Jack]

My stove has been burning hot lately, mostly because of the windy days but it got me thinking that maybe, just maybe, I had some really dry wood. So I whipped out the ol' moisture meter and went to the stack, starting with 3yr old oak and ending up with the stuff I split last April. April's maple came in at 20%, 3yr old oak read 6%. wet ends of the splits reading at 37%. I figure, whow, I'm set and maybe a little over-board. Then for kicks I stuck the two prongs into a puddle and got a reading of 37%, which let me know I don't really know.

btuser, you will get some serious cresote deposits in your flue if you try burning that puddle this winter. I say leave it in an open area for another year where it will get plenty of sun and wind,,, and try covering the top when it rains.

 

[precaud]

Yes, rot is an ever present problem, but if you get your wood below 25% and then get it under cover so it doesn't get wet, it will never rot and will keep literally forever.

Agreed, and that's at the basis of my gathering and storage habits: dead/down and standing dead logs, stacked and covered, until needed. Some logs do have the onset of partial rotting on one side (usually the side that was facing down) but the rot stops when it's stored and kept dry.

 

[North of 60]

Give the vid a try. Its still useful to understand the black beasts.

Good video, but a lot of hype. Their stoves are 4 times more efficient than any non-catalytic wood stove? C'mon. So a BK has 80% efficiency and a Jotul Oslo only has 20%? Boy, that must piss off all the Oslo owners when they find out they are using 4X as much wood as they need to. And since a new Jotul stove is supposed to be twice as efficient as my stove, the BKs must be 8X as efficient, so I can go from 6 cord/year to 3/4 of a cord and heat this place the same? I'd be all over it, but I ain't buying it.

I also find it kinda humorous that they are recommending wood that is substantially drier than 95% of people are able to achieve. I don't think that one summer in ten will get my wood down below 15% around here, this year was a fluke. Thankfully, I don't have to depend on that or I'd never have dry enough wood.

Note that the video said not to burn wood larger than 8-10" in diameter. They put some pretty honking big pieces in those stoves to get those extremely long burns. With splits that large, you will have no problem burning extremely dry wood at all, even with the air wide open. FWIW, I was burning cherry that was about 12-14% MC all morning long with no problem, even in my non-cat dragon. Splits were large, however, about 6" in diameter. When I left for the afternoon, I put on three nice pieces of very marginal hickory. They went right to flame on the hot coal bed. When my flue temps got to about 500º (less than 10 minutes), I shut the bypass damper, waited for the flue temps to stabilize, shut down the air most of the way, and went shopping. They were still burning nicely when I got home. In fact, the place got so warm and we had to open the front door for a while.

You are only gonna get "X" amount of BTUs out of a pound of wood not matter how dry it gets. Heating this place all day during a cold snap in Jan with only 3-4 splits... it just ain't ever gonna happen.

I didnt make the damn video and I warned ya it was one sided. :coolsmirk: SHEEEEES, just showed ya where I got 12 to 18%MC from.
Now go put 3-4 splits in your stove and come back and tell me how it did in January. :lol:

 

[Hiram Maxim]

You guys can debate all ya want but I will follow the applied sciences and experience's of Backwoods Savage! ;-)

The dryer my wood gets the longer and better it burns......

If your stove is over firing don't blame it on good fuel :wow:

 

[oldspark]

This site would not be as much fun with out the debates!

 

[NH_Wood]

This site would not be as much fun with out the debates!

I disagree - it would be just as fun without debates ( ;-) - Cheers!

 

[oldspark]

This site would not be as much fun with out the debates!

I disagree - it would be just as fun without debates ( ;-) - Cheers!

Good one!

 

[Wooddust]

With a trend here toward seasoned wood that seems to border on obsessive and lots of recent posts about overfired stoves, I wonder if wood can be "over" seasoned?

Granted, some of the over-fires are within normal burning temps. but still well over what the user wanted to see.

Yes, I can here the cursing as I type from those who have busted there ass to get two or three years ahead, but I wonder if this is nescassary or even beneficial

Well, I cant address more than where I live. In my experience as a woodworker and as a wood burner the answer is probably not. Wood will over time under the conditions it is stored in achieve an equilibrium of internal moisture relative to the ambient conditions it is in. I have some walnut, air dried furniture grade in an un heated but dry location, stickered and stacked that after 4 years has never varied more than a % or 2.

On the other hand wood stove stacked and split firewood on my property will be sawdust in a few years with the termite activity we have. The exception would be hedge(osage orange), Black Locust, and Eastern red cedar all not a favorite munchie of termites. If I leave oak in a stack past 4 years it will have major termite infestations. My goal is 2 years with a high percentage of my wood being hedge and the balance oak and hickory.

Just my observations

 

[Battenkiller]

Ya got about as much chance of lighting crude oil as you have lighting that big oak tree in the yard. In fact a better chance with the tree.

I was speaking of fuel oil. Leave it to a retired oil man to have crude thoughts when oil is mentioned. :lol:

Ya know, a pile of creosote in the open won't burn even if you set a torch to it, but I don't want it in my chimney because things work differently there. ;-)

 

[iceman]

***** I talked to Pacific Energy today on another issue but we got on this subject*******
please dont shoot me!....
this was taken from another thread i posted in


on another note, i know there is a thread about wood being to dry, as was told to me from pe ...... YES wood can be to dry… The explanation was epa stoves always have air going in it. Its simple fuel to air ratio, the drier the wood the more energy released. If the wood is less than 10% it will release more energy, possibly causing extreme temps. Since you can’t close the air off all the way thats whats lead it to extreme temps. That may cause overfire.. They calculate mc at 15-20% for what they considered “best operating practices” if wood is stacked and split outdoors for 1-2 yrs it should be 15-20% (this is from pe) its ok if its longer usually as 3 yrs it will be around 15% or so… But packing a firebox full of 10% or less wood could very well lead to a bad situation for the stove as temps may get to hot…

this was the explanation from pe..

 

[SolarAndWood]

But packing a firebox full of 10% or less wood could very well lead to a bad situation for the stove as temps may get to hot…

I'd love to see a stick of firewood anywhere between Springfield and Syracuse under 10%.

 

[oldspark]

Unless it is kiln dried you wont see firewood get much below 15% or so.

 

[kabbott]

But packing a firebox full of 10% or less wood could very well lead to a bad situation for the stove as temps may get to hot…

I'd love to see a stick of firewood anywhere between Springfield and Syracuse under 10%.

Me too... Last year I checked some exposed framing in my house and it was 13-14% on my elcheapo moisture meter... And it's been
seasoning for 145 years :coolgrin:

 

[iceman]

But packing a firebox full of 10% or less wood could very well lead to a bad situation for the stove as temps may get to hot…

I'd love to see a stick of firewood anywhere between Springfield and Syracuse under 10%.

Lol me too! But this is what I was told ... I can only think that people who store wood inside after its been outside will ever get wood down that low ...

 

[firefighterjake]

Lots of words here . . . don't know if I'm a dumb whippersnapper or not . . . I do know I'm a dumb firefighter . . . and I do know I noticed a pretty big difference in burning wood that was seasoned over a year . . . I suspect there may be a point of diminishing return . . . but I also suspect I may never reach that point and will not worry about my wood not being at the optimal point for burning.

As I said, I'm just a dumb firefighter . . . if I can get a fire going and keep my house warm . . . and keep myself and my wife safe . . . then all is good in the world.