pen said:
I'd be willing to bet a case of beer that if one of those 10 year old splits of ash of yours were set outside in a pile where they received some moisture / wind / sun for a year that it would crack all to hell.
I really doubt it.
There's no way that a single piece of firewood or well-weathered lumber on my property is anywhere near cracked as badly as the wood in your photos, nor is any of it moldy like that. If it wasn't still 10 below out, I'd grab my camera and take some shots.
I had a bunch of firewood that was drying in my basement all last winter, and then left outside all summer in the rain and then brought back in to dry. It looked about the same as when I first put it out in the spring, bark tighter than it was on the tree. Pallets have rotted away after 4-5 years on the ground, but they never cracked and fell apart, nor did the wood that was stored on them look like it'd split in two if you dropped it. Last year I brought in some three year old ash that was stored on those pallets and it hardly had any checking going on at all. You can see it at the very bottom of the stack in my basement in the photo below. Blackened ends from mildew staining, but no cracks... and the bark is on there tight.
Longer time frame? Well, my white pine picnic table is well over 10 years old, with only the original coat of stain to protect it and it doesn't look like your wood, although it is starting to rot pretty badly. 17 year old deck is still in pretty fair shape, too, even though I never once applied a sealer to the wood. Even longer yet? How about wooden boats that have been in and out of the water, taking up water and then drying out again for 100 years and left out year round in some of the most inhospitable and varying conditions you can find don't do that. They may show cracks here and there, and they may rot, but they don't usually develop huge, gaping cracks in the planking, stems or keels, nor do they just fall apart unless they hit something in the water. I have a 60 something year old wood and canvas canoe that I am restoring, and it shows no substantial cracking anywhere. It probably spent its entire life out in the elements.
So, no, I have never seen that kind of destruction of wood once it has been thoroughly dried. Weathering damage will occur, but will be limited to the areas closer to the surface until many a year passes by.
Regardless of whether or not you see this occurring in your own backyard, I still maintain that the appearance of firewood can be very deceiving regarding its moisture content. If your wood has been out there for two years and it looks like that, it is safe to assume it's seasoned, but that is because we know it has spent the proper amount of time required, not because of the way it looks. How it burns may help a seasoned pro, but how's a newbie supposed to tell how his wood burns if he's never burned both known green wood and known dry wood to get some experince with the way they burn? Bottom line, if you are new to this and have a suspect pile of wood, the meter is probably the easiest way to tell if it is close or whether it needs another year in the stack. Even a cheap meter with no built-in species correction can easily differentiate between wood that is 20% MC and wood that is 30%.
![[Hearth.com] Free Moisture Meter](/talk/data/attachments/39/39065-c50cf3e8d6f5c78023f8e13da31d0067.jpg?hash=MIdeXkv2KB)
![[Hearth.com] Free Moisture Meter](/talk/data/attachments/39/39081-67ef7ce4347ad7b4c66b17165e3597bc.jpg?hash=LaUcjjjBJ3)
