the yard the town of oyster bay dumps off there wood from tree removal is right by you.it is located in old bethpage,just call the town for location,its free but its hit and miss.your friends offer of a cord of seasoned and a cord of unseasoned for 300 is a great deal.
Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??
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fredarm said:
I used Envi-blocks my first year. They work very well.
Here is a link to an Envi-blocks dealer locator - (broken link removed to http://www.enviblocks.com/dealerlocation.html)
Good luck!
With regard to pallets, that is the source of much of our bricks now and was up to about 80% of the "chippy" bricks we made at the beginning of the year. Ultimately, we could probably produce chippy bricks for less than $100/ton from pallets and this is one of our long term strategies. In the meantime, if you don't mind dealing with a lot of nails and a lot of small pieces, you can get large quantities of pallet scrap for the trouble of picking it up. Our first operation was putting a grinder in at a pallet recycler who used to have to haul his scrap off to a mulch producer that charged $100 a truckload to take boxes of scrap and useless pallets. Before we installed our grinder, to save money on their disposal cost, they would put out boxes of their scrap with signs that said "free firewood".
I suggest you look for pallet recyclers on the island and you will be able to get all the wood you want. Most of the scrap will be broken 3/4" or 1/2"x4" deckboards 40" long. The notched 2x4 stringers are broken less often and are usually just "sistered" if they are broken. The guy who mentioned masonry pallets is absolutely right about the willingness to give them away because they are special and not worth the cost to ship back to brick producers. By the way, don't worry about paint on regular grocery pallets (40x48). The FDA requires any paint used on grocery pallets to be food grade. However, the heavily painted pallets are usually part of a rental pool and that fact is clearly marked on the pallet. The blue pallets are CHEP, the red ones are PECO, and there are occasional yellow and green painted ones as well. Everything else is called "whitewood" pallets and used pallets are worth about $1 delivered to a recycler, who sorts, repairs and grades them and resells them for about $5 apiece versus about $10 for a new pallet. The pallets weigh an average of 40 pounds so if you wanted a bunch of oddball pallets, you could probably get a "gypsy" or "pirate" that goes around collecting recyclable pallets from the grocery stores to bring you as many as you want for $2 each, which would be $50 per cord equivalent. Neatly stacked, 24 40x48x6 pallets would be about 4'x4'X 10', not a lot bigger than a cord. And you could safely stack them at least 6' high. Higher than that would be unsafe to stack and unstack by hand. In our warehouse we stack them 16' high with a forklift. Most hardwood pallets are made with green wood, but by the time they have been through a few uses in conditioned warehouses, they are dryer than "kiln-dried" on average, about 12%.
The species of wood used for pallets varies depending on where they are made. Pallets made in the east are usually made from random hardwoods from the pieces too short or flawed for premium use. There is a lot of poplar used for pallets and this is so light that it is often called a "soft" hardwood and burns like pine. Pallets from the west will be made from softtwod. Heavy duty pallets for masonry or equipment will be made from oak and hickory. Canadian manufacturers ship mostly on softwood skids, which lack the bottom boards and are not used much by American manufacturers. Consequently you can probably get as much as you want if you find distributors on the Island that import a lot from Canada. You might check the builders supply stores, I have heard stories that trucks haul unwanted pallets all the way from Long Island down here to Virginia because we still have construction and demolition landfills that accept pallets for a tipping charge of "only" $25/ton. Many landfills will not take pallets because they don't crush and take up a lot of volume.
I suggest you look for pallet recyclers on the island and you will be able to get all the wood you want. Most of the scrap will be broken 3/4" or 1/2"x4" deckboards 40" long. The notched 2x4 stringers are broken less often and are usually just "sistered" if they are broken. The guy who mentioned masonry pallets is absolutely right about the willingness to give them away because they are special and not worth the cost to ship back to brick producers. By the way, don't worry about paint on regular grocery pallets (40x48). The FDA requires any paint used on grocery pallets to be food grade. However, the heavily painted pallets are usually part of a rental pool and that fact is clearly marked on the pallet. The blue pallets are CHEP, the red ones are PECO, and there are occasional yellow and green painted ones as well. Everything else is called "whitewood" pallets and used pallets are worth about $1 delivered to a recycler, who sorts, repairs and grades them and resells them for about $5 apiece versus about $10 for a new pallet. The pallets weigh an average of 40 pounds so if you wanted a bunch of oddball pallets, you could probably get a "gypsy" or "pirate" that goes around collecting recyclable pallets from the grocery stores to bring you as many as you want for $2 each, which would be $50 per cord equivalent. Neatly stacked, 24 40x48x6 pallets would be about 4'x4'X 10', not a lot bigger than a cord. And you could safely stack them at least 6' high. Higher than that would be unsafe to stack and unstack by hand. In our warehouse we stack them 16' high with a forklift. Most hardwood pallets are made with green wood, but by the time they have been through a few uses in conditioned warehouses, they are dryer than "kiln-dried" on average, about 12%.
The species of wood used for pallets varies depending on where they are made. Pallets made in the east are usually made from random hardwoods from the pieces too short or flawed for premium use. There is a lot of poplar used for pallets and this is so light that it is often called a "soft" hardwood and burns like pine. Pallets from the west will be made from softtwod. Heavy duty pallets for masonry or equipment will be made from oak and hickory. Canadian manufacturers ship mostly on softwood skids, which lack the bottom boards and are not used much by American manufacturers. Consequently you can probably get as much as you want if you find distributors on the Island that import a lot from Canada. You might check the builders supply stores, I have heard stories that trucks haul unwanted pallets all the way from Long Island down here to Virginia because we still have construction and demolition landfills that accept pallets for a tipping charge of "only" $25/ton. Many landfills will not take pallets because they don't crush and take up a lot of volume.
i tried those compressed wood bricks, i think there great. if they ever become more affordable on long island i would buy a couple of tons.
UPDATE:
Made a lot of progress today on getting myself a reasonable amount of dry wood for this winters burn. I grabbed an F250 from work this AM and went over to Jim's yard as recommended by a couple people on this forum. He has a large yard in Huntington and actually stacks his wood on pallets in separated rows with a tarp on top of each cord. He is a straight shooter and took a bunch of time with me showing me the yard, using both of our moisture meters to test etc etc. The stuff he is selling now was split in the spring so its not measuring 20% in the middle of a fresh split but its still better than anything else I've found so far.
I loaded up a cord of dry mixed hardwood for $180. Funny enough my buddy who owns the tree company showed up while I was there to drop some wood off for Jim. I told him his stuff was OK but I needed the driest stuff I could find to burn this winter. He was completely understanding and even invited me to his processing yard to take all the old pallets I could get my hands on.
After offloading Jim's cord I took a ride over to the processing yard and he showed me around. What an operation! The seasoned pile he is selling from now was split before the stuff he delivered to me last month and I tested it. Measured almost exactly the same as Jims... high 20's in the center of a fresh split but bone dry on the outside. I took a few pics while I was there. There is an endless amount of very dry pallets I can take as well as a "reject" wood pile I can raid anytime. It's basically a lot of knots and such but most of it is very dry.
I went home and stacked Jim's cord in my shed... I now have 2 cords in the shed and my buddy is going to drop off a cord of his "seasoned" and a cord of green tomorrow. I started building a "Holz Housen" next to the shed so I figure by the time I use up the dry stuff in the shed in a few months the Holz Housen wood will be in pretty good shape. All said and done I will have 4-5 cords stacked 2.5 of which are good and dry ready to burn and in the shed.
Here are a few pics from the day:
My little helper:
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00016-20091118-1237-webp.210839/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00018-20091118-1237-webp.210840/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00019-20091118-1242-webp.210841/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
My buddy's "seasoned" piles:
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00024-20091118-1433-webp.210842/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
All the Pallets I could ever want:
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00023-20091118-1430-webp.210843/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
I thought this was awesome... A giant turn of the centure Log cutter. Second picture is of the 4' blade:
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00022-20091118-1354-webp.210844/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
![[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/img00020-20091118-1354-webp.210845/ "[Hearth.com] Good dry wood on LI that doesn't cost over $500 a cord??")
I will take some pics tomorrow of the Holz Housen and woodshed if you guys are interested. Thanks for all the help!
Made a lot of progress today on getting myself a reasonable amount of dry wood for this winters burn. I grabbed an F250 from work this AM and went over to Jim's yard as recommended by a couple people on this forum. He has a large yard in Huntington and actually stacks his wood on pallets in separated rows with a tarp on top of each cord. He is a straight shooter and took a bunch of time with me showing me the yard, using both of our moisture meters to test etc etc. The stuff he is selling now was split in the spring so its not measuring 20% in the middle of a fresh split but its still better than anything else I've found so far.
I loaded up a cord of dry mixed hardwood for $180. Funny enough my buddy who owns the tree company showed up while I was there to drop some wood off for Jim. I told him his stuff was OK but I needed the driest stuff I could find to burn this winter. He was completely understanding and even invited me to his processing yard to take all the old pallets I could get my hands on.
After offloading Jim's cord I took a ride over to the processing yard and he showed me around. What an operation! The seasoned pile he is selling from now was split before the stuff he delivered to me last month and I tested it. Measured almost exactly the same as Jims... high 20's in the center of a fresh split but bone dry on the outside. I took a few pics while I was there. There is an endless amount of very dry pallets I can take as well as a "reject" wood pile I can raid anytime. It's basically a lot of knots and such but most of it is very dry.
I went home and stacked Jim's cord in my shed... I now have 2 cords in the shed and my buddy is going to drop off a cord of his "seasoned" and a cord of green tomorrow. I started building a "Holz Housen" next to the shed so I figure by the time I use up the dry stuff in the shed in a few months the Holz Housen wood will be in pretty good shape. All said and done I will have 4-5 cords stacked 2.5 of which are good and dry ready to burn and in the shed.
Here are a few pics from the day:
My little helper:
My buddy's "seasoned" piles:
All the Pallets I could ever want:
I thought this was awesome... A giant turn of the centure Log cutter. Second picture is of the 4' blade:
I will take some pics tomorrow of the Holz Housen and woodshed if you guys are interested. Thanks for all the help!
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