Kiln dried as real as Seasoned wood.

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drstorm

Burning Hunk
Aug 19, 2016
124
Northeast PA
I know this isn't the first time its been tested on this forum.But just in case there are some newbies reading.Today I picked up a bag (.75 cu feet)of kiln dried firewood from my local TS store.
I only buy this occasionally to decoratively stack near our nice BK Chinook.No bugs at least.
So I split the fattest piece in the bag and put my moisture meter to it.
The verdict is,
DO NOT BURN THIS.
Mid 20's up to the 30s% piece of unburnable,but bug-free wood.
Moral is,check everything.
 
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Someone is cheating and needs to be called out. Let your local store know.
We have about 6 TS stores within an hours drive.They all sell the same thing.
In these parts,The Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Metro area,you would exhaust yourself trying to find actual seasoned wood,or anyone who even really knew what that meant.Thank God for this forum.
I am actually surprised more people in this area do not burn their houses down from what they are sold.
 
Someone is cheating and needs to be called out. Let your local store know.
Most of the stuff sold at box stores ect is only run through the kiln long enough to bring up the internal temp high enough to kill any bugs so they can transport it not to actually dry it. And yes that is still legally called kiln dried.
 
The Redstone tractor supply store eco bricks do burn fantastic though.

+ 100 on that, I picked up a few packages to test out and they are awesome, I picked up a ton of liberty brick but they do not burn as long and hot as the tractor supply even if they are better compressed than the Redstone ones,i get 12 hr burn from 5 redstone bricks in my high valley 1500, the liberty bricks don't compare.
 
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The term "kiln dried" is as indefinite as the term "seasoned". Actual moisture content is the only thing that is important, and neither term specifies that. Unfortunately, this is a case where the buyers' due diligence is necessary depending on their requirements.
 
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Yes there are some good reputable sellers in New England that fully dry the wood. They are established operations that stand by their product and want repeat sales. And then there are those that are distanced from the customers with bagged grocery store wood that don't.
 
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Yes there are some good reputable sellers in New England that fully dry the wood. They are established operations that stand by their product and want repeat sales. And then there are those that are distanced from the customers with bagged grocery store wood that don't.
I see that here. I have a neighbor a few miles away who sells stacks of firewood to campers and convenience stores. I've seen him cut green fir and put it in small stacks to sell. It may be okay for campfires, but I hope he isn't selling to stove burners. Sorry, but the responsibility is on the buyer unless moisture content is negotiated up front.
 
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,i get 12 hr burn from 5 redstone

Newbie question: at the end part of the 12 hours, what sort of heat are you getting? I put 4 Crown 'logs' in my hearthstone heritage and topped out at 325'ish.....they definitely didnt provide heat for anywhere close to 12 hours.....all this to say that Im waiting on an order of redstone's and after reading your comment, they cant get here soon enough :)
 
Yes there are some good reputable sellers in New England that fully dry the wood. They are established operations that stand by their product and want repeat sales. And then there are those that are distanced from the customers with bagged grocery store wood that don't.

Bills Sales in Portsmouth RI sells real kiln dried firewood. Burns like it's been doused in gasoline!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
Construction scraps are kiln dried and if it does get wet it dries out fast. A great source of firewood if one doesn't have enough seasoned hardwood and doesn't care about not getting long burns.
 
Newbie question: at the end part of the 12 hours, what sort of heat are you getting? I put 4 Crown 'logs' in my hearthstone heritage and topped out at 325'ish.....they definitely didnt provide heat for anywhere close to 12 hours.....all this to say that Im waiting on an order of redstone's and after reading your comment, they cant get here soon enough :)
Blower still running with house 77° with outside temp high 30's, bricks still glowing red but they don't make no coal. Out of redstone's now but I burn liberty bricks.But my insert is notorious for long burns with the air cut almost all the way down.
 
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+ 100 on that, I picked up a few packages to test out and they are awesome, I picked up a ton of liberty brick but they do not burn as long and hot as the tractor supply even if they are better compressed than the Redstone ones,i get 12 hr burn from 5 redstone bricks in my high valley 1500, the liberty bricks don't compare.
...Out of redstone's now but I burn liberty bricks. But my insert is notorious for long burns with the air cut almost all the way down.
Yute, are your Liberty bricks of recent vintage?

I got some from the new facility, adjacent to their single supplier of sawdust to keep it pure. I
'm getting very good heat with a 30-lb load, easy catalyst start, and coals @20 hours, if I want to wait that long to reload. I haven't tried Redstones, but I'm skeptical that I would find them worth ~ 2x the price of Liberties.
 
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Yute, are your Liberty bricks of recent vintage?

I got some from the new facility, adjacent to their single supplier of sawdust to keep it pure. I
'm getting very good heat with a 30-lb load, easy catalyst start, and coals @20 hours, if I want to wait that long to reload. I haven't tried Redstones, but I'm skeptical that I would find them worth ~ 2x the price of Liberties.
I only bought 7 packages to test them out and got a ton of liberty bricks after they were done, liberty bricks are nice but I preferred the redstones. Not sure if the size of the redstones had something to do with it but yeah I got longer burn times with them. But like I say I'm good with the liberty bricks also lol.
 
Never heard of Liberty bricks but I have burned several tons of Redstones, they are fairly inexpensive here possibly because I am only an hour or so away from the source. Had to be real careful with them in the Jotul not to have an inferno on my hands but the new Woodstock has excellent air control and low burn capabilities, the ecobricks really rock now!

Kiln dried as real as Seasoned wood. < before I finished stacking the front row so you could see the back rows...
 
Never heard of Liberty bricks but I have burned several tons of Redstones, they are fairly inexpensive here possibly because I am only an hour or so away from the source. Had to be real careful with them in the Jotul not to have an inferno on my hands but the new Woodstock has excellent air control and low burn capabilities, the ecobricks really rock now!

View attachment 191263 < before I finished stacking the front row so you could see the back rows...
How many do you burn at a time
 
How many do you burn at a time
Depends on what I want to do. With the Jotul 550, I think around 12 was max and even that was hard to control.
With my Woodstock I've gone up to 24 bricks - that's about 84 lbs of really dry fuel - potentially over a quarter-million BTU per their estimates-be careful!! I have a thread documenting that long burn https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/woodstock-ideal-steel-ecobrick-long-burn.152955/ I've only done that just a couple times to test though, got a great long and really low burn. Usually I mix, I burn some loads half ash cordwood with maybe a dozen or so bricks to get a nice day long burn. It's nice when I'm on just a few hours of sleep and getting up at 4am for a long day at work to not have to get up 20-30 minutes earlier to load the stove and have it last till I get home from the previous days load. I know most people have someone at home to keep the stove running when they are away but I'm solo here and on days I work I'm gone 14 hrs door to door usually, squeezing a few more btu in the stove is a plus. Sometimes I just use them as fillers since they are smaller than cordwood, I can usually slide all my wood to one side which leaves a small gap at the other side I can normally fill with a few bricks.

Keep in mind the Woodstock can burn in a fully catalytic slow burn, non-cats can't usually sustain a clean burn that low and you got to be more careful with these things on a higher burn.
 
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When stacking it's recommended to alternate the direction of each layer so that gaps between the bricks don't align. This helps keep the burn from taking off.
 
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I've never burnt more that 10 bricks at a time, I will definitely try it out when the over night temps drop again
 
I must be doing something wrong;

Finally got my redstone order yesterday and so this morning I put 4 bricks onto hot ash from the overnight, Air fully open on a hearthstone heritage, the bricks were burning in no time (much better than Crown bricks that I had bought a few weeks ago). After about 15 minutes, I closed the air down to about 25%. Temp via stoneguard read about 325 2 hours in. An hour after that, reading was about 275'ish. The bricks seemed to be on their last legs at that point and so I added 'real' wood

On many threads here on Hearth, when posters talk about these bricks, common gist is *hot* *long burn* etc. I'm not getting any of that. Am I wood brick jinxed or something? Is 3-4 bricks at a time just not enough to benefit, or is there a minimum to use for full effect.

thanks in advance
 
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