Ok guys. Probably been asked a million times, but............ what does everybody shoot for as far as mosture %?
Moisture content
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Below 20% is ok, the lower the better, there is no real magic number but mid teens burns very well for me. There are those with much more experience than I who will undoubtedly chime in.
I have one question on this myself. I have a bunch of Oak I cut this year that has been dead for 20 years. It is as light as a feather when compared to fresh Oak and some of it (mostly the branches) measure under 20 percent as soon as it was cut. Some of the trunk pieces are at around 26, but still very light. I have tried to burn some pieces and they seem to burn great, even at 26, no bubbling of water etc. Would you still hold off on burning any of these pieces? I hate to have to monitor every piece and I would like to burn some as my back log on a cold winters night.
GolfandWoodNut said:
I try and burn nothing with MC more than 20 but...... You gotta do what you gotta do. I am assuming you are taking the reading in a fresh split on solid wood area. If you measure in PUNK it will read more moisture. If I were you I would wait if at all possible. But that is me.
I know Dennis, however I know even you are burning some 2009 wood this year, so it doesn't always work that way. The ultimate test is how the wood burns, I have enough cherry and maple and Locust to get me through this winter, it is just very tempting to burn some Oak.
Correct Golf. Some of the wood we will burn this year was cut during the winter of 2008-2009. Split in April of 2009 and stacked in rows of three. Most of it is white ash that was dead or dieing and there is just a little bit of soft maple in there too. The soft maple was really super dry at the time of splitting. I made a lot of that into kindling though. Speaking of that kindling, just last weekend I loaded up about 80 pounds of that kindling and delivered it. We have an old steam engine railroad train (Polar Express) that really gets busy through the Holiday season and they need the kindling for use in the caboose.
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