In aviation, the faster the airplane, the further ahead of the plane you have to think so you're ready for the next step, otherwise you're scrambling to get on top of things...the plane is now flying you instead of you flying the airplane. Same kind of applies here. The softer the wood, the faster it'll burn, so the further ahead you have to think to preempt the bad things that will happen.
Pine still raging with air all the way down
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You are simply showing your inexperience i dont go looking for soft woods but if i have to cut it i am going to run it through the stove.
There are many areas of the world where they have no choice but to burn softwoods. And they have no problems burning it
Read mine completely. It recommends only using softwoods for starting a fire and getting the stove up to temp. It doesnt say not to use softwood true, but it doesnt recommend it for sustaining a fire.
One year I heated an entire season with pine. I had a guy bringing it to me for $20 a truck load already split and seasoned! I just let my oak sit another year. It burned great! There’s nothing wrong with it at all, back in the day people only had the old neighbor or their grandpa giving them advise. Now, we know better. Burn baby!
So can you show me where it says dont use softwoods or as you said only use seasoned hardwoods??? The whole pine thing comes from the fact that it dries fast and burns hot. Because of that when people ran out of the wet hardwood they were burning that had loaded the chimney with creosote they went for the pine and it lit the chimney off. It wasnt the pines fault. It was the wet wood burnt previously. But the soft wood got blamed because the chimney fire happened when burning it.
I think that's the wrong interpretation of the tea leaves. All the manual says, or at least of what was shared, is these are common woods for best results and does so for both hard and soft.
A pound of pine is a pound of oak.
maple1
Minister of Fire
I recall from as far back as I can remember that you never burned evergreens in the fireplace. Nobody I know would even think about doing it. Was always told it would clog the chimney. All evergreens were saved for the outdoor firepit. Maybe I lived a sheltered life....
Im still not going to do it.
I burn our whole Christmas tree in the basement in our indoor boiler every January. Not all at once, and not a fireplace - but it is certainly evergreen.
And unseasoned hardwood will clog a chimney as good unseasoned softwoods.
Maybe it is the sheltered thing?
Yes and multiple sweeps here hundrends of experienced burners and most stove manufacturers say it is perfectly fine.
If you dont want to burn it that is fine but we are not going to perpetuate the innacurate myth about pine here. Let it go or the thread will be locked.
Try a smaller volume of wood and see how it goes. As you know pine burns fast but if you aren't trying to extract maximum heat then reduce the amount of available fuel.
As others have said also close it down sooner than later. Once my stovetop temp is around 400F I close it down, the secondaries kick in and the temp still rises a bit, then plateaus before slowly going down over the course of a few hours.
If I load the stove to the brim and leave it wide open it will easily hit 700F. I only do that on really cold winter mornings and once closed down it stays at 500F+ and really heats the place up.
maple1
Minister of Fire
Hardwood can be just as crappy as softwood.
As long as each is seasoned & the appliance is operated correctly for the fuel that is in it, there is no issue.
I would often reload over coals without even opening the primary air. This would prevent the stove from taking off too bad. With my Freedom, the front tube and baffle support would glow orange if I didn’t really watch it and keep it shut down. Same thing would happen with poplar, it’s not just from the pine. Any light wood that’s overly dry will have this same effect.
black smoke signals
Feeling the Heat
Just to make this clear again not all wood is the same and not all stoves are the same! No one said anything about pitch being the gasoline in my case it was! Now the op has a different stove with different intake control than mine which until my stove heats up the t-flap is open. Then when loading up with high pitch pine it takes off. Not sure if moisture content helps or corrects the high pitch of the wood for the cat to eat surly can’t be good for the cat or the stove
It doesnt hurt the cat or the stove at all. Did your stove burn out of control or just get hot fast?
![[Hearth.com] Pine still raging with air all the way down](https://www.hearth.com/talk/data/attachments/230/230177-62527acc56e3877381802321490bf3b8.jpg?hash=d3s8XTz812 "[Hearth.com] Pine still raging with air all the way down")
Yes i read your manual and it in no way says soft woods are unsafe in any way or that they should not be used. It simply is not there.
I am not saying i will squelch open debate. I am saying i will not allow disinformation to be spread by someone who is unwilling to admit they are wrong.
maple1
Minister of Fire
That does not say or imply that softwoods are not to be used. Or are 'crap'?
Says to start the fire and get up to temp. If you sustain a fire with dry softwood you will either have a rager, or choke it down and get creosote. My term is crap, and always will be. There is one time I would sustain a burn with pine. That would be after I had burned all the hardwood furniture in the house and had nothing left to keep from freezing to death.
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