Who needs kiln dried...

[richardwale]

I also have no interest in spending this year splitting logs and stacking them and keeping them for 18 months. I don't have any interest in doing the same again next year and still not getting any money for what I did last year!! Getting paid in two years time for the work I do today is, in my opinion, a bloody bad hobby!!

 

 

I'm not sure of any firewood supplier who would use that method!!

[Chalgravesteve]

Barrow bags are a good way of selling logs. I'm guessing you buy imported kiln dried and break it gown into smaller volumes?

 

Nope.

 

I have a 40' shipping container/kiln attached to a dragon boiler and 10,000 litre accumulator tank. Yes it is on RHI. We light the boiler once a day and forget about it. The boiler heats the accumulator and the kiln draws the heat from the accumulator and can run 24/7 if we light the boiler every day. We run it Mon-Fri.

 

I have local 6/8 tree surgeons who bring me their chip and arb waste logs daily.

 

I have 5 greenkeepers from my main business, a golf club, who instead of washing machinery all winter now run a firewood business instead as well as keeping the course in shape during the winter period. We run a Gandini Forestcut 48 processor, split logs into steel cages that are 1.2m x 1m x 1.9m high and on wheels so we can push them around in the kiln and we get about 40m3 into every kiln.

 

So we process and dry every single log we sell. Our logs are BSL accredited. The carbon footprint is tiny, as the logs we sell probably travel less than 30 miles in their entire lives. The RHI boiler burns all the stuff that is hard to split, so the entire tree gets used up.

 

I looked at doing firewood about 6/8 years ago and concluded that the space required to store the seasoning wood, and the time that it would take to get it down to a consistent level so that I had a consistent, decent quality product was not worth the effort for the return.

 

Splitting stuff today, drying it for 7-10 days and selling it in the weeks after, that is a decent business model. I don't have any additional staff costs as I was already paying the greenstaff anyway. I just get a better use of their quiet time and produce additional revenue as a result.

 

I am the recommended log supplier for 6 different stove suppliers who love our wood, so every time they install a stove they give their customer my card.

 

All that takes groundwork to establish and just as much hard work to maintain.

[simonm]

I think most people who buy kiln dried, buy small amounts and don't store outside or for long enough to become damp.

 

Each to their own i suppose, seems a bit gimmicky having super super dry logs...dont they burn overly fast with them being so dry?

[skyhuck]

Each to their own i suppose, seems a bit gimmicky having super super dry logs...dont they burn overly fast with them being so dry?

 

Simply turn the stove down.

 

I've also found that cutting the logs larger also slows them down, the heat from dry logs is quite surprising

[richardwale]

Nope.

 

I have a 40' shipping container/kiln attached to a dragon boiler and 10,000 litre accumulator tank. Yes it is on RHI. We light the boiler once a day and forget about it. The boiler heats the accumulator and the kiln draws the heat from the accumulator and can run 24/7 if we light the boiler every day. We run it Mon-Fri.

 

I have local 6/8 tree surgeons who bring me their chip and arb waste logs daily.

 

I have 5 greenkeepers from my main business, a golf club, who instead of washing machinery all winter now run a firewood business instead as well as keeping the course in shape during the winter period. We run a Gandini Forestcut 48 processor, split logs into steel cages that are 1.2m x 1m x 1.9m high and on wheels so we can push them around in the kiln and we get about 40m3 into every kiln.

 

So we process and dry every single log we sell. Our logs are BSL accredited. The carbon footprint is tiny, as the logs we sell probably travel less than 30 miles in their entire lives. The RHI boiler burns all the stuff that is hard to split, so the entire tree gets used up.

 

I looked at doing firewood about 6/8 years ago and concluded that the space required to store the seasoning wood, and the time that it would take to get it down to a consistent level so that I had a consistent, decent quality product was not worth the effort for the return.

 

Splitting stuff today, drying it for 7-10 days and selling it in the weeks after, that is a decent business model. I don't have any additional staff costs as I was already paying the greenstaff anyway. I just get a better use of their quiet time and produce additional revenue as a result.

 

I am the recommended log supplier for 6 different stove suppliers who love our wood, so every time they install a stove they give their customer my card.

 

All that takes groundwork to establish and just as much hard work to maintain.

 

[aesmith]

Is this right or wrong. Wet log goes in kiln...comes out dry say 10%...log goes in customers log store in normal atmospheric conditions and rises to say 20%??? Why pay more for kiln dried???

That's right in principle, although depending on storage it might be rising to more like 15-18%. The link on the first page gave typical final moisture contents for different regions of the UK. The figure for Aberdeen more or less matches our own home-use wood that's stored under cover for a couple of years before use. If that's correct then I guess the idea for kiln dried would be just a touch below final air dry figures.

 

As an example I tested a sample of kiln dried from Latvia, the reading near the outside was around 13-15%, but if I measured right in the centre it was too low to register on my meter. To my mind that shows they dried it more than necessary.