How do you air dry your wood down to 20% ??

[Rough Hewn]

Another operation
 
How does that compare labour wise to processing freshly harvested wood to size and dumping it into ventilated containers in one hit, moving under a roof, preferably transparent, and then taking them from store and delivering them in one hit?

That's a great system.
Very efficient.
How do the bags handle the moisture loss from fresh?

The French more often will as BigJ says
Buy fresh cut and split tipped on the driveway, stack and store themselves.

Also 99% of woodstoves in Brittany will take 50-60cm logs.
So it's one cut to cut 1m3 of logs to 50cm if banded or stacked.

It's different that's all,
works too as there are several large firewood firms who do exactly that.
[emoji106]

[Rough Hewn]

I can answer that for you. I tried some billets one year and it took as long to cut them up on the processor as it did to cut and split roundwood. The billeting was painfully slow at around 2 cube an hour with a pretty much perfect splitter for the job. Never again. They dried well and were easy to handle but if your time has any value its a no go IMO

That's British forestry.
Go look at what the French use for firewood. Makes me cry as a miller.
Plantation grown perfect hardwood stems.
For firewood.[emoji23][emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

[Big J]

6 minutes ago, Rough Hewn said:

That's British forestry.
Go look at what the French use for firewood. Makes me cry as a miller.
Plantation grown perfect hardwood stems.
For firewood.

Poker straight oak and chestnut grows like a weed in France. In the UK, any broadleaf woodland left unattended will rarely produce anything other than shit due the constant weather onslaught and grey squirrels.

Edited February 22, 2020 by Big J

[openspaceman]

Just now, Rough Hewn said:

How do the bags handle the moisture loss from fresh?

I was thinking more of IBC crates or potato boxes, I have no experience myself as I cut split and stack mine by hand for my own use and seem to have no problem getting them dry enough in a summer season.

 

When I sold logs 30 years ago they were nowhere near 20% but then it was common to see a wisp of blue smoke from chimneys, a lot has changed in pollution awareness since.

[spuddog0507]

15 hours ago, Big J said:

That's a lot of capital investment, both in terms of the barn and stock for almost three years.

 

If firewood customers weren't idiots, then we'd have them all trained to take unseasoned timber in spring to season themselves over summer. No storage costs, no capital outlay. We'd save a fortune, they'd save a fortune and we'd be doing it like the rest of Europe. 

If only J, been trying to educate firewood customers for 30 years and it seems a impossible task to get them to buy in spring, only ever got through to about half a dozen over the years,

[Rough Hewn]

I was thinking more of IBC crates or potato boxes, I have no experience myself as I cut split and stack mine by hand for my own use and seem to have no problem getting them dry enough in a summer season.
 
When I sold logs 30 years ago they were nowhere near 20% but then it was common to see a wisp of blue smoke from chimneys, a lot has changed in pollution awareness since.

Times are changing...

[Rough Hewn]

That's next year.

[Woodworks]

27 minutes ago, Rough Hewn said:

That's next year.

Small suppliers under 600 cube per annum have an extra year to comply. They clearly want us all to get kilns as it gives the reason for extra time "The government is minded to consider small foresters to be those producing less than 600m³ a year, as those producing less than this volume may find it difficult to invest in the equipment necessary for seasoning."

[Big J]

7 minutes ago, Woodworks said:

Small suppliers under 600 cube per annum have an extra year to comply. They clearly want us all to get kilns as it gives the reason for extra time "The government is minded to consider small foresters to be those producing less than 600m³ a year, as those producing less than this volume may find it difficult to invest in the equipment necessary for seasoning."

The notion that in order to reduce emissions from burning wood, we need to be burning more wood (to kiln dry the logs), thus creating more emissions and for the likely endpoint being badly stored logs that regain the moisture that was reduced in the first place is truly moronic.

 

It's like having an electric car powered by fossil fuel powered power stations. It's madness.

[Woodworks]

16 hours ago, Big J said:

 

 

If firewood customers weren't idiots, then we'd have them all trained to take unseasoned timber in spring to season themselves over summer. No storage costs, no capital outlay. We'd save a fortune, they'd save a fortune and we'd be doing it like the rest of Europe. 

Funny you should mention them being idiots. Had 2 in 3 drops today.

 

First one needed logs urgently as he was about to run out of telegraph poles to burn. I saw these "logs" when I got there and he was not kidding they were literally chunks of wet telegraph pole out in the rain!

 

Number two had got some fresh wood off a mate that he was struggling to burn on his open fire so could he have some nice dry softwood to mix it in with.

 

Wouldn't be surprised if these two dont give off more pollution than 20 sensible users with modern wood burners with our logs. The new regs wont make the slightest difference to either case.