gas fire conversion

[scbk]

^^Well I love softwood so if you ever have any to get rid of, give me a shout, can collect

[Spruce]

My flue is very well insulated and I take care to promote proper combustion.

However, I found that softwood produces a substance in the smoke called creosote, which is partially burned tree sap. Creosote is highly flammable. Burning softwood will cause it to build up on the inside walls of my flue until it reaches a point where the flue catches fire. It's happened here 2wice. My house is entirely built from larch, I don't want to burn it down so I switched burning to hardwoods and the problem was solved.

 

The idea that softwood produces creosote but hardwood doesn't is a myth. If anything you're more likely to get a buildup of creosote with hardwood as it is likely to have a higher moisture content.

 

 

Furthermore, generally speaking I found hardwood logs tend to be much more dense than softwood logs therefore they burner hotter. Given two similar sized and seasoned logs, one hardwood and the other softwood, the hardwood log is generally heavier and produces more energy than the softwood log. You therefore need fewer hardwood logs to produce the same heat output and because they take longer to burn the refuelling intervals are longer as well.

 

I doubt anyone who has burned dry softwood would agree that hardwood burns hotter. The solution to the size/weight/number/burn time conundrum is to split softwood into bigger lumps.

 

Softwood and hardwood both come for free here, so given the findings above, I switched.

 

I'm on my way. What's your address?