Does firewood actually dry in cord form?!!!

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

For years I was always anti logging cord straight into the back of the truck since I thought that whilst the ends might be pretty dry, but once a few inches into the stick it would be as green as the day it was felled. I have taken moisture meter readings which would confirm this. However if this is the case, the weights of larch chip et al would be blatently lying; my goodness does it lose weight stacked under visqueen with open sides.

 

There have been debates about billets vs logs for drying time i.e end grain vs split and so on.

 

Processing cord that has been stacked and drying for X (?) number of years is imo the lowest input system for the highest output unless you can load logs by machine which still adds one stage in the process.

 

What are the facts on this one?!

 

[Eddy_t]

It does dry, eventually, what you've got to remember is it drys from those 2 ends only, and if it rains on the stacks, it's got to dry what soaks in before it drys the remaining moisture out

 

 

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[mendiplogs]

It does dry, eventually, what you've got to remember is it drys from those 2 ends only, and if it rains on the stacks, it's got to dry what soaks in before it drys the remaining moisture out

 

 

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HI EDDY/TCD it does but take too long if you have large butt say oak beech 2/3ft it will take far too long to season it better to cut up into logs as we had a large butt off a farmer it was oak butt 3ft been down for 10/15 years still very wet so i think it best split into logs thanks jon

[18 stoner]

Very dependant on species IMO.

 

Just in the world of hardwood it varies a lot, as Jon says such as oak can take years, yet such as sickie will get below 25% in a matter of months left in the stick.

[mendiplogs]

Very dependant on species IMO.

 

Just in the world of hardwood it varies a lot, as Jon says such as oak can take years, yet such as sickie will get below 25% in a matter of months left in the stick.

 

HI 18 as you no there are way around it to season it a lot faster things you can do and still have it in large cord size thanks jon

[Peter]

It does dry, not so quickly as cut logs. If you can fell and leave for a few weeks before snedding out the leaves will pull a lot of moisture out of the wood.

[openspaceman]

It does dry, not so quickly as cut logs. If you can fell and leave for a few weeks before snedding out the leaves will pull a lot of moisture out of the wood.

 

Yes this is sour felling often inadvertently practised with whole tree chipping when the felling gets ahead of the power station.

 

Bark is waterproof so until it dies and cracks away from the wood it resists moisture loss. Oily bark like birch is particularly bad as all the time the wood is above 25% decay bugs and fungi can turn it into a mush inside the bark. Any species will be suffering a loss of dry matter ( i.e. fuel value) all the time it is wet enough for decay mechanisms.

 

In the bad old days, before you could send a forwarder in at any time of year no matter what mess and ruts you leave behind, we had to make use of this fact to control the rate of drying of birch poles for turnery. These had to be winter felled and often not forwarded till after June. So we had to stripe the bark with a gouge made from a hooped bandsaw blade, 1 stripe for <4" 2 for <6"> and 3 for 6-7" IIRC.

 

Notwithstanding that yes wood does dry in cordwood stacks.

[Alycidon]

if the bark is somewhat stripped by a harvester then yes to a degree, I have been processing harvested Syc and Ash recently, delivered 2011, 21% and 24% on processing.

 

I processed some soft a few years ago, been down a couple of years, 4% on the end, 27% a foot into the trunk.

 

A

[muttley9050]

Isn't wood a lot easier to process when green and dries a lot quicker, so what is the benefit in leaving to season in the round?

[mendiplogs]

Isn't wood a lot easier to process when green and dries a lot quicker, so what is the benefit in leaving to season in the round?

 

HI MUTT some may like to leave in cord as it may not get nicked and theres less hrs to turn it into logs as you just split then out to customer but we split then store them up thanks jon