Crap vs good wood in stove?

[dig-dug-dan]

About to install a burner in my conservatory. My mate said "you will be keeping all the best logs for yourself now instead of selling them"

No I wont. I will sell them, and burn all the crap I cannot sell. Including old fence posts, and tons of conifer!!!!

[woodyguy]

I suspect the snobbery about hardwood vs softwood and ash vs everything else just comes from ignorance and the number of cowboys out there selling unseasoned wood. If you had a delivery of wet oak one year then next year paid top price for well seasoned ash, then you are going to swear by the ash. I burn mainly birch cause I've got thousands of them and I thin them regularly. It's all wood.

Please don't anybody quote that God awful poem!!!

[CJM]

I suspect the snobbery about hardwood vs softwood and ash vs everything else just comes from ignorance and the number of cowboys out there selling unseasoned wood. If you had a delivery of wet oak one year then next year paid top price for well seasoned ash, then you are going to swear by the ash. I burn mainly birch cause I've got thousands of them and I thin them regularly. It's all wood.

Please don't anybody quote that God awful poem!!!

 

That information comes from the leaflets you get with your brand new stove, only burn kiln dried hardwood as its 100% sustainable and its carbon neutral bla bla bla bullsh*t bullsh*t bullsh*t......... annoying

[billpierce]

yeah as said burn any wood as long as properly seasoned. i think the fuss is about some folk thinking you get more for your money buying seasoned hard wood than soft etc

[openspaceman]

You will be cursing them cut up pallets when you get a puncture from them .

:

 

Yes, this is why I burn pallets at home as those left lying around end up breaking up and shedding nails whereas cutting the stretches into 12" lengths for kindling and using the blocks as logs means the nails all stay in the stove and can be disposed in the dustbin.

 

I once went through the site of a small, family, November 5th bonfire with a magnet and retrieved a wheelbarrow load of nails but I bet I missed half of them

[Lucan]

i think the fuss is about some folk thinking you get more for your money buying seasoned hard wood than soft etc

 

Well sometimes you do. It is estimated that softwood contains 75% of energy of hardwood per volume. Therefor if your local merchant is only offering softwood 15% cheaper then why buy softwood?

[openspaceman]

Crap???? Yes I have burned that too

 

I made a device to burn cleanings from the stables, worked well as the wood-flakes were reasonably dry. Dried dung cakes are a common fuel in the third world even if a bit wasteful of their fertiliser value.

[Billy68]

I guess that makes me a cowboy as I sell unseasoned wood and I burn whatever comes off the pile and I've been doing it for a long time and have a lot of happy customers it's all about education

[Big J]

There is a chap on the local Gumtree selling kiln dried Ash logs for £275 for two cube - finest quality firewood you can buy he says.

 

My question would be, why go to such lengths to find such extraordinary quality timber if you are only going to burn it?

[agrimog]

when anyone asks me what I burn, my standard reply is, " I burn special stuff, its called tree wood"..... if its dry, it goes in the stove, and the sawdust from the mill goes into empty fruit juice cartons, gets mixed with waste vegie oil, (courtesy of the local kebab shop), and these get burned as well. heats the house and workshop all winter to toasty