Steven P

If you have the time stacking them will give a greater surface area to the wind and sun (? not convinced about sun, it does the job, not relying on getting sun in the Great British summer that's all)

I was about to swear and curse again at you... just replaced the tyre on my barrow. The first one (Chinese if that makes a difference) was very very tight to go on, the metal band came out the tyre, and I managed to get about 6 pinch punctures in the inner with the tyre levers. Tried a crow bar because of how tight it was a dented the rim. The UK supplier was great, replaced the tyre no problem. Second inner tube had a 'leak' in it when I took it to the tyre place - they struggled to get it on, told me to get a new wheel. Last go.. and it went on with no force sitting it on my knee watching Top Gear repeats or something (the first tyre needed a lot of body weight behind it...and the dented rim, plus a bent tyre lever). Oh in between all of this once the old one was on and 1 puncture left I tried a can of puncture sealant.. it blew the inner tube apart and spewed sealant all over the garage. So.. all in about to swear at you. I did cut up an old bike tyre and line the wheel rim with that in case of spiky rust (glued it in place) and seeing your post, should maybe have done the same and another old bike inner tube between the tube and the tyre? Old mountain bike days - had Kevlar between the tyre and tube for protection. If that's any use for you? I wanted to repair this since the wheel had a fixed axle in it, otherwise would need to get a new axle and shims to make it all fit if I had a new wheel, adding to the hassles. Oh, also needed a trip to B&Q for 2 bolts and nuts after having drilled the old rusted ones out. Not confident now about the new inner tube, but I have the old one still - a lot thicker from the feel of it (Noting that I had put a new hopper on this last year... sometime I guess they just wear out)

If it cuts OK then to me it is doing the job.

Th farmer opposite me did that, tightened it all up with the tractor

I'm going to jump in and call your bluff,.. it's what the people want I guess. I'm not so far from Paisley (Thornliebank direction if you want to make up your story), where is the tarmac job? I'll take a run past it at the weekend. However I might add a note about pilot holes in woodwork - I do that myself but I tend to use the cheapest screws from the cheap isle in Aldi, and a lot of my projects are made with pallet wood - not the best combination of cheap and cheap.

however.. most threads die away when everything useful has been said... good as a reference but not a lot new to add

Yup, get what you think you will need, then add some more and a little bit extra or good measure is where I aim for. According to what I read 5m3 should do my house, with a single 5kw stove heatng the house. I also am on good terms with the coal man too (multi-fuel stove), which gets to my first piece of advice, know where you can go to to get more if you run out - nothing like a 6:00 trip to B&Q for overpriced logs or coal after work when it has all gone. So if you are using all 4 stoves and based on my use 25m3 -might- be OK (not knowing your location, it is windy? and colder but maybe better insulated?) 25m3 looks like a line 25m long 1m high and 1m wide?....Noting here that if you make a bit 25m3 pile(gong with this number for now) the outside will dry nicely, the inside can stay wet - no airflow to the inside, no direct sun. I'll go 2 ways for my logs, either a stack, maybe 60cm wide (2 log lengths) along the walls, head height (I have kids, don't want it much higher), or I'll buld them a tower of logs, hollow centre (look in the log book), and a log roof, same size thickness walls, but I am not so keen to just lump them into a pile. Making a stack gives more surface area to the wind (location as well - get sun and wind?). It is a bit more work but mostly I am happy to burn wood seasoned for 8 months - so what I split now, I'll burn in the winter. Oh, split it as soon as you can. Pallets on the floor are great (I also have them on the garage floor when I take the dry logs in there), if not couple of bricks and sme long logs on top to make a base off the ground. I don't bother with a tarp in the summer, I shoul get one for the winter - the summer rain wn't affect it too much, winter rain does because that is constant here, 2 or 3 dry days drys out sumer rain easy enough, and of course i am not chasing tarps ll over the place in any heavy wnd

I was thinking it all depends on the local rules what things are made from, however paper cups.. plastic insides all over. Canada: Fast paced living in the cities - not every city, som still have time for breakfast (I regularly go to Quebec, mostly relaxed there) Another thought I had today - getting The Boys their ice ceam fix. how about silicone ice cube trays? Do a melted wax mix, pour into them, set, pop them out, job done, I reckon 30 minutes (to melt the wax) can make hundreds

If you are gong to the expense of candles my first thought is it would work out a similar price to firelighters from the shop with more hassle? Oh, one I used to use is just bung a tea light under the kindling. Myself, a decent dry kindling and a newspaper does me fine, but with lockdown and no 'metro' on my commute I am going bog standard firelighters from Lidl. Still with kindling on top, and they does well. If you are making your own, might be that you want to melt the wax in a pan, and mix in all the sawdust, shavings and so on and them spoon that into your egg cartons? You could even pour this mix onto a baking tray (grease proof paper it first) to make a fire lighter slab and just break bits off a you need them, or chop into squares? Might be better to get a dedicated pan for this, saves arguments.. I do the same with bird feed, melt lard mix in bird seed, pour into yoghurt pots, hang from a tree On a very similar theme - my boys love their ice cream so take those boxes, stuff them with sawdust and onto the fire - a lot cleaner and saves covering the hearth with sawdust

Take a nail out the fire, glowing orangem that will be at about 850 deg C. Am sure a lot of us have either had the sides of the stove begin to glow, or heard of it happening, that is at about 650 deg C Normal operation, outside of the insulating firebricks and cast body, 200 to 300 deg C soubds about right. The magnetic thermometers are fo the flue - not a part of the stove as such, not insulated and much thinner waled which is why they are hotter

Maybe, just been looking at saw dust burners and stoves. similar apart from the bit at the bottom

The stove manufacturer would be able to tell you and to tell you what the minimum sec for a hearth for that stove is. So maybe see a stove you like and in budget, and ask the manufacturer. I would expect more problems if you were changing a stove and just assumed an existing hearth was OK if the new stove is physically bigger. Wouldn't expect a modern stove to heat a hearth above 100deg C though (Going downwards - Fire, Grid, air gap, ash pan, base of stove, air gap, hearth would need a fair heat to get through all of that)

Stainless steel shell -could- be there to make it look nicer and not affect the stoves operation. When I was looking last night I had a feeling that the top hole should have a cover on it and for some reason thought it would be removable with a handle or something but no cover shown in the pictures. If you take the pipe out the back as a flu connection (controllable which does happen to dampen the fire), then the top hole doesn't make sense to be left open as part of a passageway for the smoke - it wold flood the room with smoke. There might be alternative flu connections of course for a more versatile installation. If so is the back connection removable, if not then it only has 1 flue connection. (and then going by these guesses, rear flu, with a hole on the top... what is that hole for?) The next piece to work out then is maybe fuelling the stove. Can you get a log in past the grid at the front? If you couldn't get a log in then it isn't a log burner and is for smaller stuff like coal, chips or pellets. it isn't a liquid stove because it has an ash pan and no feed pipe connection from what I see.

Looking again at this, it it some sort of pellet stove? Pour the pellets in at the top, they fall down to the fire? Only thinking what it might be.

So it is some kind of stove we'll assume. fire proof? I would be tempted to screw up a couple of pieves of paper, light them and pop them in. If there is a flu and chimney a bit of paper should be enough to create some heat and a bit of a draw up the chimney taking away the smoke. If it doesn't a couple of pieces of paper will send enough smoke into the room for you to notice it. This is tricky to see from the photo - has it been used before? Nice smooth metal with sharp corners, no remains of ashes, put your hand in and no soot anywhere might suggest new stove that hasn't been used Final check you might want to do is to look at the chimney, where is it in relation to the stove? (and if you do the paper check, you might see some smoke coming out). So if it looks like there is a flu and chimney the next thing to do is to get it swept and cleaned then? Oh, looking at the photos, I assume that is its door stood behind it. The handle from the top to the pipe behind the stove is for the air supply. If you look at the stove, is there a makers mark anywhere. So my suspision looking at it, is they stove was placed there to look good for the sale. I suspect it is quite new. No chimney attached - with my stove half the cost was installing a chimey liner in the existing chimney, if your room doesn't have a handy chimney the vendor might not have bothered to do the full job and saved the cost. So let us know how you get on, it looks intruiging

Looking at the photo, from the stove top to the cowel must be more than 6.5 ft, 4ft outside leaves about 2.5 ft insde above the stove - the poster is a hobbit! I suspect he means from the ceiling to the cowel is 6.5 ft

Rich Rule... Mr Steven would pretty much kill me if I left my axes hanging about in the hall like next to your fire, bad enough sharpening the chainsaws in the living room and watching a film together. Stere, I used to get the free Metro on my commute to light fires with, grabbed enough in the year to see me through the winter, the plan all went wrong this year and working at home, no commute, no papers. Had to buy firelighters for the first time this year

Your campfires will take quicker if you lght them up a bit anf not at the base, Same as Norwegian Log Book suggests, larger logs at the base and the hot embers will set them on fire. Benefit of this is that you don't flick ember in the air putting a large log on if it allready the the base of the fire My top tip, dry kinding and after that we all have our favourite ways

How heavy is it? Oak is heavier than willow which are the 2 choices being considered. Also the end grain, willow is fast growing and will have wider growth rings oak will be closer together. I'm no expert and might be wrong of course. Often when I see logs like that a few leaves sneak in and they can help you out

I'd agree with Big, J, since new year, 3 weeks, I thik there has only been a cuple f days where it hasn't gone below freezing which is unusual. I keep a note and will check soon but most years we get 1 or 2 cold days in the UK, then it warms up for a week, then another couple of cold days. This year, about 3 weeks in a row

Just to add to this, anything that you get tipped this winter will still be wet, and will need to be dried if you want the 'ideal' 20% moisture content. So it will be good for next winter. You might have to accept the inevtiable and buy some fuel this winter. It might be possible to get waste wood that is dry from local joiners and so on, perhaps clean pallets (not painted for example). Pallets you can usually pick up on industrial estates if you ask and should be dry wood. Of course you have to deal wirth nais and taking them apart. But then you would normally have to split and maybe cut free logs too.

I have a file for the dinks, a stone and a Fiskars Xsharp. I was dubious about the Fiskars but on their axe it is OK, dead easy to just quickly run the axe through it a couple of times without a big sharpening set up needed. Not had much luck on the hand axe with it yet, the blade is a different angle and it needs a bit of work to get it to match the XSharp, having said that, the knife side works well in the kitchen too. Can't go wrong with a stone and a file, does the lawnmower as well

Pretty crappy? Regardless who owns them they are not yours. Imagine you were in Essex near one of the fields used to store new imported cars, you can't just go in that field and take one simply because there are hundreds there. Same with with trees - the value is less but the principle is the same. Another way to look at the issue is that if everyone took the attitude, council land, council trees, we own it, I'll take it, then pretty quick there will be no trees left. Often the dead wood on the ground can be left for wildlife

Thinking about this, construction sites have fuel tank for things like generators, no need to bury them in concrete. They will need a bund and so on, not sure about filling them though, much like Donnk pictured

I'll agree with Stubby here about getting a bulk load of logs. I don't however know your set up, your new house might be a small city centre terrace with a yard, it might be detached house and acres of land. You migh have a log store outside at the moment, there might not be. But to answer your question, 1 bag will last about a night. They are priced for the occasional fire, such as a few over Christmas week and the odd weekend and where buyng a bulk load would be more expensive or inconveniant to having to store half a load till the next winter. If you had a fire on each night, £6.50 a night it soon becomes an expensive thing. These bags are bulky in a retail shelf and have to pay their way... so the pice is high. Bulk delivery, comes from an out of town yard generally, with much smaller overheads, and so are a lot cheaper... but you need to store them and keep them dry.. which is where Stubby comes in with building a log store. You might also consider getting a hatchet or small axe, again a money saving thing that pre cut kindling is another process, adding a cost to log.. which you have anyway it soon pays for tself. There are a lot of log suppliers out there, and you can look on places like Gumtree where there will be the occasioal advert for logs but these generally need splitting, however can be free too. It also might be that a local log supplier if asked nicely could deliver smaller amounts if you don't have space to store them - probably at a premium but not as much as Wicks