Daerve

Interesting thread. I must state I haven't read it all but have to agree with a lot of what has been written in the first post. I got my wood burner fitted last year and apart from the one crate of kiln dried stuff have had a nightmare with wood suppliers. I can cope with the vagaries of volume but if a supplier says it's seasoned, I expect it to be seasoned. I don't even care if it's not seasoned as long as the price is right, I'm a patient man but if a supplier says it's seasoned I expect to be able to burn it straight away and with just one exception barring the kiln dried it has been wetter than an otter's pocket. I don't like buying kiln dried, air dried is IMO a better burn,supports local businesses and is more environmentally friendly but if it's flogged as dry and isn't then I'm afraid I won't be buying again and will have to resort to the imported kiln dried rubbish so I can actually burn what I buy this year. Partly through processing a load of arb waste and unscrupulous suppliers I have about 3 years worth of wood, none of which is any good for burning now.

I have no idea to be honest as I've not measured it but logic dictates that a neatly stacked 2m3 will always give you more than loosely filled 2m3 in bags even if it's shook and bedded down. An "industry standard" for firewood is virtually impossible due to it's organic nature but even selling by volume gives vagaries which consumers pick up on.

Here lies the elephant in the room. I can get 2m3 of kiln dried ash for £190 delivered in the summer, that 2m3 is stacked in the crate with very little spare space so I'm getting just under 2m3 of wood. The cheapest local supplier charges about 80 quid a cube for seasoned hardwood if I go and fetch it, slightly more delivered. They supply in 1m3 bags which are loose filled. I'm therefore gambling on both moisture content and quantity so the kiln dried crate will generally win hands down. For what it's worth I much prefer using air dried logs and giving my money to local businesses but it just demonstrates the competition imported kiln dried logs bring to the market from a consumer point of view.

Unless you forced air through the container it will most likely rot the wood. Airflow is key to seasoning, all it needs is a roof and good airflow.

We have to use oil for CH but it's rarely on with the burner going. We only tend to use it in the morning prior to firing up the burner. Considering that I'm a total unashamed log goblin and have used up every spare bit of space to store free sourced wood means it's a lot cheaper than oil. No one gives away oil but wood....

Interestingly couldn't get the meter to even read when MC gets below 20%ish. Tried on a piece of seasoned oak and kiln drid ash plus a 42% soaking wet lump of oak. Only the wet oak would read which was 2.5 mega ohms. Though I suspect cheapy moisture meters aren't laboratory accurate, they're more than good enough to test if something can be chucked on the fire. More here if anyone's interested. http://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/fplgtr/fplgtr06.pdf

Moisture meters simply measure resistance, you can use a multimeter too. I'll have a play in a min with a cheapy ebay special and a professional multi meter. Give me a few minutes and I'll post the results.