who is still burning wood in april?

[Daddy Tanuki]

My grandfather told me "you should have your next years' wood all cut split and stacked under roof by Easter"
- I try to have it done during the early winter when it is cooler out, and no bugs but then life happens it seems...got a bit more to process yet mostly slabs from the sawmill - which will dry out quickly anyways - we use them duing cold mornings in the fall, or to light a fire later in the winter.
I totally agree with your comment about well seasoned wood, even SPF - will burn very clean.

this is 2027's firewood. I always let it age about 3 years. makes for a clean chimney.

 

[OffGridForGood]

2027 - I wish I had my storage set up with that much room.
Ya got me thinking...

 

[Daddy Tanuki]

2027 - I wish I had my storage set up with that much room.
Ya got me thinking...

remember currently I am only up there on the weekends, so I do not need as much I stock about 3 cords per year, at least I did up to renovating the cabin with new siding, insulation and double pane glass. this year I only used about 1/2 of that (1.5 cords or less) so i need to make adjustments to my wood pile. this time I already had the wood cut and sitting at a lot and had to move it or pay for storage. I might not cut any wood next year as a result.

 

[millsan1]

Here is most of this winters wood. Rented a big processor. I liked it so much I ended up buying a small processor. Ran it about 3 hours and made 2 chords.

 

[Daddy Tanuki]

View attachment 219821

Here is most of this winters wood. Rented a big processor. I liked it so much I ended up buying a small processor. Ran it about 3 hours and made 2 chords.

Nice thats enough for two or three years for me I would guess, now when i move up there full time for retirement I hope that my waste oil burner/Solar dump load will keep me at the one or two cords level. below is my wood processor's

View attachment 219821

Here is most of this winters wood. Rented a big processor. I liked it so much I ended up buying a small processor. Ran it about 3 hours and made 2 chords.

 

[Off-Gridder]

I'm a little late to the thread but to answer the original question, the last burn at our homestead was May 11... we were blessed with 18" of wet heavy snow here. For those who live off-grid and depend on battery storage for power when power is not being generated you may find our thermal battery storage system interesting.

It's based on a rocket stove combustion core embedded in a thermal mass. I built this over the winter to do a better job at maintaining heat overnight in my shop and at the same time significantly reducing the amount of wood I burn and time I spent tending to fires. The long name for this design is a batch rocket masonry mass heater. It takes relatively small loads of wood in the firebox which is lit from the top and burns down. The combustion gases travel horizontally through a venturi port which speeds up the flow and make a 90 deg turn up a riser that is about 3' tall. The entire combustion core is made of high temperature refractory brick and the gases exit the riser into a double skin brick enclosure that is almost 6' tall. I embedded several thermocouples in strategic locations to monitor the temperatures. The gases in the riser reach almost 1,600 deg F where they exit the top into the brick enclosure with is a huge mass of roughly 7,000 lbs. The heat is absorbed into the mass and cools the gases until they drop to the exhaust port at floor level and then exit up the chimney. The mass does a fantastic job at capturing the heat that the chimney exit temperatures as it leaves the mass is only 175 deg F. There is zero smoke due to the high combustion temperatures ever last bit of combustible fuel is consumed. Consequently, there is also zero soot or creosote in the system, almost 100% clean burn. With the rocket mass heaters you also don't have to be so choosy with what you burn. A bundle of sticks off of your land will work just as well as carefully seasoned hardwood. It takes a few days to get the mass up to temperature, roughly 140 - 150 deg, but once it is it only requires a couple quick burns a day to maintain it. We used to burn about 7 cords a year and I'm guessing from our brief experience that this will at least cut in half (I only finished building the heater in March).

Here's a picture showing the combustion core and a picture of the finished heater which sits behind the bar in the shop.

 

[Daddy Tanuki]

I'm a little late to the thread but to answer the original question, the last burn at our homestead was May 11... we were blessed with 18" of wet heavy snow here. For those who live off-grid and depend on battery storage for power when power is not being generated you may find our thermal battery storage system interesting.

It's based on a rocket stove combustion core embedded in a thermal mass. I built this over the winter to do a better job at maintaining heat overnight in my shop and at the same time significantly reducing the amount of wood I burn and time I spent tending to fires. The long name for this design is a batch rocket masonry mass heater. It takes relatively small loads of wood in the firebox which is lit from the top and burns down. The combustion gases travel horizontally through a venturi port which speeds up the flow and make a 90 deg turn up a riser that is about 3' tall. The entire combustion core is made of high temperature refractory brick and the gases exit the riser into a double skin brick enclosure that is almost 6' tall. I embedded several thermocouples in strategic locations to monitor the temperatures. The gases in the riser reach almost 1,600 deg F where they exit the top into the brick enclosure with is a huge mass of roughly 7,000 lbs. The heat is absorbed into the mass and cools the gases until they drop to the exhaust port at floor level and then exit up the chimney. The mass does a fantastic job at capturing the heat that the chimney exit temperatures as it leaves the mass is only 175 deg F. There is zero smoke due to the high combustion temperatures ever last bit of combustible fuel is consumed. Consequently, there is also zero soot or creosote in the system, almost 100% clean burn. With the rocket mass heaters you also don't have to be so choosy with what you burn. A bundle of sticks off of your land will work just as well as carefully seasoned hardwood. It takes a few days to get the mass up to temperature, roughly 140 - 150 deg, but once it is it only requires a couple quick burns a day to maintain it. We used to burn about 7 cords a year and I'm guessing from our brief experience that this will at least cut in half (I only finished building the heater in March).

Here's a picture showing the combustion core and a picture of the finished heater which sits behind the bar in the shop.

View attachment 219850

View attachment 219851

sweet! makes me want to visit and order a wild turkey double on the rocks.

 

[Off-Gridder]

sweet! makes me want to visit and order a wild turkey double on the rocks.

We can do that... or we also have a variety of moonshine as well as lots of other tasty bourbon's and whiskey's.

 

[UpNorthMan]

Off-Gridder, do you have plans for that stove! That looks awesome and very professional!

 

[Off-Gridder]

Off-Gridder, do you have plans for that stove! That looks awesome and very professional!

Thanks UpNorthMan... it was a really fun and challenging project considering I never laid brick before. I'm now a journeyman brick mason . It was 2 months of planning and gathering materials and almost 3 months of construction. It can certainly be built faster depending on your mason skills and desired quality of the finished system.

There aren't any plans per se, you'll find that these systems are all custom built based on needs and desired functionality. There is another variation of this design that has a thermal storage element to it but it provides rapid radiant heat by using a steel barrel as the shroud around the riser to capture the hot gases and then distribute through a masonry mass as it cools.

Here are a few links to give you more detail. First is a photo album of my entire build. Next is a link to my As-Built details posted on the Rocket Mass Heater forum on Permies.com. If you are still interested in learning about this wonderful way to heat, the Permies RMH community is a great group of folks willing to help you through the process. Also, check out this guy from Holland, Peter van den Berg... he's been at the forefront of development for the past 15+ years, and is continuing to develop the technology. He was fantastic in guiding me through my build for the critical details. Last is my actual build thread on Permies that I used to leverage the rocket scientist community to help keep me on track.