The thing about firewood

[timill]

is that it warms you several times.

We had a couple of dead trees felled when we moved in here (standard Tennessee method - chainsaw to prepare the fell, and a length of line, a block, and a pickup truck to do the actual felling) and the feller chainsawed the trunks into firewood lengths.

On Monday we hired another chap to split the logs - he reckoned a couple of ricks (whatever that is) so about $80. In fact he spent much of the day at it, estimated the pile at 6-7 ricks ($240) and there's still as much again to split.

So this week I've been moving the split wood up from where the trees were to the lower porch and stacking it. I now have a pile about 8'x2'x2', and the original pile doesn't look any smaller.

Who needs a gym?

Comments

[nojay.livejournal.com]

Have you ever heated a house with wood? If not, prepare to be surprised just how fast that small pile you are so proud of disappears up the chimney. I suspect Marcia may be more aware of this than yourself.

I presume the "chap" you hired used a powered splitter to do the work; splitting fresh wood with a maul and wedge is a bugger and if it was done manually you got a bargain. If you stack the slabs you've got left under cover and let them dry out for a couple of seasons then a cruiser-weight axe and some practice will do for the rest of them.

[timill]

I haven't, but I certainly expect it to disappear rapidly.

The splitter was indeed powered, (by gas/petrol) and I'm now looking at the small electric splitters (around $300) to deal with the stuff he left. I have a maul and a pair of wedges should I feel short of exercise at any time...

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

From age twelve to fifteen, I lived with my father, who heated his home with wood. (He was a US Forest Service officer and we generally lived in or near USFS bases, with decent access to firewood we could legally cut.) Dad aimed to lay in approximately six cords of wood (http://www.woodheat.org/firewood/cord.htm) per season. (I'd never heard of a rick (http://hearth.com/econtent/index.php/QA_Templates/info/1868/) of wood myself.) His pickup truck, with side-boards to extend the load and overload springs to keep from collapsing while holding it, would hold about 3/4 cord. He did most of the cutting, and I did a whole lot of hauling. And boy, you're sure right about how much trouble splitting green wood is. The pine we were using seemed to grow with spiral grain, making things even worse. After I blistered my hands trying to split the stuff and my father discovered I wasn't malingering when he tried to split some himself, he broke out the chainsaw to cut the stuff lengthwise. I think he didn't fancy renting a power splitter, but it sure generated a lot of sawdust!

Even having a broken arm didn't exempt me from hauling in firewood from the wood pile to the fireplace. And when I had a newspaper route, I was up a couple of hours before everyone else in the house on account of needing to fold my papers and go deliver them, so I also got to get the fire stoked up in the morning. I'm getting cold just thinking about it.

[nojay.livejournal.com]

My father was in the coal-mining industry as a pit engineer, originally working on steam and later electro-hydraulic equipment. As a miner he got an allowance of "concessionary" coal, heavily discounted at about 10% of the list price for house coal. We went through about seven tonnes a year in a family home in Scotland (wet and cold but rarely below zero centigrade in winter, never hot in summer). By volume, that would be about 2 cords.

When he retired, the concession went down to 5 tonnes a year and I used to go up to his cousin's farm to their timber wood to bring down van-loads of pine to supplement the coal. I'd also pick up anything like broken pallets or other scrap wood as targets of opportunity.

[armb.livejournal.com]

> splitting fresh wood with a maul and wedge is a bugger

But, at least for ash, easier than splitting seasoned wood because you put it off because it's a bugger....

My pile is a lot smaller though.

[armb.livejournal.com]

P.S. My grandfather had a timber-yard. We have photos of a large tree being taken back by horse team (after being felled by hand, of course). In fact we used his old two-man saw to finish felling a tree in my parents' garden, since my chainsaw was too small to do it all (and it gave better control - we also had a winch on a rope doing the pickup's job).

The version of the "several times" I've heard was "once for felling, once for splitting, once for burning".

[mkillingworth.livejournal.com]

This is good red oak, and the trees were dead, so much of it was already dried out. And a rick is nominally half a cord.

[nojay.livejournal.com]

Doesn't matter if the trees were dead or not. Seasoning only really starts when the wood has been cut into lengths and the grain ends are exposed so it can dry out.

Oak will take longer to season (a couple of years stacked) than pine or other softwood. If it's red oak then you will need a splitter, unless you want to end up with forearms like Popeye. Problem is that once you have your own splitter you start looking around for other trees to take down and turn into firewood. That means getting a chainsaw and a pickup truck and a hound dog -- no, scratch the last one. Samson will have to suffice. P.S. give him a scritch from me.