Splitting and Burning

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We are now officially into winter. It's cold outside...the snow is getting deeper...and the wood is burning up faster. I never would have guessed how much I would use my new Collins Splitting maul when I first purchased it. Before the snow hit I decided to pull out a lot of the larger rounds from the wood pile and split them. It's nice to have some split wood around when I am loading the stove. The split pieces seem to lay well in the firebox and help my larger rounds burn. Plus, my wife appreciates the split wood as they are easier for her to toss into the Hardy. It's always wise to keep the wife in good spirits! Before I had this maul, I would never split a log unless it was too big to fit in the firebox door. The maul has added a new dimension to my Hardy experience and has made me realize that their is value in split wood.
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Below is a picture of some quick work of mine with the Collins Maul. I split up some large cherry rounds and, despite the cherry being in the wood shed over a year, I could smell the aroma of fresh cut black cherry when the log split open. It's a great smell. Try putting your nose close to your screen and maybe you too can catch a whiff. Sometimes I think the wood is just too pretty to burn. Just like this black cherry you see below. It has a great color and grain. Oh well...in ya go!

Last night the temperature dipped to 12 degrees (f) but the Hardy went easy on the wood. The firebox was about 1/3 full after an 11 hour burn. I haven't done a scientific study on wood usage but I am pretty sure round logs will burn longer than if they were split. There is probably a trade off where the split wood burns hotter but the rounds last longer...but honestly I have too much wood right now to worry about it. Of course, this won't always be the case. I already see my woodpile getting smaller and it won't be long until the snow is gone and I am back in the woods cutting up next winter's stash.
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OWB

My Hardy H2 and Woodshed

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I wanted to post a couple pictures of my Hardy H2, the woodshed, and the surrounding woodpile. If you are thinking of installing an outdoor wood furnace maybe these pictures will help you with your planning. Again...as I have continued to confess, my woodshed is WAY too small for keeping enough wood under roof for a burning season. My woodshed measures 8'x16' and I can stack the wood about 6 foot high. This yields 6 cords of wood under the roof. In reality my shed should have been double this size as I think I average about 12 cords of wood a year in my Hardy.
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This picture is of my Hardy as it sets by the woodshed. You are looking at the path I walk to get to the firebox door, which is on the other side of the furnace from this view. I set the furnace this way so I can conveniently grab a log from under the roof and toss it into the firebox. Also note the extra 4 foot piece of smoke stack. I installed this to keep the embers from shooting into the shed. The extra length helped a lot in directing any errant embers away from the seasoned wood. Finally you can see to the left of the picture how I stack the wood along the Hardy to serve as a wind break. This keeps the snow from drifting as I sit in the middle of a cornfield and the wind tends to really whip out here.

This next picture shows the other side of my Hardy. From this vantage point I am standing under the roof of my woodshed looking at the door to the firebox. I can keep out of the rain or snow while I am dealing with the furnace by standing inside the woodshed. This really is a nice convenience during very cold winter days as I can stay out of the wind and be close to the firebox and ash bin. If you are not familiar with the Hardy, the ash bin is the smaller door on the bottom. I have a shovel I slide into this door to dig out the ashes when they start to build up. The firebox is the larger door. I have learned the hard way that you never open the firebox door without first opening the ash bin. If you value your hair and eyebrows you will open the ash bin door first!

This angle is also from under the roof of my woodshed and it shows the Hardy in relation to the house. My Hardy sits about 50 feet from the house and I placed it to the northeast corner of the lot. This, for the most part, places my house out of the prevailing wind as the smoke usually blows the other way from the house. If you are interested you can see one of my ham radio antennas on the right side of the upper roof. It is a copper J-Pole for my 2 meter UHF rig. But I digress...

Lastly...what would any picture of a Hardy H2...or any outdoor wood furnace...be without the "business end" in action. This is not a big fire when I snapped this shot but I was getting cold and took what was available to me. You really have to be careful when you open the firebox as the Hardy H2 will spit fire at you if you aren't careful. My firebox takes about 2 fillings a day, during freezing temperatures, to keep the house warm. This is a beautiful sight to me. All the work I did this summer to find, cut, haul, split, and stack wood begins to pay me back. My gas bill is still sitting at $0. Just the way I like it!

Merry Christmas from OWB!

Cold, Nasty, Weather

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We had an interesting week with our weather here in Northeast Ohio. Wow did it get cold...and windy...which made the cold seem much more cold than what it really was. This morning I woke up to a hard, driving rain. Outside it wasn't just rain, but ice and freezing rain. The roads were slippery and I saw three cars in ditches on our way for morning coffee.
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This year the wood I am burning in the Hardy H2 has been seasoned for 1 to 2 years. This is the first year I have used "seasoned" wood...that is, having dried out for over 1 year. Until this year I have burned wood that was cut earlier in the spring. It dried over the summer and then went into the Hardy that winter. Last year, however I had a very productive year harvesting firewood which allowed me to stash some wood for next year...which is the case THIS year in that I have a large pile of seasoned wood to burn. What I have noticed immediately is how much nicer, and hotter, the seasoned stuff burns compared to what I had fed into the Hardy in previous years. Don't let anyone tell you different about firewood...seasoned wood makes a HUGE difference in the amount of heat it gives off, and its worth to the user as a resource to heat a house.
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This current cold snap we are dealing with had tested my Hardy and my woodpile but both came thru with flying colors. Two years ago Ohio had some minus teens temperatures and my Hardy never even strained in its role of heat provider. The weather we experienced recently was low-teens temps but with 50 MPH winds. It was awful going out to feed the furnace as the wind just cut right through me. I keep reminding myself that nothing is free in life...even free heat is not free. Consider the cost of chainsaws, splitters, trucks, trailers, gas, oil, chains etc...but also consider leaving the comfort of your house to trudge out to your furnace, in a blizzard, to fill it with logs until you get to do it again before you leave to work the next morning....Who am I kidding, I loved every minute of it. God bless the Hardy H2!
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OWB

Organizing the Wood Pile

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My woodpile for this season isn't that pretty to look at. Don't think it is because I'm lazy...because I'm not...but this year I got my wood in huge spurts and when I was cutting so much, I didn't have the time to stack when I was unloading my truck. Result...the pile got away from me this year. This picture was taken from my upstairs bathroom and you can compare it to earlier photos I took of my Hardy and the wood shed. Of course the wood shed is too small...one of my planning miscalculations when I installed this OWB. You can see the Hardy in the center of the pile. I stack wood around it to serve as a wind break and snow fence.

I am sorry for the shadow as it makes the pile a little hard to see. My pile goes farther to the left of this picture. All the wood to the left is ash, and the small split pile in the center too is ash. In an earlier post I wrote about a big score this fall with a farmer's field, mostly ash, and this is the result. The split stuff was with my new Collins Maul. That was a lot of fun.

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Here is another photo of my wood pile. Here my house is to my right and I am looking east. In the foreground is ash. Against the woodshed is maple. Everything else is black cherry and a little oak.

My plan this year is to burn everything in the shed and then replace that with what is on the grass. Most of my wood in the shed is a year old and I am not pleased with my older maple logs as they are starting to turn punky. I split an old maple log yesterday and it had a mushroom growing inside it. Not a good sign. Each day the weather is nice I am outside organizing the pile. If I took a picture today I think you would notice my progress. So far this season we haven't had snow and that has made managing my wood pile nice. It's satisfying to me to know that my hands have touched every single log you see in this picture. That's a lot of work for "free" heat!
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Smokin

My new Collins Splitting Maul

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I added a new weapon to my arsenal of firewood making tools. It is the Collins 6 pound maul with a fiberglass handle. I was at Ace Hardware and stumbled upon a one-day-only 50% off sale. I went to the sledge hammer rack looking for a good axe and decided to try a maul. I had never used one as I don't make a habit of splitting the wood I burn. I only split a log if it won't fit in the door of my Hardy H2. Here is a picture of my new toy.

I must say that the maul is a great invention. Before the purchase of this Collins Maul I mostly used a wedge and sledge, which works well but nothing like the speed of this maul. If you have a good group of logs, without knots or crotches, a maul just may be your answer. You can have a nice pile of split wood in no time with a maul. This works great. If you do run across a stubborn log you have to spend some more time with it by nibbling around the edges, peeling it like an onion. Be advised that you can forget trying to split elm with a maul but as for the ash logs you see in the picture I knocked these out fast. I was physically spent after splitting two face cords of wood but it was the most fun I have had since running a Dolmar chainsaw! I can see how splitting wood can be a better alternative to a gym membership but anytime you are swinging a six pound steel chisel, the risk of injury has be recognized. I would keep your spectators back at a safe distance too as some of the wood can fly long distances when whacked with the maul.

I have been contemplating the purchase of a hydraulic splitter but to be honest, the maul is a lot faster...assuming you have the right kind of wood and you have the physical shape to trudge through the task. But, of course, not all wood is easy to split. There are elms, sycamores, apple and the like out there...and the ubiquitous stubborn log that just don't seem to split. I ran across a few of those with my new maul and tossed them off to the side until I someday buy my splitter, or borrow my friends. A splitter would be a MAJOR investment and I would only buy one if I knew I could make money with it...enough to justify its expense...selling firewood. I have noticed I am slowly becoming ensnared in the grip of woodcutting addiction. With chainsaws, wedges, mauls, splitters, my Hardy H2...my daily thoughts usually revolve around these. Some of my favorite things!

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Smokin