I have a pair of welders gloves..... as well as a wood burner.
I put the gloves on all the time now when dealing with the stove
If a glowing ember falls out of the fire onto the floor, I can actually pick up the ember and throw it back in the fire without a moments hesitation..... No faffing about with tongs.....
Three or four feet across. As big as I could ge tin the back of the truck single handedly.
You use the ash shovel which also doubles as a heat sink. Never quite fast enough though and inevitably there are burn marks.
I never bothered with a guard when in the room, but always had one up when the fire was unattended. The stove is a lot less hassle and a lot warmer for a smaller amount of solid fuel burnt.
Yes, well I've just got the smokeless fuel alight with the aid of a blowtorch. Seems you have to get enough of it to a certain temperature before the fire is self sustaining. It is blowing a gale here and the kitchen hood anti backdraught shutter is slapping but from the firelighter smoke a good draw up the chimney - so far so good. I wont put on any wood until I have the fireguard which is on order. Cheers, Simon.
You need to learn how to lay a fire. Ask a boy scout.
Keep a watering can by the fire.
I have a multifuel wood burner stove and this is the method I use:
scrunch up news paper into balls, each ball being one sheet only.
Build one layer on bottom of grate.
prepare some soft wood dry kindling that is 30cm by 1cm by 1cm.
I put down 6 sticks evenly spaced in parallel. I then put a 2nd layer of sticks same as first layer but perpendicular.
3rd layer is same as 1st layer 4th layer same as second layer.You then end up with a spaced out version of Jenga on top of a layer of newspaper balls.
Open primary air vent, open secondary air vent.
Set fire to the newspaper close door till its slightly ajar.
When all of the wood is all converted to red glowing embers, ( takes about 5 mins) then put a log on.
close secondary air vent. Use the primary air vent to control fire burn rate.
Continue to burn with logs until you get a good thick layer of embers.
Then start with smoke less coal, one layer at a time.
You need lots of hot embers in order to have enough heat to start the smokeless fuel going.
smokeless coal will need more air than wood, so open the primary air vent.
I have a multifuel wood burner stove and this is the method I use:
scrunch up news paper into balls, each ball being one sheet only.
Build one layer on bottom of grate.
prepare some soft wood dry kindling that is 30cm by 1cm by 1cm.
I put down 6 sticks evenly spaced in parallel. I then put a 2nd layer of sticks same as first layer but perpendicular.
3rd layer is same as 1st layer 4th layer same as second layer.You then end up with a spaced out version of Jenga on top of a layer of newspaper balls.
Open primary air vent, open secondary air vent.
Set fire to the newspaper close door till its slightly ajar.
When all of the wood is all converted to red glowing embers, ( takes about 5 mins) then put a log on.
close secondary air vent. Use the primary air vent to control fire burn rate.
Continue to burn with logs until you get a good thick layer of embers.
Then start with smoke less coal, one layer at a time.
You need lots of hot embers in order to have enough heat to start the smokeless fuel going.
smokeless coal will need more air than wood, so open the primary air vent.
If you are splitting a lot of logs, I would seriously recommend one of these:
Get the stand as well. I find I can keep splitting methodically for hours, without the wear and tear to the shoulders from using a maul.
Cheers Richard
Visited friends with a stove. They do send out a lot of heat, but I found t he open fire was pretty good for radiated heat once the whole area heated u p. Then if you turn the coals over, the radiated heat doubles. Trouble is i t doesn't heat up the air that much. But, much nicer looking direct at flames than through the glass of a stove. I bunged on a few timber offcuts now and then.
Is it safe to burn modern "tanalised" wood ?
Anyway, we basically sat in front of the fire instead of watching TV (its i n the other room !). And I cracked nuts and chucked the shells into the fire. Not so easy to do that with a stove. Happy Christmas. Simon.
snip
depends whether you or your kin breathe the smoke containing the toxic copper, chrome and arsenic compounds?
Jim K
pper, chrome and arsenic compounds?
Some info from elsewhere:
"Tanalised" is a bit of a generic term and you need to establish which Tana lith formulation has been used. The old CCA treatments did contain arsenic (Copper/Chromium/Arsenic - IIRC) but not been used for many years so unlike ly that any new product or offcut therefrom would have these metals. The gr een tinted stuff is TanalithE which does contain copper but neither of the other two. Tanalith Clear aka Tanalithm has no heavy metal content.
I suppose the other thing is burning too much softwood can tar up the chimn ey and thats not good.
Simon.
I've not seen one of those since 1990 when the curator ordered it destroyed. They were still being marketed by a chap Near Petworth till at least 1976. Is it still possible to get black powder for muzzle loaders?
Dried logs tend to be harder to split than green and green logs dry quicker once split.
I use a 5lb felling axe as nowadays I find mauls too heavy. If it doesn't split with 3 blows I give up and saw it. Occasionally I will use the hycrack variant on tractor PTO but that is not without problems.
AJH
Naughty, this tends to open the eye and eventually split the cheek off the axe head.
AJH
Ford V8 log splitter:
Especially look at the end!
I have this theory that you chop and split wood to keep warm, and throw the wood away. I turn on an electric heater, powered by a hydroelectric power station. Sustainable!
Visited friends with a stove. They do send out a lot of heat, but I found the open fire was pretty good for radiated heat once the whole area heated up. Then if you turn the coals over, the radiated heat doubles. Trouble is it doesn't heat up the air that much. But, much nicer looking direct at flames than through the glass of a stove. I bunged on a few timber offcuts now and then.
Is it safe to burn modern "tanalised" wood ?
Depends. The old stuff has arsenic and copper in it. The ash is therefore poisonous and should NOT be put in the garden. Neither should old fencing be burnt in the garden. The arsenic can be taken up by vegetables grown there.
The newer treated timber uses chromium salts which is not as effective but is not poisonous. But you can't tell the difference appearancewise between the two.
Is stuff bought recently guaranteed to be the new stuff ? It sounds like I might be OK burning the odd offcut chucked on top of the coal to boost the flames ! Simon.
so Harry, you say chromium is not toxic??
Jim K
copper, chrome and arsenic compounds?
nalith formulation has been used. The old CCA treatments did contain arseni c (Copper/Chromium/Arsenic - IIRC) but not been used for many years so unli kely that any new product or offcut therefrom would have these metals. The green tinted stuff is TanalithE which does contain copper but neither of th e other two. Tanalith Clear aka Tanalithm has no heavy metal content.
erm.... so in Tanalith Clear etc etc, what other toxic nasties do the prese rving then? & would you want to breathe them in or make others breathe them in?
mney and thats not good.
?really - source?
Jim K
On Friday, 20 December 2013 08:56:37 UTC, sm_jamieson wrote: snip lots
?? on the basis of Harry's reply and you finding out there's no heavy metals in Tanalith Clear?
Sounds like you were going to burn it anyway?
Jim K
This is in "Harry world" where he gets to make up the rules of physics and chemistry as he goes along. Unrelated to the real world.
Soluble chromates are quite nasty skin sensitisers for dermatitis and any chromium in the Cr(VI) oxidation state are known carcinogens.
It is a potential occupational hazard from grinding stainless steels particularly the ones with a higher chromium content.
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