The firewood thread

[drsmith]

I'm very impressed as to how well marri burns after 4 or 5 years of curing. Much better than Jarrah.

I wonder whether an ideal curing time of more than 1 year is typical for other Australian hardwoods.

 

[CanOz]

I'm very impressed as to how well marri burns after 4 or 5 years of curing. Much better than Jarrah.

I wonder whether an ideal curing time of more than 1 year is typical for other Australian hardwoods.

How long do you think it will be until they ban it altogether? Love a nice cozy wood fire...

Cherry burns beautiful too, had a dead tree on my talbot place one time,

 

[trainspotter]

I'm very impressed as to how well marri burns after 4 or 5 years of curing. Much better than Jarrah.

I wonder whether an ideal curing time of more than 1 year is typical for other Australian hardwoods.

It sure does and ideally the longer the better for hardwoods Doc ...

 

[trainspotter]

Aaahhh I can hear the Co2 burning ...

 

[Smurf1976]

A firewood thread. Now that's a topic about as far away from the stock market as I can think of. One of the few commodities that doesn't even have a spot market that anyone can speculate upon. All good.

No idea what tree species the pile of wood I've got is, it's just firewood cut from "waste" timber that would otherwise be set on fire in the open to get rid of it. Uneconomic to transport the small bits to sawmills etc, and they couldn't really use it anyway, but it burns fine.

With the cold weather now having arrived I'll be firing up the Saxon heater this weekend. 21 years old, still goes fine and heats the house nicely. Also toasts the cat nicely.

There's no chance that this Smurf is going to freeze in the depths of winter in Tassie. Wood heater is rated at 11kW and with ducting (fan forced) through to the bedrooms so it heats the whole house. Then there's the 13kW of electric heat in case that's not enough (or like now when I just can't be bothered lighting fires). So it can get as cold as it likes outside but no chance I'll be freezing anytime soon.

One thing about wood though is that cheapest isn't the best. Plenty of people around here selling "3 tonnes" of wood that they claim to have somehow fitted on the back of a 1 tonne ute. I get mine from a commercial operator (proper business not a one man show) and suffice to say they need a decent size truck to deliver the wood with. Price per tonne is higher but then their definition of a "tonne" is 3 times as much as what the others think it is so it's cheaper overall. Always turns up cut to the right length too.

At a previous address there was an old cast iron stove. It burnt wood reasonably well but went through rather a lot and it was a hassle since only small pieces would fit in. Got a load of coal once - had the stove glowing red hot with that and turned the place into a sauna the first time I tried it. Learned pretty quickly that a little bit of coal goes a long way so didn't put too much in after that and all was good. Not so good for the planet but it put a lot of heat out, no doubt about that. Very warm.

 

[drsmith]

How long do you think it will be until they ban it altogether? Love a nice cozy wood fire...

Cherry burns beautiful too, had a dead tree on my talbot place one time,

Hopefully not in my lifetime.

I've so far been in the fortunate position of establishing a reasonable stockpile by scavenging wood green and leaving it to cure outdoors for a few years.