Firewood

TINA'S ARK WEB DESIGN

FIREWOOD

Buying Firewood

It's always best to shop for firewood before you need it. Sometimes you can find great deals in the spring and summer, before people are thinking about cool weather and warming their home. Good places to find postings of wood for sale are: Your local newspaper's classified ads. Grocery store, church or post office bulletin boards. Signs posted around the neighborhood.

Most firewood is sold in cords, face cords, ricks or truckloads.

Cord: A cord of firewood measures 8 feet long x 4 feet wide x 4 feet tall.

Face Cord: A face cord is 8 feet long, 4 feet tall but only as wide as one stack of wood. This is usually about half the size of a cord or less.

Rick: A Rick is basically a pile, the size can vary quite a bit.

Truck Load: The size of a truck load will depend on how large the truck is and whether it's thrown in the truck or stacked.

Find Dry (Seasoned) Wood

It takes 8 to 12 months to dry (season) wood for burning so unless you have wood on hand already you will want to purchase dry wood. Dry wood burns longer, cleaner and produces greater heat. Unseasoned wood creates a potentially dangerous creosote buildup in your chimney.

Hardwood Burns Longer

When shopping around for wood keep in mind that hardwood is going to burn up to twice as long as softwood. So just because a cord of softwood might be cheaper doesn't mean you are getting a good deal. Softwood is effective for kindling or mixing with hardwood but hardwood will burn longer, tends to burn cleaner and will produce more heat. Examples of softwood: Pine, Fir, Cedar. Examples of hardwood: Oak, Ash, Madrona.

Click Here For Wood Species Comparison Chart

Storing Firewood

Store wood off the ground and protect it from weather.

You will want to store wood about 4 inches off the ground. Any wood on the ground will collect insects and rot more quickly. You will also want to keep it covered from rain and snow.

Keep wood away from the house.

Wood against the side of your house could attract wood loving insects like termites who will start nibbling on your house. It also keeps air from circulating around the wood which will help keep it dry.

Try not to store wood for more than a year once it's dried.

This isn't a hard and fast rule. You can store dry wood for more than a year but at some point it will start to rot and collect tons of insects. Make sure to use your oldest wood first.

Bring wood in as you need it.

While it's nice to have a lot of wood on hand in the house, you inevitably bring in insects even if you clean off the wood. So don't bring more than a days worth of wood into your home at a time. A wood pile in your house is basically a guest room for little critters.

HOMEMADE FIRE STARTERS

Use pine cones covered with wax.**

Pack charcoal in paper egg cartons and tie shut. When ready to use, just light the carton.

Put a piece of charcoal in each section of a paper egg carton. Cover with melted wax.** Tear apart and use as needed. You can also use sawdust, dryer lint or Pistachio shells instead of the charcoal.

Take 100% cotton balls and thoroughly rub Vaseline into them. Keep in a ziplock bag.

Newspaper cut into strips(3"-4" wide). Roll up and tie with string. Cover with melted wax.**

Use lint from your dryer as a fire starter.

Bundle about 10-12 Diamond brand "strike-anywhere" wooden kitchen matches together with waxed dental floss. The heads of the matches should all be pointing in the same direction. Generously soak the buddle of matches (except heads) in melted paraffin wax** to waterproof and to provide a long burn time. Dip heads lightly only to waterproof them. Simply strike on flat rock to ignite.

Cut a cotton cord into 1" lengths and soak in melted wax.** Let dry and store in empty film container or ziplock bag.

These are called candy kisses. Use the small 6" emergency candles and wrap them up in waxed paper. Tie/twist both ends of the waxed paper to seal in the candle (looks like a salt water taffy candy). Light an end when you are ready to start your fire.

Cut waxed milk cartons into strips to be used as kindling for your campfire.

Stuff paper towel or toilet paper rolls with paper.

To get your charcoal pieces ready quicker, use a charcoal chimney.

Newspaper crumbled into a ball

Use dried pine needles

Soak a piece of charcoal in lighter fluid. Coat with wax.**

Use small condiment or "sample-size" cups. Add a long wick to each cup and fill with melted wax.** You can also fill them with sawdust.

Stack of small pieces of cardboard covered in wax**

Waterproof your matches by dipping them in wax** or coating them with clear nail polish

Use cotton string about 3-4" long, put in wax paper bathroom cup with about an inch hanging over the edge. Fill cup nearly to the top with saw dust and pour melted wax into the cup. The saw dust will compact and become waterproof. The extra string length is a wick to start burning the starter, but can also be tied to another starter string through a pack loop to carry outside your pack. - Submitted by C. Berman

Keep a plastic "twister" type of pencil sharpener handy. It's great for shaving kindling (especially if wood is damp)

Use wooden ice cream/popsicle sticks. Keep them in a watertight container.

Unraveled twine

Take an empty toilet paper roll and tie some tissue paper onto one end with some twine. Fill roll with sawdust, cotton balls, etc. Tie the other end as you did the first one, but leave some string hanging out. Put candle wax on the string.

Use old tuna or cat food cans. Wash & dry. Cut long pieces of cardboard about 1 1/2 inches wide. Roll these into tight spirals. Pour empty cans about half full of wax. Insert cardboard spirals and let the wax set.

* Never use liquid igniters on your campfire. Example: lighter fluid, gasoline etc.

** When melting wax, only use a double boiler set up. Melted wax can easily ignite.

Have a fire extinguisher handy in case of emergency.

10 Uses for Wood Ashes

By: Mark Feirer

A cord of firewood can produce 50 pounds of ashes—a formidable heap of soot but also a great source for mineral-rich dust that has practical uses. Just be careful to store them in a fireproof container with the lid shut to choke any embers. Unlike ashes, you can't use flames any place except in the fireplace.

Use wood ashes to:

1. De-skunk pets. A handful rubbed on Fido's coat neutralizes the lingering odor.

2. Hide stains on paving. This Old House technical editor Mark Powers absorbs wet paint spatters on cement by sprinkling ash directly on the spot; it blends in with a scuff of his boot,

3. Enrich compost. Before the organic compound get applied to soil, enhance its nutrients by sprinkling in a few ashes, says the host of radio's You Bet Your Garden, Mike McGrath. Adding too much, though, ruins the mix.

4. Block garden pests. Spread evenly around garden beds, ash repels slugs and snails.

5. Melt ice. TOH building editor Tom Baker finds it adds traction and de-ices without hurting soil or concrete underneath.

6. Control pond algae. One tablespoon per 1,000 gallons adds enough potassium to strengthen other aquatic plants that compete with algae, slowing its growth,

7. Pump up tomatoes. For the calcium-loving plants, McGrath places 1/4 cup right in the hole when planting,

8. Clean glass fireplace doors. A damp sponge dipped in the dust scrubs away sooty residue.

9. Make soap. Soaking ashes in water makes lye, which can be mixed with animal fat and then boiled to produce soap. Salt makes it harden as it cools.

10. Shine silver. A paste of ash and water makes a dandy nontoxic metal polisher.