Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Property Projects & Construction Stacking firewood

Felled, bucked and limbed a few dead Green Ash around the property this Summer and spent the Fall splitting. I wanted to use a high ridge along my Southern property line to catch the N and S winds to accelerate seasoning process - though Ash doesn't need much time.

I stacked them single file like I do in my backyard, and kept getting blow downs. Pretty frustrating to have high winds undo hours of work every other week. Here's a photo of my first attempts and the toppled stacks.




Eventually I got wise and figured I needed a new solution. I thought using pallets to build a crib would be a worthwhile experiment. Spare pallets and Tposts + very warm January weather = project impetus!








I pounded a t-post at either end to create the bookends and began the tedious task of restacking.





Here's the finished product, and she's still standing several weeks later. Hope this might be helpful for others looking for more stable methods for stacking/seasoning firewood.




Here she is fully loaded with both rows and ready to season.

TJ, good job.
Will you burn all of that yourself, and if so, how long will it last?

Oh, my gosh! You're so industrious!

We burn a lot of wood at home - enjoy making fires with the kids - but just for recreation purposes. I'd say we go through a couple cords a season, and this load should last me a couple years. I also have another cord stacked in the backyard, but due to the shade and lack of wind howling through in the city it takes a good couple seasons to properly season.

I end up probably spending around $1k/cord when one considers the time and effort involved felling, cutting, splitting and stacking the wood. When you consider a full cord of oak or locust costs around $240 around Lincoln, it's really just a labor of love. When I bought the land back in 08 I figured I ought to buy and learn to use some big boy tools, like a Stihl 290 MS saw. I didn't even know how to start it, let alone operate the saw. For the first 3 months or so I held it so far away from my body afraid of a kickback my arms were toast after 10 minutes. I must have looked pretty silly. Last Spring I finally had the guts to try knocking out my first standing tree. I called Esshup for lesssons on site how to fell it - was about 40' Green Ash. I almost landed the first one on my Tundra as I nearly didn't account for the vertical height soon becoming horizontal. Since that first tree I have found myself pinched in the backcut of another decent sized Ash as I didn't estimate the fall correctly - not even close - and had to get a chain and pull it over with the truck and hope it didn't land on me while driving away. Total idiocy, and I'm lucky to have my life and limbs after my trial and error ways, but now I'd risk to state I'm getting pretty good with the saw and even bought a 14" Echo this Fall to help with the limbing and smaller stuff. It's a long and dangerous road when you are a self taught city guy.

Hey now, I'm proud of myself for actually solving a problem without simply throwing money at it like usual! Talk about resourceful....move over Brettski.

Is that code for something?

TJ, if you haven't done so yet, please buy a pair of full wrap chaps .

If you don't get a Bailey's catalog, call them and get one on order.

Yes they're hot but the peace of mind is something else. (and not the Village People type of hot either..................)

I need to come out there and give you some tips.

If the tree has a large enough diameter, you can get away with using wedges while cutting to make it fall opposite of the lean. There's ways to make the cut to make the tree fall a different direction too. But, it's something that can't be taught over the phone.

My firewood solutions. I first stacked in the yard near my house, a lot of work. Then I built a section on the pole barn for storage, still a lot of work moving and carrying wood. Then I had 4 rows in the garage, still a lot of work moving wood. I ended up with one row of good dry wood in the garage that I use sparingly to use with outside wood when needed. Now I just dump the outside wood in piles and eliminate lots of work. I used to cut and split my wood but I have a tree surgeon that lives by me and I get a very large heaping load on a big truck with a tilt bed for $250 and he dumps it where I tell him. I fill my mower cart and pull it into the garage and burn the wood with little carrying.

furthermore...


exit...stage left

Proud comes before the fall (something like that).

You may want to consider a steering committee out there at Green Acres. Years back we burned 12-16 cords of wood each winter in our thermostatically controlled word burning furnace, Yes, I built the furnace myself.....

Dwight, that's a lot of wood. How much time did you spend processing it all, or did you have it delivered split?

Or should I be asking how big of a piece would fit in the furnace?

I did the wood with a bud who also burned wood to heat his home. My chain saw was a big MAC with a 30" Bar on it. I built an 8 hp dual stage log splitter that had a 6 inch bore cylinder (36" stroke) that would split about anything. The furnace would take 30" by 12" diameter chunk of wood though most were split smaller diameter to keep the weight down.

Gail kept the furnace going for several days a week when I was on the road. Even on the coldest of day/nights it only needed to be filled once per day.

I am glad that we don't do any of that anymore. Geothermal is much easier and cheaper too.

Yeah, I'm self deprecating that way. But hey this was a significant chapter in my problem solving annals which demonstrates just how limited I am...which was rather the humorous thrust of the post.

Great ideas for wood. I am trying to figure out what to do with my wood at the lot and I love the palets idea.

I love the convenience of stacking wood along my fences in my backyard in town, but seasoning takes so dang long due to shade and lack of airflow I decided to take advantage of the sun and winds out on the farm. The pallets provided the extra stacking stablility I needed, gave me an extra row upon which to stack [doubling the total wood seasoning], keeps it up off the ground a few inches to improve airflow on bottom rows, and there's a nice 12" gap between rows running along pallets which should provide nice internal airflow, too.

Now, when the winds howl and it prevents me from fishing I can at least know my wood is getting a good drying blast! There's a silver lining I didn't have before.

An oil company did some testing on my land and took down about 3/8 to 1/2 mile of oaks. There are some open areas so it's not a continuous mess. Most are not quite large enough to have to split. They paid me $9,600 in damages. I'm cutting it up as I get the time and inclination.

I have a lot of acquaintances who want free firewood. That is, if I cut it and deliver it. No way! One actually told me that he couldn't justify a pickup and didn't have a saw. I expect that very few of them have ever used a saw. I have 3 saws, 2 pickups a 16 ft trailer, several box trailers and a front end loader.

every time I pull out the chainsaw, Dski starts singin' that stupid Vonage jingle

TJ continues...



come on Bruce...do we gotta paint you a picture?

TJ, the wood will season quicker if you keep the top of the pile protected from rain, but leave the sides open. Even better if you can make the top large enough so it doesn't drip water on the stacked wood. Guys use metal roofing and hold it down with wood pieces, cinderblocks, etc.

http://www.arboristsite.com/ has a forum that is just for wood burners and homeowners. Lots of guys have posted and said that stacking wood 2 rows thick hasn't slowed down the seasoning time, but it makes the piles more resistant to getting blown over by the wind. Putting them on pallets is recommended, but I've also seen wood stacked on lengths of PVC. Bugs won't eat thru the PVC to get to the wood.

I've never protected my wood from the elements as I know tarps do more harm than good retaining moisture and I am not sure how to build a makeshift roof on this pile. Again, I'm no Brettski - my pallet crib strained my internal resources enough already. Also, a roof entails buying lumber, and this was all created spending zero capital, which appeals to me.

Still, if a guy were looking for a new challenge, how would you recommend one make a study, effective, and affordable roof structure for the wood?

Buy some of the steel that is used to build the sides of pole buildings, slap it on the top of the pile, leaving the edges overlap the sides. Put split pieces of wood or cinderblocks on top to keep it from blowing away in the wind. Easily removable and easily adjustable.

Sounds simple enough...but will this roof rival one of Dwight or Brettski's acheivements? I understand their projects are designed to also make lemonaide and double as a time machine.

Did I mention the Fish-Tazer that Brettski, myself and an incognito electro-mechanical engineer are working on?

Shock up a meal or use it as a small scale electro-shocker for pond sampling.

glad you brought this up....why do I always get volunteered for product trial tests whenever Dwight and Theo come up with some hairbrained contraption idea? If it's not the Theopult, it's the Don't-taze-me-bro fish tazer. I feel like a high voltage pin cushion.

Theo wanted to remain incognito so you have answered you own question, "why do I....."