Tractors and wood! Show your pics

[Molalla1]

I been moving wood into the shed between rain events lately. It wasn't a very good summer here for drying wood with all the rain and high humidity. But still, I am amazed at how dry it actually is compared to last April and early May when I split it. Not ready to burn but another summer in the shed will fix that.


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gg

Nice GG . . . I've still got 7-8 DF to take down because of some disease, good size ones.

 

[Gordon Gould]

Nice GG . . . I've still got 7-8 DF to take down because of some disease, good size ones.

My daughter lives out in Oregon. Since we get out there often enough I know what you mean when you say "good sized DF". Have fun !!

gg

 

[Gordon Gould]

I know everyone loves photos, but this week I failed to take any. We cut down and stacked 5 trees on Saturday, four Ash + one Maple. The ash were all standing dead from Emerald Ash Borer, and the Maple blew over in a storm.

I just cut them to 15 foot lengths and pile them by year, staging until I have room in my wood sheds to split and stack them. I have reduced my split and stacked space down from about 30 cords to 17 bays each just over 1 cord... probably about 20 cords of stacked and split. We usually have 6 - 10 cords in log form, but don't track that as closely.

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That seems like a lot of wood to have stored and/or in the works. Especially if you are talking full cords, which I assume you are, and not face cords. How much do you burn in a year ?

gg

 

[WinterDeere]

That seems like a lot of wood to have stored and/or in the works. Especially if you are talking full cords, which I assume you are, and not face cords. How much do you burn in a year ?

gg

Full cords. I used to burn 8 - 12 cords per year, which is why we kept 30 cords split and stacked, for 3 years drying in rotation. Now I'm trying to keep usage closer to 6 cords per year, hence scaling back to about 20 cords split and stacked. I'm presently running two 3 cubic foot Blaze King stoves, one in each wing of the house.

I always kept a 3-4 year rotation, because most of our wood was oak and/or hickory, for many years. The oak especially takes a long time to dry. But more recently, with all of the ash borer damage, I've been stacking mostly ash to replace the oak we've been using. Less BTU's per cord, versus oak, but we have to get rid of the stuff somehow.

In addition to the wood, we also burn 1000 gallons of oil + 2 heat pumps + some resistive heating + propane + electric water heater. It's a big old stone house, built in four phases starting 1734, and half the windows and doors are 1775 or older. Not the smallest or most efficient bit of architecture ever built.

 

[goeduck]

Nice GG . . . I've still got 7-8 DF to take down because of some disease, good size ones.

Yeah, those big DFs grow like weeds out here. One of my properties required a forester evaluation due to county regulations (property is taxed lower due to timber). The forester marked part of the property as replanted. I said, no normal regrowth. He was shocked those DF trees could regrow that well on their own.

 

[Gordon Gould]

Full cords. I used to burn 8 - 12 cords per year, which is why we kept 30 cords split and stacked, for 3 years drying in rotation. Now I'm trying to keep usage closer to 6 cords per year, hence scaling back to about 20 cords split and stacked. I'm presently running two 3 cubic foot Blaze King stoves, one in each wing of the house.

I always kept a 3-4 year rotation, because most of our wood was oak and/or hickory, for many years. The oak especially takes a long time to dry. But more recently, with all of the ash borer damage, I've been stacking mostly ash to replace the oak we've been using. Less BTU's per cord, versus oak, but we have to get rid of the stuff somehow.

In addition to the wood, we also burn 1000 gallons of oil + 2 heat pumps + some resistive heating + propane + electric water heater. It's a big old stone house, built in four phases starting 1734, and half the windows and doors are 1775 or older. Not the smallest or most efficient bit of architecture ever built.

Wow - Makes you appreciate what the colonials went through to stay warm or more likely just keep from freezing to death. Things were colder then too.

gg

 

[WinterDeere]

Wow - Makes you appreciate what the colonials went through to stay warm or more likely just keep from freezing to death. Things were colder then too.

Yeah, I've heard a lot of conflicting opinions and conclusions on this. It's been documented in some places that the average household firewood usage in the 18th and 19th century was something like 30 - 40 cords of wood per year.

But it's also claimed in other sources that "comfort" is a modern concept, our forefathers really weren't as concerned with keeping their homes warm, as we are today. Often cited with this, is their wardrobe, the way they wore underclothes, then their clothes, then a vest, then a jacket... usually all outer layers being wool. Seems to make sense.

(And young readers may confuse "jacket" with "coat", we use them somewhat interchangeably today. They'd also don a coat atop all of this, to go outside.)

I suppose both could be true, as I strongly suspect they were burning green wood, based on so many accounts in literature of cutting wood only shortly before burning it. Burning wood before it's lost most of its water content, is basically throwing your hard work into boiling off the water in the wood, it takes a lot of energy to boil off a small amount of water... and green firewood can contain a lot of water.

What bothers me most, no matter how much wood they actually consumed per year, is that they had to do all of it without a chainsaw. No matter how much wood you're burning, that really sucks.

My family has been in the same area for a little over 300 years, and some of the old tools that have been handed down from one generation to the next, have landed in my shop. Among them are one two-man saw, about 6 feet long, and another large one-man felling saw with holes at the tip of the blade for attaching a second helper handle. The teeth are aggressive, they'd probably cut pretty fast if re-sharpened, but the force required to push and pull one of them thru our large oak trees must have been enormous. If you were a homeowner without a few big sons, I can imagine you just got used to living cold, as the work to process enough wood to keep an old uninsulated stone house with single-pane windows warm, would have been out of the grasp of anyone over a certain age... particularly before the invention of anti-inflammatory medication.

 

[Eagle1]

Yeah, I've heard a lot of conflicting opinions and conclusions on this. It's been documented in some places that the average household firewood usage in the 18th and 19th century was something like 30 - 40 cords of wood per year.

But it's also claimed in other sources that "comfort" is a modern concept, our forefathers really weren't as concerned with keeping their homes warm, as we are today. Often cited with this, is their wardrobe, the way they wore underclothes, then their clothes, then a vest, then a jacket... usually all outer layers being wool. Seems to make sense.

(And young readers may confuse "jacket" with "coat", we use them somewhat interchangeably today. They'd also don a coat atop all of this, to go outside.)

I suppose both could be true, as I strongly suspect they were burning green wood, based on so many accounts in literature of cutting wood only shortly before burning it. Burning wood before it's lost most of its water content, is basically throwing your hard work into boiling off the water in the wood, it takes a lot of energy to boil off a small amount of water... and green firewood can contain a lot of water.

What bothers me most, no matter how much wood they actually consumed per year, is that they had to do all of it without a chainsaw. No matter how much wood you're burning, that really sucks.

My family has been in the same area for a little over 300 years, and some of the old tools that have been handed down from one generation to the next, have landed in my shop. Among them are one two-man saw, about 6 feet long, and another large one-man felling saw with holes at the tip of the blade for attaching a second helper handle. The teeth are aggressive, they'd probably cut pretty fast if re-sharpened, but the force required to push and pull one of them thru our large oak trees must have been enormous. If you were a homeowner without a few big sons, I can imagine you just got used to living cold, as the work to process enough wood to keep an old uninsulated stone house with single-pane windows warm, would have been out of the grasp of anyone over a certain age... particularly before the invention of anti-inflammatory medication.

How much wood was used for cooking, heating water, etc. In the old country it was not uncommon to have a wood cooking stove going non-stop to keep a water tank hot. Many places also a built in smokers in the chimney to preserve meats.

 

[FriendwithTractor]

My friend has recently installed a woodstove in his newly constructed house. He's chomping at the bit for heating season to start. I keep telling him he won't be so gung-ho about it come mid-March, but a shiny new toy is a shiny new toy.

I took the advice of several from my last post and found myself in unfamiliar territory (A craft store). After several minutes of looking strange holding different ribbons up to my STIHL shirt (Had to match the color), I had a winner. A bribe of gummy bears to my mother later and I had a nice Stihl Orange bow for the 500i Wedding Gift. I will remember to get pictures of the gift table for you all.

 

[WinterDeere]

How much wood was used for cooking, heating water, etc. In the old country it was not uncommon to have a wood cooking stove going non-stop to keep a water tank hot. Many places also a built in smokers in the chimney to preserve meats.

I've seen those wood fired kitchen stoves with built-in water heaters. But all the ones I've seen are a bit newer, like late 19th or early 20th century. There was actually a really nice bit of information on them in the PBS docuseries "Victorian House", aired in the early-2000's. That was set around the year 1900, if I recall correctly, and they were describing the boiler on their stove as new technology at the time. I'm really not sure when they became a "thing", but I suspect there must be very few if any in 18th century rural American homes, which is the timeframe for which I heard that 30 - 40 cords per year estimate.

That said, cooking wood or heating water on an open hearth probably took a whole lot of wood.

The largest part of my house was built 1775, and they included two large cooking (aka "walk-in") fireplaces, but also installed a stove thimble directly above each of those fireplaces. There are also at least three or four other thimbles feeding now-discarded chimneys, meaning they definitely had or at least planned to heat this house with freestanding wood stoves.

As to why they had cooking fireplaces with thimbles above, I'm really not sure. I suspect that they either used the fireplaces for some period, until they could afford a cooking stove, or wanted the fireplace as backup, in case the new cookstove tech didn't work as advertised.

My friend has recently installed a woodstove in his newly constructed house. He's chomping at the bit for heating season to start. I keep telling him he won't be so gung-ho about it come mid-March, but a shiny new toy is a shiny new toy.

Hah... I remember those days. I grew up in a house with four fireplaces, and we used them quite a lot. Then I lived 15 years in homes with no fireplaces or wood stoves, and really missed the whole process and ambiance. When I moved into the current house, there were three large fireplaces, but two had gas logs and the third was filled with a wood stove. I begrudgingly ran the wood stove, while I began the process of removing the gas log from another, and quickly became sold on the idea of heating by woodstove. I do miss the smell and sound of an open fireplace, but after paying the price of a nice tractor to heat this place with oil for one year -- and still being cold -- I ended up sticking new wood stoves in both of the cooking fireplaces.



A dozen years in, I still look forward to heating season, but not with the same excitement or anticipation as when it was new. I still enjoy processing firewood, but stove and chimney maintenance is a chore I loathe.

We still have two gas heaters, one gas log in the patio fireplace, and one ventless gas stove in the basement rec room: