Fireplace could this be cheating?

[ArmyPair2]

Now by no means are we short of firewood with all the trees we have but anytime we go into the city and shop at Home Depot we always pick up scrap wood that we burn in a outdoor pit. We always see folks buying bundles of logs for 4 or 5 bucks that last maybe 30 min of pine wood but our scrap wood last a lot longer for maybe a few bucks.

Every 3 months I place one of those clean out your chimney logs in the house fireplace but do you think tossing in scraps of oak and cedar for a cheap price would hurt? I know most of the scraps we toss in is not seasoned wood but it is cheap. When we do light the fireplace for a romantic evening I always tell her that watching that scrap burning looks just as good as her knowing I will get a smack.

I know this scrap is still wet and does not give out much heat and I always use my normal wood that I season for at least nine months. Would it be smart buying scraps at times or cheating not burning real logs?

 

[RalphVa]

You're not going to get stuff in your fireplace exit, too much excess air. Had a Franklin stove, which is a very leaky stove, in Vermont. Never got anything in the exhaust from it. Ran a good stove in NJ, and it got a good coating of stuff in the stack every year. Cleaned it out with some tire chains put together and swung around the outer edges.

You don't get much heat from a fireplace, mostly radiant. You'll likely lose more heat up the chimney of the fireplace than you get into the house proper, unless it's a very small house like the one we had in Vermont. Won't make much difference what wood you burn in it.

Ralph

 

[Katahdin]

While my house was being built we'd gather up all the scrap pieces of lumber at the end of the day and toss them into the contractor's pickup, he'd burn the wood in his kitchen wood stove for heat. I agree a woodstove is the way to go, I have a nice hearth wood stove that now sits in front of our fireplace.

 

[lockhaven]

just a word of caution, the fireplace flue is way to large for a stove. The smoke will cool and deposit creosote on the chimney walls. If going with a strove be sure to put a properly sized liner in the chimney. If the fire place is used for romantic purposes only stay with it, even a glass front stove is not as cozy as a open fireplace. just my:2cents: