New Wood Stove

[GBeck]

Just had it my new fusion wood stove installed ... WOW what a difference then the oil furnace...(now I'll have lots of oil for the shop furnace on the other thread )
But what I am wondering is what everyone is using for wood storage in the house. The wife is starting to insist I stop using the gray storage tub for keeping the wood inside...

 

[DennisArrow]

For me, outside storage where you can bring in what you need for immediate placement into the stove is best. I dont know about you; but when I am down at the woodpile, or even at the house woodpile, I move a piece of wood and out pops everything from big ol wolf spiders, lil spiders, roaches, beetles, carpenter ants..........on and on..........I especially fear powder post beetle invasion into my home from doing this..............

Anyway, I bring up to the porch just outside the door and stack enough wood for 3 or 4 days depending upon the weather and feed the stove from there..........Dennis

 

[GBeck]

right outside the door I piled enough for roughly a week or so...but I am trying to get into the habit of bringing in a days worth into the house mostly just because I don't wanna have to open the outside door right before bed....

never really gave much thought about the spiders and such.....good point

 

[dmccarty]

I can deal with spiders in the wood. I can deal with just any old bug.

But after the mice got into the house no more wood was piled up on the porch. We have a big rubber maid two wheeled wheel barrow. Two loads a week heat the house. Keeps the porch a bit cleaner. Keeps most of the bugs out of the house. And NO &^^&^(& mice.

Later,
Dan

 

[schmism]

my uncle that burns to heat his house has a special built in wood bin that nests under the stairs right next to the stove in the living room.

ive seen these types of racks in other peoples houses

If your handy seems something purpose built would be just the thing.

 

[Mickey_Fx]

We store our firewood in plastic bags in the form of pellets. Around here, pellet prices are very close in price based on heat content as cord wood. Its clean to store and easy to transport. Depending upon weather, a 40# bag can last 1-2 days. With the programmable tstat for the stove, we can forget the stove for the most part. dump in a bag of pellets in the hopper when needed and remove ash every few days and that's it.

Still have 3-4 cords of firewood stacked from when we were using a stick burner.

What we do may not be the anwser for everyone.

 

[3RRL]

We just got a new wood stove for the first time and do like Dennis does.
We keep the firewood outside on the deck, but near the stove in a firewood cart.
My Special Firewood Cart

 

[GBeck]

haven't had the mice problem 'yet', but I am sure they are coming, I've only been in the country for about a year now, but I do see the dead ones that the cats catch so hopefully that will keep them out of the house.

schmism - that is what she is looking for, can't say I've seen them around here like that...nice pic

3rrl - I have been following that thread...nice looking cart

 

[smfcpacfp]

My woodstove is in my basement and I used to put 10 full cords of wood all around the furnace in one corner of the basement. I use less wood and more propane, so I brought in 6 cords this year.

We get so much snow (15 to 30 feet) that it would be a major ordeal to bring it in after the snow begins to fall, so we have learned to have it all in position before the snow flies.

 

[srossman]

Just had it my new fusion wood stove installed ... WOW what a difference then the oil furnace...(now I'll have lots of oil for the shop furnace on the other thread )
But what I am wondering is what everyone is using for wood storage in the house. The wife is starting to insist I stop using the gray storage tub for keeping the wood inside...

I use one of these to bring in the wood from my front porch to the wood stove. I also have a canvas wood carrier that I place at the bottom of it to help keep some of the dirt contained. If I bring in a full load, it is enough wood to last me for a day. (note: I am not the old guy in the picture )

 

[MossRoad]

We are lucky in that we have an outside cellar stairway right next to the stove location. It is 4' wide and we can store a couple weeks worth of wood inside there. I stocked my wood supply just outside the double metal doors, so on nice days, I open them up and top it off.

 

[bhostasa]

I currently keep all of my wood in the barn. I have a decent sized wagon (about a pick-up truck load) that I fill up about once a week and park in front of our walk out basement doors. My wood burner is downstairs so I bring it in as needed from the trailer.

I'm about to start finishing our basement. My plan in to build a wood storage room, like a coal bin, next to the wood burner. I'd have access to the room from the outside and be able to take it from the room directly to the wood burner...hopefully reducing the mess. Should be able to store about a cord at a time in there.

 

[Highbeam]

I have the solution for you. Well for me anyway.

I stack and split my wood pretty in pretty large splits with the intention of splitting it down smaller as I use it if needed.

Every week or so I fill up a harbor freight wood cart with the split down wood and use the cart to haul in the week's wood. The cart holds a lot. You could just park the cart and feed from it if your wife will let you. Mine won't so I then unload the cart into...

I went to Home depot and bought two of the steel hoop wood carriers for about 20$ each. The double rings are about 4 feet across and hold about a week's worth of wood each. One is full of splits and the other is filled once or twice a year with red cedar kindling. The steel rings are black and look sort of wrought so they are decent.

The shorter term indoor storage of a week or two means that I move the wood just before bringing it into the house. The bugs get shaken off during the move and then there are none in the hosue.

 

[GBeck]

here's another rookie wood stove question...the stove I have can fit I think 20 inch long logs, but what is the best size for an all night burn...
I have been trying different things and so far it seems the bigger you put in sure it will last longer, but gives you more ashes and the 2 inch round ones seem to burn the cleanest but also the quickest.

 

[thunderworks]

GBeck: I doubt you really get more ash. Any volume of wood, converted to heat and gas, reduces to a given amount of unburnable residue. Put more wood in the combustion chamber, get more ash. Put in less wood, get less ash. The ash buildup is a function of total wood volume you put in the stove, not the size of a particular piece.

 

[Egon]

The ash buildup is a function of total wood volume you put in the stove, not the size of a particular piece.

It will also depend on the amount of combustion air that was available at the time of the burn and if the firebox was at optimum burn temperatures.

 

[groundcover]

I think I have the final answer to the ongoing wood issue,now I just need to convince the misses that a small garage door where her chair is and a pallet of firewood in the family room would be a positive fashion statement ! The pallet racks have worked great but trying to get rid of the extra move of unloading it into the house.

As far as burn time the unsplt rounds will usually burn longer. When loading make sure to get the fire burning good and hot before turning it down . If you load it up and damp it down too soon you can get a dirty burn and creosote build up that can feed a chimney fire . A good indication of a clean burn is lack of smoke out of the chimney. It will smoke on start up and when the damper is first turned down but after that mostly just heat waves.

 

[scott_vt]

Good Afternoon GBeck,
I do the same thing as Steve in Michigan. I have been bringing in large amounts of wood into the basement since I built this home. It has not fallen into a big pile of dust in the basement yet ! I find that any bugs generally stay with the wood pile. I do have some spiders in the basement, but everything comes with a cost. When its snowin and sub zero, all I do is go over to the pile and feed the stove ! I can get about 4 cords of wood along the back corner of the basement through my bilco doors. Its a pain dumping it down there and restacking it, but its also nice in the middle of the winter as Steve points out !

 

[TDVT]

We do the same as Scott & Steve. We have tried storing it various places but as we are in the snow belt of Vermont, it works best to have it all in the basement before the snow really gets going. Not much of a problem with critters or bugs.

I made a platform to fit in the loader & increase the capacity & we dump it down the bulkhead & re-stack. We only use 3-4 cords a year, so it isn't too bad.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

Ted

 

[groundcover]

I keep a couple of cords in the bacement too. Last year after it was all in I got a bug bomb,shut down the boiler,let it rip and left the house for the day. Never saw a bug or spider all winter.