is hard maple really that great?

[svk]

It doesn't sound like you have Sugar Maple then, properly seasoned it should be hard as a rock.

+1

I was cutting standing dead SM earlier this summer and although the wood was clean, sparks were flying and it was very heavy.

 

[haveawoody]

Yeah Norway maple is just a bit less BTU than Sugar maple.
Got to love splitting Norway maple though, looks and splits like Ash but heats like Ash and 1/2

I burnt quite a bit of Norway last winter on the very cold nights and was quite impressed with heat, burn time and coaling.
As night blocks it happily burnt all night and pumped out lots of heat for easily 6hrs with some nice hot coals ready to go in the morning.

 

[Wood Doctor]

Hard maple is good firewood. It's rare around here but what we do have must sit in the round for a few months before it can be split. The stuff is so mean when green that is stalls out 22-ton, 2-stage hydraulic splitters as if they were toys. Finally, after a full three months lying on their sides, the rounds cut to length can be split.

I've also turned on the lathe some beautiful tool handles with it. They will last forever.

 

[jwilly]

The hard maple firewood is going for pallet logs around here, the mill is paying $350/mbf for 10" firewood. It is in short supply.

 

[Whitespider]

Hard maple (Sugar Maple and its close cousin Black Maple) has never impressed me that much as a heating fuel... but it's surely one of the best for building a bed of coals for grilling/cooking over. In this area the Black Maple is more common, but drive an hour east and the Sugar Maple is. I've seen BTU charts that rate them the same, and others that rate one (could be either one depending on the chart) over the other... and, they will naturally hybridize which can make positive identification confusing. I burned 1½ cord of hard maple (believe it was Black) last winter... it was nowhere near the equal of the Bur Oak I burned.

As firewood, or more specifically heating fuel, the conditions where it grows must have an impact... the hard maple I've cut 'round here is difficult to split and ain't anywhere near as heavy (or dense) as the various oaks after seasoning. Don't misunderstand me, I ain't sayin' it's bad or poor... just that I wouldn't consider comparing it to oak as a few others have in this thread.
*

 

[haveawoody]

Dito for hard maple.
It's one of the best coaling woods around but IMO BTU just cant compete with firewood like Locust, Oak, hickory, hornbeam, rock elm, osage.
Hard maple seems to be just a step down from that group of amazing firewood.
Then again none of the above are exactly what anyone would call easy to light and hard maple is easy.

I've found quite a variable for hard maple growing in good soil with good moisture it tends to be much softer with big growth rings.
Growing on clay soil with little water it's wood is as tough as nails and small growth rings.
Makes for quite a difference as firewood.
Those slow growing tortured twisted trees of any species always tend to make the best firewood.

 

[cheeves]

I cut hard maple in the fall/winter. Cut,split and stacked, it has no problem being ready the following fall. In fact it is seasoned just fine by summer. Easy to split, burns hot, and is abundant (up here). Just about the perfect firewood,IMO. Beech and oak are plentiful, and even a little better. Oak takes longer to season, splits just as easily and burns a little longer. Beech splits a little tougher when green, but it burns hot and dries almost as fast as maple. You can't (won't) go wrong with hard maple.

I agree Buddy!! When I lived up there in Philips, ME it's all we burned. That and yellow birch!
Great firewood!! And silver and red maple grown in this sandy soil down here isn't bad at all!!

 

[mainewoods]

If you don't have the time or space, to be a year or two ahead with your firewood, then maple is a very good choice. If you have the time and space, oak is an even better choice.

 

[ppkgmsy]

I cut hard maple in the fall/winter. Cut,split and stacked, it has no problem being ready the following fall. In fact it is seasoned just fine by summer. Easy to split, burns hot, and is abundant (up here). Just about the perfect firewood,IMO. Beech and oak are plentiful, and even a little better. Oak takes longer to season, splits just as easily and burns a little longer. Beech splits a little tougher when green, but it burns hot and dries almost as fast as maple. You can't (won't) go wrong with hard maple.

Great post. An excellent description of those 3 classic firewoods in New England.

 

[513yj]

I burn mostly hard maple and American beech and both are excellent firewood and also plentiful around here. I reserve the little oak I can get along with my ironwood for the brutal cold nights but they don't make it warmer in the house they just lengthen the refill time.

 

[AIM]

Hard maple is great.....and even soft maple is better than most, even though it gets a bad rep.

I agree with both opinions. Soft maple does get a bad rep. The little trick I learned about soft is to get it cut and split pretty quick and burn WITHIN a year.

 

[haveawoody]

AIM,

I think soft maple in northern regions is just a much better firewood than in southern regions.
Silver and Red for me at least are pretty decent firewood.
Not like burning one of the few amazing firewood types but soft maple goes long into the shoulder season with big chunks burning for about 70% the time of a big chunk of amazing firewood does.

I think you would find the same thing with hard maple, in northern regions a much more dense wood than southern regions.
Now if we could only hybrid Osage Orange and grow it in our climate I bet we would really have some tough wood LOL

It's possible to grow Osage here in southern Ontario but a nasty winter like last years and it's gone.

 

[Jeremy102579]

How long will soft maple last if it is split and stacked off ground in sun ?

 

[stihly dan]

Personal experience says more than 5 years.

 

[Marine5068]

I've got tons of softer Silver Maple to split and stack this year.
About four cords of it actually. It all came from three trees, but these were huge trees. One was over 34" in diameter and 70 feet tall. and two others were no slouches either.
Friend of mine wanted his cottage lot cleared and we took down some 200 trees. Most were in the 8-10" diameter range but a few were big...real big.
I also have rounds from a large Poplar and Butternut from there to split and stack as well.
And I cut, split and stacked a large White Paper Birch that came from the site too.
I also got some smaller Green Ash and Elm.
Good thing is that the site has lots more to be cut and it's only five minute drive from my place.

 

[KindredSpiritzz]

It doesn't sound like you have Sugar Maple then, properly seasoned it should be hard as a rock.

Im a dummy. I forgot i had some bass wood mixed in with the sugar maple i cut last year. The bass wood was the stuff that was all punky. I'll never cut that crap again, worse than pine. The sugar maple in the mix was beautiful.

 

[benp]

Im a dummy. I forgot i had some bass wood mixed in with the sugar maple i cut last year. The bass wood was the stuff that was all punky. I'll never cut that crap again, worse than pine. The sugar maple in the mix was beautiful.

Give me pine any day over bass wood. Heck even good popple and I cannot believe that i admitted that out loud.

 

[Johnny Yooper]

So i was looking at the btu chart and it says that hard maple has a higher btu rating than almost all others on the list. I haven't burned really any hard maple that I recall but I just got about 4 cords of it for next year. Anyone else burn much of it and what would you compare it to?

One of the best species there is in the upper Midwest, period. Beginning when I was old enough to walk but too young to run a saw, I helped my Dad cut firewood in the U.P.; that went on for the better part of two decades. The only maple he would take was hard maple, absolutely no soft maple no matter how handy it was. Junk wood, he would always say. And when I got old enough to run the saw, I got some quick lessons in telling the difference. Of course, if we had to practically trip over a yellow birch, ironwood, or black cherry to get at a hard maple, well, those would get whacked too. Nothing against oak, there just ain't any in his woods. 90% of the maples I have in my woodlot here in Wis. are soft maples; I have an OWB, heat the house, shop, and burn year round (heating hot water) so I take whatever is handy and not punky, and yes that means a lot of soft maple, but I've been granted forgiveness. It's like cigars: smoke 'em if you got 'em.

If you have access to hard maple, never ever turn it down.

 

[James Rafetto]

So i was looking at the btu chart and it says that hard maple has a higher btu rating than almost all others on the list. I haven't burned really any hard maple that I recall but I just got about 4 cords of it for next year. Anyone else burn much of it and what would you compare it to?

So i was looking at the btu chart and it says that hard maple has a higher btu rating than almost all others on the list. I haven't burned really any hard maple that I recall but I just got about 4 cords of it for next year. Anyone else burn much of it and what would you compare it to?

I have found hard "rock" or sugar maple maple to light easily and to burn hot but I have not found it to coal as well as most other hard wood species used for wood burning. I have a charmaster wood burning furnace where the air comes over the wood not under the wood and woods that coal well like Oak and black locust form charcoal like coals that last long into the night and sometimes into the AM. The hard "rock" maple burns out somewhat quickly after burning hot and gets reduced to fine ashes without coals so the stove cools quickly. That may be a desirable trait if one likes it cool during the night but I prefer waking up with warm walls and floors! Please understand that norway maple is barely a hard wood and loses a lot of weight when dry and is easy to split where true rock maple / sugar maple remains quite heavy and is often quite hard to split by hand.

 

[johnnyballs]

I have found hard "rock" or sugar maple maple to light easily and to burn hot but I have not found it to coal as well as most other hard wood species used for wood burning. I have a charmaster wood burning furnace where the air comes over the wood not under the wood and woods that coal well like Oak and black locust form charcoal like coals that last long into the night and sometimes into the AM. The hard "rock" maple burns out somewhat quickly after burning hot and gets reduced to fine ashes without coals so the stove cools quickly. That may be a desirable trait if one likes it cool during the night but I prefer waking up with warm walls and floors! Please understand that norway maple is barely a hard wood and loses a lot of weight when dry and is easy to split where true rock maple / sugar maple remains quite heavy and is often quite hard to split by hand.

welcome to AS...