learned my lesson about the wet wood

[TJ-Bill]

Damm.. I've worked Damm hard the last few years staying at least a years a head of my burn season.. I always have some in the shed ready to burn and then I fill the rest in with next years wood. This year I didn't buy anywood because I was 2 years ahead. I had almost 12 cords ready to burn and another 3 that needed to be cut waiting to be split.

I've never covered my wood, I've always figured that whatever tarp I put over my wood to block the rain just prevents the sun and wind from drying it. This year I didn't have enough time to get all my wood under the woodshed but I figured a little later never hurt anything since I really didn't have room for it all anyway.

It;s rained so much and the air is so humid that I'm having ahella of a time getting my fires going, the wood seems so wet!!! it's been dry for 2 years!!! My fault because I normally try and burn alot of soft wood this time of year witch I cut around the property. I cut it but I haven't had time to split it and pile is as of lately, even though it's been down for 8 months it still won't burn.. I'm going to run out of cedar logs to split for kindling..

lessoned learned I must say. Never depend on a dry fall always get your Sh*t together first.....

Now just to mention I do have 1/2 my wood shed full of very dry wood from 2 years ago, but I've been trying to load the empty half so I have the good half blocked off.

 

[Ayatollah]

Some woods are like a sponge. They just suck up moisture. But it'll get out pretty fast too.

 

[stihly dan]

You are correct. Shame on you. But lesson learned, it's never to late to change things.

 

[Iron Head]

Wet seasoned wood will dry dehydrate much faster than green wood.
A couple of days without rain should get your firewood back into it's cured stage.
Cellular structures of green and cured wood are very different.

 

[Encore]

Had that problem myself last year. With all the rain and the mild winter causing all snow to melt consistently, it was a huge pain in the neck getting the wood to dry off mostly because we don't have a wood shed. I just stack a weeks worth of wood in the garage and go from there.

Once your wood dries off though you'll be good.

 

[groundup]

Interesting thread

 

[Streblerm]

Had that problem myself last year. With all the rain and the mild winter causing all snow to melt consistently, it was a huge pain in the neck getting the wood to dry off mostly because we don't have a wood shed. I just stack a weeks worth of wood in the garage and go from there.

Once your wood dries off though you'll be good.

I keep two racks of wood inside my garage. Each one holds at least a weeks worth of wood. If the wood was dry and got wet from rain then it will easily dry out in a week unless it was punky. If you take a rain wetted piece of wood that has been stacked and drying for some time and split it, you'll see that it is only wet on the outside.

Even with wood that I keep under tarps there is a difference between burning it straight out of the pile and after being in the garage for a week. If it is really wet then I'll put a fan on it for a day or so.

A woodshed is definitely on the list, but its a pretty long list.

If you re in a bind you can always dry wood by putting it near the stove. That will dry off surface moisture in a hurry.

 

[Sandhill Crane]

Have the same issue with the shed, leaving good access when restocking, especially early in the burn season until part of the first and second row is opened up. There is oak in the back that has been there several seasons now.

 

[Garmins dad]

All you guys with the wood sheds that have more then two or three rows in em.. How well does your wood cure in there? Do you stack it in rows outside first for it to dry out for a year? I'm always worried that the wood wont cure in a four or five row deep wood shed.

 

[Fyrebug]

The wet wood is the least of your problems.

The real problem starts when you decide to burn it anyway... You will cause a great amount of creosote and if you don't clean your chimney on a weekly basis you will risk a chimney fire.

Best advice is go to Lowe's and buy a wood moisture meter. Anything above 20% should not be burned...

The alternative is not worth contemplating.

 

[zogger]

We keep three days worth of wood stacked behind the stove, and rotate it around, i'll flip them end to end as well. Sitting there getting baked by the heat of the stove, brick wall behind, gets any lingering moisture out. Even stuff that was just rained on and still wet.

heck one time I had nothing but green wood and needed to burn. Rack built up over the stove, split small, laid the wood up there, it cured in a couple days. I mean it cracked and got light and burned like old seasoned wood then.

That's something else you can do, take that wet wood you have now and resplit it smaller before you bring it in, then bake that stuff as close to the heater as is safe.

 

[Fyrebug]

We keep three days worth of wood stacked behind the stove, and rotate it around, i'll flip them end to end as well. Sitting there getting baked by the heat of the stove, brick wall behind, gets any lingering moisture out. Even stuff that was just rained on and still wet.

heck one time I had nothing but green wood and needed to burn. Rack built up over the stove, split small, laid the wood up there, it cured in a couple days. I mean it cracked and got light and burned like old seasoned wood then.

That's something else you can do, take that wet wood you have now and resplit it smaller before you bring it in, then bake that stuff as close to the heater as is safe.

As long as you respect your clearances to combustibles, you should be good.

 

[brenndatomu]

Yep, wet wood sucks! Everybody's right though, rain soaked "seasoned" wood drys back out pretty quick.

I'd venture a guess that 75% of the problems that people have with their stove/chimney have, in some way, something to do with burning wet or not properly seasoned wood. That's the biggest improvement I've made, cutting a year or two ahead, and building a wood shed (overhang off garage) for keeping the stacks dry in the winter.

Been there, done that with the drying in front of the stove thing, works pretty well. Added bonus, extra moisture in the house when it's actually needed.

BTW, I didn't get my wood under the wood shed before sandy came through either, did get an old pool liner over it though, kept 90% of it dry.
Good luck with yours!

 

[TJ-Bill]

Well I guess if it drys faster then I'll wait and stack it in a few weeks. I have some other wood I'm going to cut and split so it's at least of this wet ground, nothing seems to dry well in the fall when we have the big rains.

Luckily I have 3 cords in the wood shed that are good and dry I just hate burning good wood when it's not needed. I'll have to be more on the ball next year, maybe cut some softwood this winter!..

I don't even have all my kindling chopped (lazy bugger)

 

[WVBartMan]

I finally bit the bullet and put my wood under cover. This allowed for 3 to 4 year of seasoning with no rain/snow on it. The result is excellent firewood with little to no moisture.
View attachment 260563

 

[Arbonaut]

Wet seasoned wood will dry dehydrate much faster than green wood.
A couple of days without rain should get your firewood back into it's cured stage.
Cellular structures of green and cured wood are very different.

That's a great point. Once it cures it deflects more water and bounces back from getting wet faster. Beyond debate in my stacks.

 

[Nosmo]

Keeping Firewood Dryer

Anyone knows it is better to store firewood under cover that to let it set outside. Here are a couple of tips that might come in handy if you cannot store all of your wood under cover.

Stack it on top of something - for instance pallets. Unsplit wood will stay dryer than split wood. If you split your wood that is stored outside stack it with the bark side up.

Bark is waterproof - it is what holds the sap inside the tree and keeps other moisture out.
Indians used to make birchbark canoes.

Nosmo

 

[tooold]

I put short tarps on a bunch of my wood stacks so the air can get to the sides. The tarps I use are these 4ftx18ft that covers just the tops. At $5 each, they cover lots of wood. Also, I have two huge stacks (about a years worth)in the shed just in case my outside wood gets wet and I can't use it.

Agrimaster All Purpose Tarp (Dimensions: 4' x 18') at Blain's Farm & Fleet

 

[Fred Wright]

I prefer not to load the stove with splits that have been recently rained on. Sandy brought sideways rain and pulled part of the tarp off the woodpile... so I left what got wet behind and brought in what was still under cover.

Wet wood stinks and smolders.

 

[savageactor7]

For exercise I usually travel the extra distance to grab from our uncovered wood unless it's real wet. Yeah like the others suggested you have to have some dry wood in stock for the wet periods.

Then again if the splits are small enough a spray bottle with diesel fuel will get a fire going a lot easier. I started doing last year because winter was just an extended shoulder season with many days with no fire.

We're been burning wet wood last couple of days but that's with an established fire...starting from wet wood requires lot of attention.