Seasoning:
1. Cut/split/stack your wood (c/s/s)
2. Keep wood off ground (on rails, pallets, racks, wood shed, etc.).
3. Allow wind to blow through pile (if covering, only cover top and not sides)
4. Allow sun to hit it.
Sometimes #3 and #4 aren't always easily achieved everywhere, but #1 and #2 are necessary.
Most wood has seasoned enough after a year. Some species like oak take two years to season. A different stacking pattern that allows more air flow can accelerate things a bit.
If you really want to speed up things, a kiln will work, but it is added expense, energy usage, and effort. The only people I know who use a kiln are serious firewood sellers whose clients require kiln dried wood or who need to comply with government regulations for transporting wood in/out of certain areas.
Really, "seasoning" serves mainly to confuse. More to the point, we're talking air-drying (or kiln-) which is a process that can be tracked objectively. Most simply with a moisture-meter (MM.) Some folks are amazed that some red oaks, on the stump, have about 50% of their total weight in water. That would show up on a MM as 80+%, since they read dry-basis (water weight/oven-dry weight of a sample.) Some oak takes 2-3 years to air-dry to the point where it'll burn properly.
Hi, curious what you guys do to dry your firewood? Do you buy a kiln? Make one? Do something else? Thanks!
Woodpile in the SUN is key imo.
I have a 20 ft container with a stove built in the back end of it. I can dry a couple cord of wood a week but I only do Ash. So your super wood as the locals call it Oak would be another story. I cut the trees when the sap is down. That helps the drying.Hi, curious what you guys do to dry your firewood? Do you buy a kiln? Make one? Do something else? Thanks!
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