Wood Heat Thread ~ post pics

My current sorry excuse for a wood yard. I've got to find time to get in the mountains and harvest some more scrub oak. I've also got 4 huge beetle kill Aleppo Pines at my grandmother's house I need to drop and split. Fortunately, our 100 degree summers with less than 15% humidity means I'll be able to burn it this winter.

 

I used to use Nicholson, which is a very good file maker, but they seemed to clog up easily. I got onto the Pferd brand after buying some at the Paul Bunyan Show, then found out I could buy them through my work for about .75/file and they work really well. I haven't had much experience with Oregon stuff as I tend to use OEM bars & chains. I can snatch up 18 & 20" chains at the Paul Bunyan for $12/$14 respectively. Husqvana brand... Love their chains. I use up probably 2 chains a year on my 20" and one each on my 18 & 14". Half a dozen files or so. I do a good bit of cutting aside from firewood maintaining the trails and stuff on my father's land. Gonna drop some coin on a new 550XP this fall (at the P.B.S.)to replace my clapped out '98 Husky 350...can't wait! Most models are marked down about a Benji.

 

Had fun with my daughter today, we cut a split a cord out of this Douglas fir cull deck.

 

Why were those logs culled ? Wind shake or fungus ?

 

OZ they either had white speck/fungus or a wind shake damage that was caused by beetle infestation. Most of the logs have higher than average pitch levels.

 

We heat mostly with wood and usually go through 8 face cord a season. Last winter sucked and we went through 10 (and ran out about then of March). I just got 10 delivered this weekend and stacked it. the wood looks good compared to the stuff we got last year (wet cherry which would not light for nothing). This year it seems to be mostly Oak with some cherry and ash.

My wife is the tree cutter in the family but she took a detour and decided to become an accountant. Apparently sitting behind a desk is not her cup of tea so she is back to stay at home mom. I expect that she will get bored and start dropping trees on our land again. We get mostly ash out of our land. I hope she does do some cutting, I actually enjoy splitting in the fall and since we are getting wood delivered now I have nothing to split.

Carl

 

Makes sense , high pitch fir can give you the " holy crap , I can't turn it down anymore " moment in the woodstove , lol

 

What's a face cord ?

 

Just like it sounds; a 4x8 measure of firewood, but only one rick deep (the front face of a cord). Typically cut 16"
Essentially 1/3 of a cord.

 

Oh , that seems goofy

 

Yeah, I'm not crazy about it as a unit of measure. A lot of times firewood dealers us it in their advertising to get your attention (only $100/cord cut/split/delivered!) and then it'll briefly mention in the ad that they're face cords. Strikes me as a way for the unscrupulous to take advantage of the trusting/elderly/inattentive.

 

Around here they do not deal in cord, an advertised cord is really a face cord. I paid $75 a face delivered and split.... not sure how that compares to other parts.

 

http://farmprogress.com/story-know-regulations-selling-buying-firewood-9-103263

Not sure how these rules came about. There are some quarantine issues here as well. I don't sell much anymore...usually give it away or trade for labor.

 

Too many people were getting ripped off, probably. I imagine that the reason a "face cord" is illegal is because it isn't a set unit of measure. A face cord that's cut to 24" gets you a lot more wood than a face cord that's cut to 16"
Same thing for moisture content and selling by weight; too many people were probably advertising wood that was still wet as 'seasoned' because it had been split for six months but sitting out uncovered and getting rained on the whole time. Or they were selling it by the ton weight as 'seasoned' so people were paying for a lot of water.

Usually regulations like that come about because people aren't being 'honorable'

 

Interesting... I never thought of that. Every face cord I have purchased has been 18 inches. I did just check craigslist and two ads had 14-16 inch face cord. some of the ads had no information on width and only one add out of about 2 dozen had the option to buy a full cord.

 

Picked up a bunch of old tools in from Craigslist the other day, got a bulk load of them for $35 from some guy that was clearing out his estate and moving to Florida. Included in the batch were a couple of old Disston handsaws and a couple of really nice (like, brand-spanking-new) old production Snow & Nealley axes. Plus there were a couple of old broadaxes, so I rigged up an electrolytic rust remover and have been going to town on them. Finally thought to document one of them yesterday.
How it started out (after I worked the old handle out of it)

After a couple of hours in the bath:

After a 12-hour soak:

The rust is all flaked off, and just the layer of 'black rust' is left. And it comes off a LOT easier than the rust, without damaging the good steel underneath.

After a good going over with a Scotch Brite pad and a rag soaked in WD-40:

Ready for a rehandle, a sharpening, and it'll go back into service.

 

This was a firewood weekend. Went up to my parents and worked up about 4 cord for them on Saturday (trees were already down; I just worked them up to stove length) for my brother to gather and split for them through the week. Then on Sunday I went out and cut and hauled 2 cord for myself (took 4 trips with the Dodge). I just tossed it all into a pile behind the house and I'll split and stack it through the week. I've still got about 3-4 cord downed that I need to haul out of there, so I'll probably be spending this coming weekend doing it all over again, lol.
Gratuitous shot of the Dodge freighted:

 

I'm still scrounging

 

You guys still having a lot of wildfires out that way, Oz? I haven't seen anything about it on the news lately (the reporters are too busy reporting on how most of California is on fire right now).