New Grump of the Day

[Penners]

50ft damson tree down,damaged a metal garden bench,Tree now cut into logs,dried a few around the logburner and now keeping the cats warm.

Phil, there are risks to using recently felled wood in a woodburner - particularly if you have a lined flue. I'm afraid that stacking the logs near the stove for a few days just isn't enough to dry the wood properly - they really need to be stacked in a dry, ventilated place for at least a summer.

Undried wood can cause condensation of acidic combustion products in the flue, and in time this can corrode the flue - even if it's stainless steel.

Of course, I don't want to be alarmist. This isn't going to happen after a small number of damp logs are used, but as a longer-term practise it can be deleterious.

 

[Flyfisher]

. . . . plus, the effective energy content of the wood is a lot lower than fully seasoned wood because a significant part of the combustion heat is used to boil off the water.

Cutting up our fallen poplar yesterday (courtesy of Doris!), I was surprised how wet the resulting logs were inside. Clearly the sap is well and truly on the rise at this time of the year.

 

[DJH]

Ewan (Euan?) has just left Tipperary, should be with you soon...

 

[paulc]

Cutting up our fallen poplar yesterday (courtesy of Doris!), I was surprised how wet the resulting logs were inside.

I spent a weekend towards the end of last year splitting poplar - The water was pouring out of the ends as the wedges went in. Not really that surprising as poplar has a typical moisture content of 64% when green. Hopefully, we get a nice warm summer so that the pile will dry out quickly.

 

[philpjuk100]

I buy kiln dried logs for the logburner,the chimney is not lined and is huge,I am just trying to get rid of them as my log storage is full.What suprised me was the way they burned completely,I was expecting to have to "roll" them.I also burned leylandi trunks and a large eucalyptus branch while still "green" which also burned well.I would rather burn them inside than on the bonfire outside which all the smaller wood went on.

 

[philpjuk100]

I now see that a big dead ash tree has fallen in the wood but am not sure if my chainsaw is "man enough" for the job,have ordered a couple of new chains,and as they say,"ash logs (wet or dry) a king would warm his slippers by".

 

[Flyfisher]

I felled a large precarious Ash last summer and will be splitting this spring ready for next winter. I've read that it burns well when green though I've never had the need to try. It certainly burns well after 18 months or so

 

[Flyfisher]

Cutting up our fallen poplar yesterday (courtesy of Doris!), I was surprised how wet the resulting logs were inside.

I spent a weekend towards the end of last year splitting poplar - The water was pouring out of the ends as the wedges went in. Not really that surprising as poplar has a typical moisture content of 64% when green. Hopefully, we get a nice warm summer so that the pile will dry out quickly.

The poplar that Doris felled was no so large really, but will still be a useful addition to the log pile. A few years ago we had two very large poplars felled that were too close to a neighbouring house and after logging and splitting them I seasoned them for about 18 months, by which time they had lost a great deal of their weight, so I can easily believe that water content figure. The two trees kept us going all winter (using the boiler stove every day) with some to spare, but although it burned well it also burned quite fast.

 

[philpjuk100]

Beechwood fires are bright and clear
If the logs are kept a year,
Chestnut's only good they say,
If for logs 'tis laid away.
Make a fire of Elder tree,
Death within your house will be;
But ash new or ash old,
Is fit for a queen with crown of gold

Birch and fir logs burn too fast
Blaze up bright and do not last,
it is by the Irish said
Hawthorn bakes the sweetest bread.
Elm wood burns like churchyard mould,
E'en the very flames are cold
But ash green or ash brown
Is fit for a queen with golden crown

Poplar gives a bitter smoke,
Fills your eyes and makes you choke,
Apple wood will scent your room
Pear wood smells like flowers in bloom
Oaken logs, if dry and old
keep away the winter's cold
But ash wet or ash dry
a king shall warm his slippers by.

The firewood poem by Lady Celia Congreve

I use poplar for the brakes on my motorcycle!

 

[88v8]

I use poplar for the brakes on my motorcycle!

Heartwood or sapwood?
Do they work when wet?

I believe that the discs in Andre shock absorbers were apple wood.

Ivor

 

[philpjuk100]

Sap wood,well seasoned,they used to use it on the brakes on pit tubs.No they don`t work when wet,they don`t work a lot better when dry!,if you hold it on down hill it smells like a bonfire!.

 

[Hobden]

But ash wet or ash dry
a king shall warm his slippers by.

So why does ash burn so well?

Sadly there may be a lot of it about in the coming years as ash-dieback spreads, assuming people are allowed to sell it on as firewood. And then there'll be none

 

[Flyfisher]

Perhaps different tree species have different percentages of water content and Ash has one of the lowest? Just guessing really.

I've read that all wood has basically the same calorific value based on dry weight.

 

[philpjuk100]

I don`t know the reason but it really does burn well,lots of heat,burns for a long time and no "spitting".Doris blew down a big ash in the wood that was dead when we moved here ten years ago,I have "logged" some of the smaller branches but the trunk is going to be a challenge!.

 

[paulc]

Decided it was about time the window in the pantry is bricked up as per the architect's drawings from when the extension was built. Ripped out the internal woodwork, and in the process, the consumer unit got dislodged (crappy little screws going in to crumbly 1920s building blocks). Hopefully, I can push the CU to one side in order to drill new holes. If not, things might get interesting with everything being live.

 

[paulc]

Perhaps different tree species have different percentages of water content and Ash has one of the lowest?

Useful little chart towards the end of this document: https://www.forestry.gov.uk/pdf/FR_BEC_Wood_as_Fuel_Technical_Supplement_2010.pdf/%24FILE/FR_BEC_Wood_as_Fuel_Technical_Supplement_2010.pdf

Ash has a moisture content of just 32% which isn't far off from being ready for burning.

 

[malcolm]

To get us back on a more grumpy trajectory has anyone tried to have an electricity meter moved? I thought it would be nice to move mine from the side of an alcove to lower down and in a cupboard at the back of the alcove with some nice book shelves above. The electricity company suggested they could do that, but after several months they decided they might be prepared to move the meter down the same wall but couldn't move the fuse. I need National Power for that. My supply is ancient so it will cost several thousands of pounds to shorten it by 3 feet as that would involve digging the road up to install a new cable.

The wires for my new consumer unit are already in the new position. Should anyone else wish to move a meter my message is don't be so naive! It feels exactly like the dropped kerb experience. Wages for the couple of guys that might come over for a a couple of hours to do the work will be a tiny percentage of the actual cost. I think my cupboard in the alcove with the shelves above might become much more imaginative in design.

 

[Feltwell]

Well, I'm going to make Malcolm even more grumpy then....

I wanted to move the meter around 3' in a previous house. I contacted the electricity board, and got everything ready - even put a new backing board in place. Electricity board man arrived, ever so friendly, moved the meter in about 10 minutes and said to me "Tell you what - seeing as how you made the job so easy for me, I'll tell the office you cancelled when I arrived" - saved me £180 !

 

[Flyfisher]

I'm afraid I may also add to Malcolm's grumpiness.

I not only had a meter moved from the house to a detached garage but also had the overhead supply to the house, which was strung over two poles in the garden, replaced with an underground supply to the new meter. It all started with a casual enquiry after our scaffolders said the cable to the house needed to be shrouded. A very pleasant chap from EDF turned up at the house a day or two later to have a look because he couldn't understand why the cable should need shrouding. Sure enough it didn't, but while he was here I asked about having the overhead cables replaced and he said he could arrange it as long as I dug the trench (because he said their contractors would charge 'silly money').

Long story short, he was true to his word and sorted everything out. I dug the trench and they did the rest, including installing the new meter in the garage. There were three or four chaps here for a couple of days, including a cherry picker land rover and what looked like a mobile workshop/tea van, but there was no charge whatsoever. They even let me keep the two telegraph poles, which subsequently came in very handy for building a lean-to wood store

 

[LadyArowana]

I'm not going to add to Malcom's grumpiness, our electricity meter is in the same place it has always been.

We did however get a bill for £8,000 not long before they gave us a new one. We don't use much leccy, before we renovated we were hardly ever there, hadn't been for years. When they read the meter they decided the only way the reading could be legit, was if the dial had gone all the way around and started ober from zero again. Luckily the supervisor chap came to investigate when we were in the middle of building work, he was very nice and said that it was obviously stupid, we would have had to be running some sort of heavy machinery to get through that much power and he could see that was unlikely in a small apartment! He did the paperwork and told me that if there was "any more nonsense" to get in touch with the Ombudsman and complain. The bill went away and they replaced the meter with a new one.