Wood burners - and open fires

[oddoneout]

They are wonderful fruit and seemingly tough small trees, often free to collect although I've never noticed the flavour difference having many times made delicious fruit jelly and jam out of both.

I agree that for culinary purposes the flavour differences don't signify, but as I have no need to make preserves these days the raw flavour is more of a consideration.

[Dave2002]

Now had another delivery of soft wood for burning. Seems OK, and hopefully will keep us warm enough for the rest of the winter period. The oil based central heating is as erratic as always - though today I detected that the underfloor heating is actually working in a couple of areas, though one area seems steadfastly shut down.
Seems to me that perhaps the water isn't circulating properly.

I asked the wood guy what other wood he has for sale currently, and he mentioned a few other hardwoods, including oak. Are there any types of wood which are particularly good for burning? Presumably what one wants/needs is low tarring, and high heat output, as well perhaps as ease of starting the fire.

[Anastasius]

Now had another delivery of soft wood for burning. Seems OK, and hopefully will keep us warm enough for the rest of the winter period. The oil based central heating is as erratic as always - though today I detected that the underfloor heating is actually working in a couple of areas, though one areas seems steadfastly shut down.
Seems to me that perhaps the water isn't circulating properly.

I asked the wood guy what other wood he has for sale currently, and he mentioned a few other hardwoods, including oak. Are there any types of wood which are particularly good for burning? Presumably what one wants/needs is low tarring, and high heat output, as well perhaps as ease of starting the fire.

I might have bad news for you re your UFH...depending on when it was put in. If it is fairly old and uses the original Hep2o grey plastic pipe then that pipe has the nasty habit of letting the black magnatite drop out of solution BUT only in the plastic. At our last place, I had one room where the radiators refused to warm up. Finally in desperation, lifted some floorboards to see a copper pipe connected to some Hep2o. Opening up the compression joint, the copper pipe was clean but the Hep2o stuff was blocked solid with magnatite. Of course, when the system was first put in, no-one really knew about magnetite and so useful items like the MagnaClean weren't available. Just saying ...

[Dave2002]

I might have bad news for you re your UFH...depending on when it was put in. If it is fairly old and uses the original Hep2o grey plastic pipe then that pipe has the nasty habit of letting the black magnatite drop out of solution BUT only in the plastic. At our last place, I had one room where the radiators refused to warm up. Finally in desperation, lifted some floorboards to see a copper pipe connected to some Hep2o. Opening up the compression joint, the copper pipe was clean but the Hep2o stuff was blocked solid with magnatite. Of course, when the system was first put in, no-one really knew about magnetite and so useful items like the MagnaClean weren't available. Just saying ...

Not bad news - might indicate a problem area which can be fixed.

Does the magnetite come in the water supply (seems unlikely), or is it generated by corrosion of metal "somewhere" in the system? We have had problems due to the wrong pumps being installed, though I thought that the significant problems had been fixed by now. Can magnetite be flushed out? Chemicals? Also do the magnetic filter things work? Are they worth while?

[oddoneout]

Now had another delivery of soft wood for burning. Seems OK, and hopefully will keep us warm enough for the rest of the winter period. The oil based central heating is as erratic as always - though today I detected that the underfloor heating is actually working in a couple of areas, though one area seems steadfastly shut down.
Seems to me that perhaps the water isn't circulating properly.

I asked the wood guy what other wood he has for sale currently, and he mentioned a few other hardwoods, including oak. Are there any types of wood which are particularly good for burning? Presumably what one wants/needs is low tarring, and high heat output, as well perhaps as ease of starting the fire.

Drat! I went to look this up in my copy of The Log Book by Will Rolls, which I bought when I got my woodburner, only to discover that it's nowhere to be found. I've given the details to several people but don't think I've ever lent it to anyone, so it must be somewhere...
There's quite a lot of info online such as this https://www.gardensillustrated.com/p...-for-stacking/ which all seem to be roughly in agreement. Now that I've finished up the wood from the conifer hedge I think I might go back to ordering a bag of softwood with each hardwood delivery as it does help to get the fire going well, and then the hardwood takes over.
Sadly there is going to be a lot of ash available - assuming a ban on deadwood movement doesn't get imposed, hasn't up to now I think and arguably wouldn't achieve anything at this stage anyway.
Ultimately the quality of the wood ( well seasoned, dry) may be more important than getting the very best species for burning, so your merchant's recommendation could be useful, assuming he isn't trying to offload a problem batch!

[french frank]

I asked the wood guy what other wood he has for sale currently, and he mentioned a few other hardwoods, including oak.

My supplier sells only kiln-dried beech and oak, plus ecologs. He doesn't deal in softwoods at all. He can't deliver to you, I'm afraid, as he's just ten minutes away from me and only does local deliveries. But you might be interested in the comments about what he has, under SHOP FIREWOOD.

[gradus]

My supplier sells only kiln-dried beech and oak, plus ecologs. He doesn't deal in softwoods at all. He can't deliver to you, I'm afraid, as he's just ten minutes away from me and only does local deliveries. But you might be interested in the comments about what he has, under SHOP FIREWOOD.

Beech and ash are better than oak if you want a roaring fire with good flame, once that's established I'd add oak to keep it going but without as much flame.
According to my supplier, beech is used by wood stove manufacturers to test their stoves as it's heat output is greater than ash/oak.

[Anastasius]

Not bad news - might indicate a problem area which can be fixed.

Does the magnetite come in the water supply (seems unlikely), or is it generated by corrosion of metal "somewhere" in the system? We have had problems due to the wrong pumps being installed, though I thought that the significant problems had been fixed by now. Can magnetite be flushed out? Chemicals? Also do the magnetic filter things work? Are they worth while?

Corrosion. Yes, I know...that's what those inhibitors are supposed to do. Stop it happening. No, you can't flush it out if it's hardened up. Even with a power flush. DAMHIKT. Yes, MagnaClean's work very well.

[french frank]

Beech and ash are better than oak if you want a roaring fire with good flame, once that's established I'd add oak to keep it going but without as much flame.

Looked at my suppliers website again and they have air-dried ash (normally), but not kiln dried. As long as the embers are glowing brightly, combustion is taking place properly. It's when they become dull that the smoke and pollutants are given off - caused by imperfect combustion. Keeping the temperature up in the firebox is essential which is why in Smoke Control Areas stoves have to be adjusted so that the air supply can only be half closed, or 70% closed - can't remember exactly.

[Dave2002]

Beech and ash are better than oak if you want a roaring fire with good flame, once that's established I'd add oak to keep it going but without as much flame.
According to my supplier, beech is used by wood stove manufacturers to test their stoves as it's heat output is greater than ash/oak.

We have oak trees which sometimes lose branches. If I store those for a year or two, could I usefully burn them then?

Can't chop the trees down or trim them much due to TPOs.

Normally I just take them to the local dump as garden waste - as long as they're not too large.

[gradus]

Looked at my suppliers website again and they have air-dried ash (normally), but not kiln dried. As long as the embers are glowing brightly, combustion is taking place properly. It's when they become dull that the smoke and pollutants are given off - caused by imperfect combustion. Keeping the temperature up in the firebox is essential which is why in Smoke Control Areas stoves have to be adjusted so that the air supply can only be half closed, or 70% closed - can't remember exactly.

If the stove is allowed to tick over with little air supplied it will smoulder for ages -in the sixties/seventies overnight 'burning' was one of the selling points for woodstoves - but the inside of the stove and the flue will blacken and if done often enough tar will form like a black glaze and that will then need to be burnt off with a hot fire, risking chimney fires which (from experience) can be extremely alarming and potentially dangerous, especially in properties with older chimneys with degraded pointing between the bricks or with thatch.
Best way to know if the fire is at the right temperature is a flue thermometer, ours is magnetic.

[Dave2002]

It has been very cold over the last few days, and we nearly faced an emergency, with very low levels of oil for the oil boiler. To conserve the oil until the delivery man came (came yesterday) we shut off a lot of the heating, and used the immersion heater for heating water. We got through quite a large number/volume of logs in a very few days. Having to load fuel into a burner like that makes one very aware of how much fuel is being used, and also I guess, that oil really is more effective. One problem with electricity and gas is that it is very easy to forget how much energy is really being consumed - with consequent effects on the environment - as all that is required usually is to just press a few switches and dial temperatures up and down.

Domestic heating is still a significant part of the UKs energy consumption, and a lot of heat used domestically simply "disappears" because many British houses have poor insulation.

[oddoneout]

It has been very cold over the last few days, and we nearly faced an emergency, with very low levels of oil for the oil boiler. To conserve the oil until the delivery man came (came yesterday) we shut off a lot of the heating, and used the immersion heater for heating water. We got through quite a large number/volume of logs in a very few days. Having to load fuel into a burner like that makes one very aware of how much fuel is being used, and also I guess, that oil really is more effective. One problem with electricity and gas is that it is very easy to forget how much energy is really being consumed - with consequent effects on the environment - as all that is required usually is to just press a few switches and dial temperatures up and down.

Domestic heating is still a significant part of the UKs energy consumption, and a lot of heat used domestically simply "disappears" because many British houses have poor insulation.

Indeed, which is why it is so infuriating when government comes up with convoluted and unsuccessful schemes to put in things like heat pumps instead of addressing the basic problems first. The continued refusal to address insulation levels in new-build is another bit of stupidity, the result of listening to influential developers keen to maintain double digit profit margins, rather than doing the right thing for people and the environment.

[Dave2002]

Indeed, which is why it is so infuriating when government comes up with convoluted and unsuccessful schemes to put in things like heat pumps instead of addressing the basic problems first. The continued refusal to address insulation levels in new-build is another bit of stupidity, the result of listening to influential developers keen to maintain double digit profit margins, rather than doing the right thing for people and the environment.

Heat pumps and EVs are OK, but insulation and efficient control systems should be mandatory, and would give quicker returns. If you have to do two things, say A and B, then the order might matter. In the case of A being keep burning fossil fuel until there’s a problem, and B is switch to a more effective form of heating, there would be less environmental damage to do B first, so that energy supplies are conserved and damage minimised. Needless to say many governments, particularly in the UK, will do most actions in the wrong order.

Similarly A could be install insulation and B could be make EVs mandatory, or A and B might just be Covid and vaccine related.

[Anastasius]

......The continued refusal to address insulation levels in new-build is another bit of stupidity, the result of listening to influential developers keen to maintain double digit profit margins, rather than doing the right thing for people and the environment.

I'd be interested to hear why you think this is the case as the Building Regs are pretty clear re insulation.