The best thing to do is split it and stack it in the spring. I stack it in rows with about a foot apart so air can circulate between the piles. I split wood small and try to build smaller, hotter fires.Fisher makes great stovesI do not cover the wood until September and then tarp it so that the top of the pile is covered and the sides of the pile are exposed to air.
it's really not that the wood is low quality, it's just that you are not supposed to use it for one year after you harvest it, since it has to dry and drain the sap. My dad, who was a "farm boy" taught me that
You guys are amazing. We are all benefiting so much from you sharing your real-world living experiences. It blows my mind how someone can thumbs-down a video like this full of tons of amazing information that NOBODY HAD TO PAY FOR (well, except you... to film it and edit it). Thanks for all you do, we love your stuff.
A Few hints on Using a Basic wood stove such as yours! The flappy thing is called a damper use it with your air intake control, (Remember to open it before you open the doors )There is a balance between draft control ( Damper ) and air intake control.when you just use the air intake to control the fire, and want a longer slow burn, That creates a cool fire thus Creosote. Using the damper will keep more heat in the stove longer letting the fire burn hotter with more air. Hotter fire less creosote. * :* Also you may want to move the fan lower. Blowing air across the flue pipe cools it, again cooler chimney less draft & more creosote. try these things out and see if you get results. Stay Warm & Safe.
Hello,I have followed your journey from the beginning, I love your commonsense problem solving ,your never give up work ethic, and the two of you working together to achieve the end goal of your homestead.You are an inspiration to people like me who have not started our homestead journey yet (I must overcome financial & physically limiting issues before I can start)Keep up the awesome sharing of your journey, I will cheer on as you forge ahead . Thank you Carl.
We've had one of those Fisher stoves since 1974. It doesn't carry the rope seal around the door. The flapper, as you called it, is a damper. Leaving it open is allowing a lot of your heat to go out of the stove. Close it down about 3/4 of the way when your stove is cooking with heat. Use the front dampers to control how fast a burn you want. Use a wood that will give you hot coals, here we burn oak and hickory and never burn a softwood in it. We heat a 1600 sq ft home with a cathedral ceiling in the range between 70 - 75 degrees on the extremely cold days. We fill our stove twice a day and when we go to bed. You also need to keep the ashes off the shelf in front of the doors.We wake up to a warm toasty house every morning.There are ways to improve the stove even more and if you're interested I'll find the link to it for you. Right now the damper in the pipe is closed all the way and the dampers on the doors are closed to about 1/8 inch and the stove is hot. We've had to open a window to let some of the hot air out. Don't choke the stove down with large pieces of wood. You need to burn smaller pieces until you get a good bed of coals in it then you can start adding the larger pieces, if the wood is dry. If you have to burn a soft wood make sure it's dry, real dry. We cut our wood late winter when the sap is down in the trees and "always "split it and stack it.
I used to heat my home and shop with 2 wood stoves. I usually burned 7 or 8 cords per year. The year I switched to propane was incredible. I had so much more free time! The only downside is that nothing gives you the feel of coziness like a good wood fire. I managed to survive the loss. LOL! Keep up the good work! I enjoy all of your content!
This is the first year we've really been on top of wood and drying out our wood. So I totally feel you guys on that! Summer gets busy and the next thing you know, it's Winter in no time. Great video!
Splitting the wood in early spring, help it dry faster, since wood only dries from the ends when they are still round. Split wood also burns better due to bigger surface area. Stacking your wood off the ground also helps alot.
You can also add a cold air intake to the inside top of the stove which will help with efficiency of your burns and add more heat to your room. Plenty of videos on UA-cam of design ideas. Good job on all your successes and the production quality of your videos.
When my wife and I had our trailer with the drop-out, we installed a wood burning stove. I used a fan with a thermometer. It would run on low power and would speed up when the stove heated to a certain amount then would shut off when the temp went to low. Saved a lot of power and kept the bedrooms in the back a lot warmer without the cold draft when you fire went to low.
I would seal up the cabin more. Cold air is more dense and will force it's way in even through the smallest of cracks and force the hot air up and out.
Another key to heating with wood is to burn your wood at the correct temperature. On that chimney thermometer you have, there is an optimal burn zone. If you burn at that temperature, you'll avoid getting creosote in your stove pipe. Most people tend to want to damp down their stoves to make the fire last as long as possible. Doing that is very inefficient and will create creosote in your chimney. If you happen to have extra space around your wood stove, you can bring in a bunch of your wood that is damp and place it near the stove and use the heat it generates to help dry out the wood that is damp.
Hi, just a little advice, don't stack your wood on the cut end . That allows the wood to absorb moisture from the ground. The best way is to split the wood and then stack it up in rows to dry. Like your videos, keep it coming.
I normally do not comment, but in my experience burning wood, (Main Heat Source) there are special cleaner logs that we burn to help clean the stacks, it is a cost, but well worth it in my opinion. Keep up the amazing work!
I grew up burning wood in a wood stove.. it's such a pleasant warmth!!!! 💓 Increasing the input of air to the fire has helped us before.. some stoves are terrible for the air input.
You don't want too much condensation, but, putting a pot of water on the stove, putting moisture in the heated area makes it feel warmer. Moist air in you're living area keeps noses and lips from splitting.
I live in a wood heated house growing up and sometimes we would have lower quality wood and high quality. we would put one large piece of high quality and 2 pieces of low quality and it would heat the whole house to the point that me and my brother would sleep with our window open. later on we got a coal and wood stove and it was a game changer. no more waking up with jackfrost nipping at out nose plus there were always enough hot coals that we didn't have to start a new fire. it also wouldn't hurt to stuff something in a bunch of those cracks, I thought our house had a bunch of drafts and holes, but you have us beat big time. That is something you don't want to be the winner at.
Hey guys. Great videos. Yes, you learn pretty quickly how important it is to stay ahead when you are burning wood. Spend one winter struggling with wet or green wood and trying to get heat and you will never want to do it again. For us, we always stay at least one year ahead. For example, we already have enough wood cut and stacked this fall to suffice for the winter of 2017-2018. Dry wood means more heat with less wood being burned. In addition, dry wood means less creosote build-up in your chimney. Of, course, this is also dependent on the type of wood you are burning, as well as the type of stove you are burning it in. One bit of advice though......if you cut birch and leave it out over one winter, do not leave it outdoors for a second winter. Contrary to popular belief, birch as a hardwood is not a good wood to leave outdoors for a long time. It has a tendency to get what I refer to as "punkie" or soft. So, after one winter outdoors, make sure it is stored indoors thereafter. Or, at least covered and protected from rain and snow. All the best.
Making your own charcoal would be a benefit as the heat is greater than wood. Google the 2 drum method using a 55 gallon drum with an inverted 30 gallon inside.
I really really wanted to hear the end of the snow plow story lol. oh and if you ever wanted to you can put down a thick layer of saw dust or wood shavings on the exposed ground to stop the heat sink effect. mmmmm the smell of saw dust
Granted you are right about the types of wood is correct, what you need to do to keep the creosote down from building up is a hot fire to burn the creosote.
Love your videos and I also noticed something about your wood pile. You should never leave any blocks standing. The end will absorb moisture from the ground and will not dry. Tip from a seasoned Canadian wood burner. Really interesting to follow you on your journey.
I would think that a "stove pipe heat exchanger" would be a better idea than the wood stove fans that run off the heat of the stove. Just my two cents.
I heated our house 3 winters with a wood stove in the basement. so the chimney was about 35 ft high, so we had a great draft. To clean the creosote out I would load it full of pine ( we were in construction so lumber cut offs were easily acquired) open the draft up all the way let it burn wide open a few hours or till all the wood burned up, l would do that once a month and I would have zero creosote in the chimney in the spring. the chimney was the same as yours. I got the idea from the stove store that sold logs for burning out the creosote.
Hey, love your videos. There was a guy who took and added to his chimney to keep the heat in the cabin. Look up heat exchangers to keep more heat in your cabin. Also to keep Alyssa safe there is a video on how to tie a climbing harness. We used this when we built our garage. It worked! And you could put some stove cement on that to hold it until later
When you have time, look up rocket mass heaters. They are like a wood stove, but use mass to hold 90+ percent of the heat instead of so much leaving via chimney. Bonus, you can sleep on it!
I have a suggestion to your soot problem, install a couple of pips for a secondary air supply inside the firebox. The idea is to let the fire heat up the air inside the tubes before its ejected over the fire where the now hot air will ensure that the soot particles and the partially combusted compounds fully combust. Since the soot is unburnt fuel a bonus of this is that the fuel to heat efficiency will increase a lot. With a setup like this you could control the primary air to a low setting for a smoldering long lasting fire, and use the secondary to ensure complete combustion. Search for secondary burn for more info.
the best way to clean a chimney is to do a controlled burn i did it this year never worked better the problem comes from the fact that this makes super hot spots in the chimney thats what is the cause of house fires also a good thing to add to it is start a fire in the chimney and than force a crazy amount of air with a leaf blower through it blows out all the ashes and other crap good as new
It's awesome watching you navigate the nuances of thermal flow and humidity. Once you guys are living in a fully insulated house, you will probably reverse a few things like putting a pan of water near the stove to add humidity. You will probably still be placing Pop's do-dad on the mantel though...
You can extend the heat cycle of your wood-stove by stacking bricks (flat rocks work but not as well) on the top and to the sides of your stove. They act like a thermal battery and continue to supply warmth after the stove goes out. It will make a huge difference as it levels off the "too hot/cold too soon" cycle.
Ever thought about building a rocket mass heater? Combustion chamber gets hot enough to burn most organic volatile compunds including creasote. Also can use between 1/10 - 1/4 the wood compared to a woodstove.
in place of criticizing, i will share with you a few methods I use. first you need to find your normal wind path. much like a snow fence, your wood pile will need to run perpendicular to that. this will allow your wind to run through your wood. place a line of pallets on the ground, to stack your wood on, this will keep all your wood off the ground, allows air circulation under the pile, and the best of all it will make sure that your pile will not fall over. splitting your wood ahead of drying season is a good idea as well. stack your wood 4 feet high and as wide as the skid. a real cord of wood is 4x4x8, and it is a good idea to know how much wood you burn. continue laying level pallets on the ground in a line until your wood is all stacked. lastly i cover my wood piles by nailing a piece of plywood to the top logs. this will keep most of the rain and snow off the pile. i have never had good luck with drying firewood in a non split block, and in a heap. i hope this method helps
Great suggestions! We actually have this exact setup. Pallets at the end of our cabin face the prevailing wind so when it blows it goes right through the wood. Our cabin is 12ft wide so when our stacks are 8' high we know we have 3 cord per 4' pallet. Works really well! Especially now when the rain is coming and the ground is swampy. Keeps the bottom of the pile dry. :)
I warm 90 % with wood and every wood is burning good and making not mess in chimney when it is enough dry. Do it early in spring or late on winter and chopp it min 2 pieces and get the autumn inside or under tarp and even then so that air can pass on sides, you have good burn wood for winter. I am living in Finland land of forests and cold winters. We are more north than Alaska.
You need a woodstove that will recirculate the VOCs (volatile organic compounds) back through the burn chamber and incinerate them. When those VOCs burn you will get a ton of heat and the exhaust smoke is fairly clean. Those pines and other conifer types have lots and lots of VOCs, aka creosotes.
Idk if you guys read this, but with wood stoves be careful with your smoke stack cuz wind pressure can blow your smoke right back into your cabin. That happened to us a few winters ago and it's not fun lol
In a foresting workshop I attended, one of the wood specialist said to throw an aluminum can in the fire weekly and it will clean the creosote out of your pipes. Then you can burn whatever you have.
For your stove there is a thing called a Magic Box. Fits right in the chimney. It reclaims some of the heat that you loos going out of the chimney. Also it has a fan that blows the heat back into the room. I am not sure how much power it would use. I have use them before with a very good out come. Great video keep up the good work.
there are tutorials on how to make your own stirling engines on here using household materials, bottles, cans, balloons. If you want something to just work and not take power, might be worth doing that.
Love watching your videos. I have a few suggestions for your Fisher Stove. I heated a 2000 square foot rancher in Maryland for 30+ years with my PaPa bear Fisher stove. You do not need a door gasket or a flue damper.. The door should close tight enough to trap a dollar bill in the seal grooves when the door is closed. I found that when charging the stove with fresh wood I needed to leave the door slightly open to get the new logs started and dry them out. You can't get distracted or you will burn your house down. I actually got the lower part of my stovepipe to start glowing before closing the doors and damping down. I coud hear the creasote falling off inside the flue as it cooled. The temp. gauge on the flue is a good idea just get the fire good and hot before damping down and it will not creasote as much. I think your stove was called the Gandma Bear because it has double doors and you load the logs sideways like a fireplace. My PaPa bear had one door and took up to a 31 inch long log and they went straight in and burned like a cigaret from the door end back. For us in Maryland, below zero temps are rare and I used oak or locust logs mostly so the house was 74 by the stove and 65 in the farthest bedrooms some 40 feet away. I would think that stove should be capable of driving you out of that little room. Mine also had red hot coals after 8 full hours of burning. I set my two air control knobs to a half turn open after getting a good hot fire started. Stay warm.
Just a suggestion, but typically, black iron stove pipe will corrode out for you in a year or so. Stainless steel will cost a lot more up front but last almost forever.
I am remembering some thing my dad used to do with our fire places we had an open fire in the lounge and a cold range in the kitchen. All our vegetable peels he uses to burn in the fire places and it kept our fire places clean he never ever had a need to clean our chimneys. just a thought.
we love watching your videos. Winter has finally arrived. I did a couple of videos on firewood types, uses and storage that may help you if you are somewhat new to using wood. There's so much to learn about firewood.
no I am far from a know-it-all. Hope it didn't come off that way. I come to watch and learn from you like many others do. Watching your video you talked about some struggles with wood last year, moisture and pipe issues, just hoping I could be of some help in return for what I learn from you.
As I moved my and my families life happily deeply towards Permaculture we build a Rocket Mass Heater last winter and are using it already for the second cold period now. For the record: It is completely unbelievable how little wood we are using (1/7th) compared to a wood stove. The wood burns extremely hot with relatively high air flow, so all problems with creosote or inefficency are solved, as all smoke and volitiles get burned, and nothing can condensate in form of creosote on the flues inside or leave your flue as unburned smokes and therefore wasted energy. Flue temperatures before wall-exit are around 50°C to 85°C after the thermal mass sucked all the heat out of the exhaust gases. We light one to two fires of 1hour duration each per day and have a really warm house around the clock (plus a nicely warm bench to sit on an fry your but a bit if your really cold). I know this video I am commenting on is old and its just a shed your heating here, but I was thinking on how you could realize such a Rocket Mass Heater for your new (real) home. Your garage ceiling must be able to carry about 500kg (or half a metric ton) per m² (or about 100pond per square foot, if I do the calculation right) to carry the weight of such a heater. If this is possible I promise you a truely confortable cozyness experiance for the rest of your life and generations to come. Like a masonry heater the great thermal mass will radiate out the fires heat time delayed and spread over up to 24 hours. Some people here in the comments falsely refer to a Rocket Stove, which is actually a cooking device and not meant ot heat a house, yet same ultra efficient way of wood combustion. Check out this great book about building your oven Rocket Mass Heater id your interested. Its with this book that I learned all about these super intelligently designed heating system. "The Rocket Mass Heater Builder's Guide - by Ernie and Erican Wisner" Feel free to ask any questions. Moritz
you guys should go to DIY box store and pick up the thermal foam insulation and staple it to the walls of the cabin. This would increase the R value and you would burn less to make heat in winter. it will keep drafts from blowing through those cracks.
your walls have inch gaps all over, you need to plug those gaps up to get any warmth. i guess it just a temporary structure but i bet you could find some cheap gap filling material. maybe some carefully applied builders foam, messy but cheap and quick?
Hey Jesse, Alyssa ! As always, your v-logs are well done, and much appreciated. Seems you've already figured this out, but the energy logs are slow, even burners. Cord wood by day, energy logs before bed - great combination. Merry X-mas to you both!
You should add a flue regulator and add a heat exchanger.i think that would help get the most btu's out of your fuel.i have been heating with wood exclusively for at least 20 years and these two items made the biggest difference for me :)
I just installed a small wood stove as a back up source if heat. It has a catalytic converter to burn cleaner, more efficient. Gives a second burn to your fire. It's cold here in NC but not brutal. It has been know to have bad winters sometimes. Ice/snow. But any time I use it to keep our common area warm, It does help bedrooms too. If I can keep my normal propane gas heat from coming on, I feel I'm saving money. I would love to cut my fuel cost in half this year. We'll see what happens.
Have you looked into a back boiler system for your log burner? One of the canal boats I took through France in midwinter had one that fed three radiators in the cabins from a small Morso Squirrel stove in the galley. Stay warm guys, Rob.
I'm in Newfoundland Canada and the prefered wood for good heat, that we use, is seasoned Birch. It's a native tree here, I don't' know if it's the same where you are.
loved this in depth look.thanks. I always find that I burn 1 soft (crap) wood to 2 hard (good) wood for my open campfires and it helps keep the fire going. I know it is different in a wood burner. and splitting it while ideal is very time consuming but may pay off for having a better hotter fire.
I would definitely go with one of those heat exchanger blowers that mount between the sections of your stove pipe. A friend of mine had one and it's amazing how much heat they capture from going out your stove pipe. The blower has a low setting for less current draw too.
winter dries the air out which makes heating the air extremely difficult moist air excepts heat a lot better always have a pot of watter on the stove putting steam into the air
Just came across your channel. My wife and I are looking to do the exact same thing you all have done. Buy some land in the mountains, rough it out for a couple years while building a log home... And let the rest be history. Awesome stuff. Interested to see where you all go from here.
Hey there, maybe it would be nice to show some daily life things. Like, how do you cook now (I would totally try to cook/slowcook on that wood burning stove), using the canned things, how is your night (do you sit by the fire, in the camper, just a sweater or all bundled up). I am a more homey and dreamy follower. I live in a small and crowded country with a "yard" of 50 square metres, I don't need the technical stuff but love to live vicariously through you.
Pine is ok for an out door wood stoves but you don't have one, so your best wood to burn is Oak or Elm that has been seasoned, last year you burned slab wood and yes it does have a lot of bark on it but if you can get it cheap enough and be able to pick your own slab wood cut it up in the spring and stack it so that its ready for winter, use it as day wood,
Just something to think about: routing the flew low and creating thermal mass around it (brick or other materials that can take higher temperatures) will increase the amount of usable heat inside your cabin. I've seen this done with rocket stoves used in cabins and homes. Also putting an "H" (made of three tees) on the top of your flew will increase its draw so rerouting the flew isn't such a big concern. This might make using less desirable woods not mess with your sleep.
Use the white pine for the hot tube.
A few $5 cans of expanding foam would take care of all those gaps in your cabin wall and up the temperature quite a bit.
What you are calling "mill ends" from logs, we call slab wood in Indiana. It makes great kindling!
The best thing to do is split it and stack it in the spring. I stack it in rows with about a foot apart so air can circulate between the piles. I split wood small and try to build smaller, hotter fires.Fisher makes great stovesI do not cover the wood until September and then tarp it so that the top of the pile is covered and the sides of the pile are exposed to air.
it's really not that the wood is low quality, it's just that you are not supposed to use it for one year after you harvest it, since it has to dry and drain the sap. My dad, who was a "farm boy" taught me that
You guys are amazing. We are all benefiting so much from you sharing your real-world living experiences. It blows my mind how someone can thumbs-down a video like this full of tons of amazing information that NOBODY HAD TO PAY FOR (well, except you... to film it and edit it). Thanks for all you do, we love your stuff.
A Few hints on Using a Basic wood stove such as yours! The flappy thing is called a damper use it with your air intake control, (Remember to open it before you open the doors )There is a balance between draft control ( Damper ) and air intake control.when you just use the air intake to control the fire, and want a longer slow burn, That creates a cool fire thus Creosote. Using the damper will keep more heat in the stove longer letting the fire burn hotter with more air. Hotter fire less creosote. * :* Also you may want to move the fan lower. Blowing air across the flue pipe cools it,
again cooler chimney less draft & more creosote. try these things out and see if you get results. Stay Warm & Safe.
Hello,I have followed your journey from the beginning, I love your commonsense problem solving ,your never give up work ethic, and the two of you working together to achieve the end goal of your homestead.You are an inspiration to people like me who have not started our homestead journey yet (I must overcome financial & physically limiting issues before I can start)Keep up the awesome sharing of your journey, I will cheer on as you forge ahead . Thank you Carl.
We've had one of those Fisher stoves since 1974. It doesn't carry the rope seal around the door. The flapper, as you called it, is a damper. Leaving it open is allowing a lot of your heat to go out of the stove. Close it down about 3/4 of the way when your stove is cooking with heat. Use the front dampers to control how fast a burn you want. Use a wood that will give you hot coals, here we burn oak and hickory and never burn a softwood in it. We heat a 1600 sq ft home with a cathedral ceiling in the range between 70 - 75 degrees on the extremely cold days. We fill our stove twice a day and when we go to bed. You also need to keep the ashes off the shelf in front of the doors.We wake up to a warm toasty house every morning.There are ways to improve the stove even more and if you're interested I'll find the link to it for you. Right now the damper in the pipe is closed all the way and the dampers on the doors are closed to about 1/8 inch and the stove is hot. We've had to open a window to let some of the hot air out. Don't choke the stove down with large pieces of wood. You need to burn smaller pieces until you get a good bed of coals in it then you can start adding the larger pieces, if the wood is dry. If you have to burn a soft wood make sure it's dry, real dry. We cut our wood late winter when the sap is down in the trees and "always "split it and stack it.
I used to heat my home and shop with 2 wood stoves. I usually burned 7 or 8 cords per year. The year I switched to propane was incredible. I had so much more free time! The only downside is that nothing gives you the feel of coziness like a good wood fire. I managed to survive the loss. LOL! Keep up the good work! I enjoy all of your content!
This is the first year we've really been on top of wood and drying out our wood. So I totally feel you guys on that! Summer gets busy and the next thing you know, it's Winter in no time. Great video!
That pine makes good kindling
Those blinky lights look like they are quite relaxing.
Splitting the wood in early spring, help it dry faster, since wood only dries from the ends when they are still round. Split wood also burns better due to bigger surface area.
Stacking your wood off the ground also helps alot.
You can also add a cold air intake to the inside top of the stove which will help with efficiency of your burns and add more heat to your room. Plenty of videos on UA-cam of design ideas.
Good job on all your successes and the production quality of your videos.
When my wife and I had our trailer with the drop-out, we installed a wood burning stove. I used a fan with a thermometer. It would run on low power and would speed up when the stove heated to a certain amount then would shut off when the temp went to low. Saved a lot of power and kept the bedrooms in the back a lot warmer without the cold draft when you fire went to low.
I would seal up the cabin more. Cold air is more dense and will force it's way in even through the smallest of cracks and force the hot air up and out.
Another key to heating with wood is to burn your wood at the correct temperature. On that chimney thermometer you have, there is an optimal burn zone. If you burn at that temperature, you'll avoid getting creosote in your stove pipe. Most people tend to want to damp down their stoves to make the fire last as long as possible. Doing that is very inefficient and will create creosote in your chimney.
If you happen to have extra space around your wood stove, you can bring in a bunch of your wood that is damp and place it near the stove and use the heat it generates to help dry out the wood that is damp.
Those things your dad makes are really cool!
Jeffry Richardson We'll pass on your address! He always has way too many! Lol!
I want one
Thank you for the video the doors can be welded if you can find the right person that can weld cast.
There are many positively in your videos. I hope you guys have wonderful winter.
Thanks Jesse, lots of good info for those of us who are new to heating with wood!
Hi, just a little advice, don't stack your wood on the cut end . That allows the wood to absorb moisture from the ground. The best way is to split the wood and then stack it up in rows to dry. Like your videos, keep it coming.
I normally do not comment, but in my experience burning wood, (Main Heat Source) there are special cleaner logs that we burn to help clean the stacks, it is a cost, but well worth it in my opinion. Keep up the amazing work!
Wood heat is a learning curve for sure! Glad to see you guys are figuring it out.
Great video, thanks and take care!
I grew up burning wood in a wood stove.. it's such a pleasant warmth!!!! 💓 Increasing the input of air to the fire has helped us before.. some stoves are terrible for the air input.
You don't want too much condensation, but, putting a pot of water on the stove, putting moisture in the heated area makes it feel warmer. Moist air in you're living area keeps noses and lips from splitting.
I live in a wood heated house growing up and sometimes we would have lower quality wood and high quality. we would put one large piece of high quality and 2 pieces of low quality and it would heat the whole house to the point that me and my brother would sleep with our window open. later on we got a coal and wood stove and it was a game changer. no more waking up with jackfrost nipping at out nose plus there were always enough hot coals that we didn't have to start a new fire. it also wouldn't hurt to stuff something in a bunch of those cracks, I thought our house had a bunch of drafts and holes, but you have us beat big time. That is something you don't want to be the winner at.
Be sure to oil up your leather gloves if they're drying out by the stove. It will make them last much longer. Obenoff's brand is good.
Hey guys. Great videos.
Yes, you learn pretty quickly how important it is to stay ahead when you are burning wood. Spend one winter struggling with wet or green wood and trying to get heat and you will never want to do it again.
For us, we always stay at least one year ahead. For example, we already have enough wood cut and stacked this fall to suffice for the winter of 2017-2018. Dry wood means more heat with less wood being burned. In addition, dry wood means less creosote build-up in your chimney. Of, course, this is also dependent on the type of wood you are burning, as well as the type of stove you are burning it in.
One bit of advice though......if you cut birch and leave it out over one winter, do not leave it outdoors for a second winter. Contrary to popular belief, birch as a hardwood is not a good wood to leave outdoors for a long time. It has a tendency to get what I refer to as "punkie" or soft. So, after one winter outdoors, make sure it is stored indoors thereafter. Or, at least covered and protected from rain and snow.
All the best.
Making your own charcoal would be a benefit as the heat is greater than wood.
Google the 2 drum method using a 55 gallon drum with an inverted 30 gallon inside.
I really really wanted to hear the end of the snow plow story lol. oh and if you ever wanted to you can put down a thick layer of saw dust or wood shavings on the exposed ground to stop the heat sink effect. mmmmm the smell of saw dust
Granted you are right about the types of wood is correct, what you need to do to keep the creosote down from building up is a hot fire to burn the creosote.
Love your videos and I also noticed something about your wood pile. You should never leave any blocks standing. The end will absorb moisture from the ground and will not dry. Tip from a seasoned Canadian wood burner. Really interesting to follow you on your journey.
You're totally right! If we have our way, those standing blocks will be left over next year and they can be split and seasoned next summer. :)
I would think that a "stove pipe heat exchanger" would be a better idea than the wood stove fans that run off the heat of the stove. Just my two cents.
I like that You are posting more vid's. So jealous of You guy's. Been watching from the start, keep it up!
I love the blinky light thing!
This was actually really useful and new information for me. Thanks for sharing all the details, even if you think everyone else already knows it.
Things like that White Pine make good tinder. You can also process them into charcoal to make them a better stove fuel.
I heated our house 3 winters with a wood stove in the basement. so the chimney was about 35 ft high, so we had a great draft. To clean the creosote out I would load it full of pine ( we were in construction so lumber cut offs were easily acquired) open the draft up all the way let it burn wide open a few hours or till all the wood burned up, l would do that once a month and I would have zero creosote in the chimney in the spring. the chimney was the same as yours. I got the idea from the stove store that sold logs for burning out the creosote.
Keith Byerly Bingo! Hot fires clean things up nice! Dirty wood still makes a huge mess.
1 year I decided to store the wood for the winter in the basement....Hmm you would believe what lives in wood😎. didn't do that again
Hey, love your videos. There was a guy who took and added to his chimney to keep the heat in the cabin. Look up heat exchangers to keep more heat in your cabin. Also to keep Alyssa safe there is a video on how to tie a climbing harness. We used this when we built our garage. It worked! And you could put some stove cement on that to hold it until later
Why not caulk the gaps in your cabin walls, and install a dryer hose and vent through the wall to provide combustion air?
Have a blessed Christmas and stay warm you two!
When you have time, look up rocket mass heaters. They are like a wood stove, but use mass to hold 90+ percent of the heat instead of so much leaving via chimney. Bonus, you can sleep on it!
I have a suggestion to your soot problem, install a couple of pips for a secondary air supply inside the firebox. The idea is to let the fire heat up the air inside the tubes before its ejected over the fire where the now hot air will ensure that the soot particles and the partially combusted compounds fully combust. Since the soot is unburnt fuel a bonus of this is that the fuel to heat efficiency will increase a lot. With a setup like this you could control the primary air to a low setting for a smoldering long lasting fire, and use the secondary to ensure complete combustion. Search for secondary burn for more info.
the best way to clean a chimney is to do a controlled burn i did it this year never worked better the problem comes from the fact that this makes super hot spots in the chimney thats what is the cause of house fires also a good thing to add to it is start a fire in the chimney and than force a crazy amount of air with a leaf blower through it blows out all the ashes and other crap good as new
It's awesome watching you navigate the nuances of thermal flow and humidity. Once you guys are living in a fully insulated house, you will probably reverse a few things like putting a pan of water near the stove to add humidity. You will probably still be placing Pop's do-dad on the mantel though...
+End User Lol. Good point. Leaky won't work for a home. Yes papas blinky light thing is here to stay!
Dude, this is me this winter. We weren't planning on getting a wood stove....next year I WILL BE PREPARED!!!! Thanks for the video and tips!
You can extend the heat cycle of your wood-stove by stacking bricks (flat rocks work but not as well) on the top and to the sides of your stove. They act like a thermal battery and continue to supply warmth after the stove goes out. It will make a huge difference as it levels off the "too hot/cold too soon" cycle.
Ever thought about building a rocket mass heater? Combustion chamber gets hot enough to burn most organic volatile compunds including creasote. Also can use between 1/10 - 1/4 the wood compared to a woodstove.
in place of criticizing, i will share with you a few methods I use. first you need to find your normal wind path. much like a snow fence, your wood pile will need to run perpendicular to that. this will allow your wind to run through your wood. place a line of pallets on the ground, to stack your wood on, this will keep all your wood off the ground, allows air circulation under the pile, and the best of all it will make sure that your pile will not fall over. splitting your wood ahead of drying season is a good idea as well. stack your wood 4 feet high and as wide as the skid. a real cord of wood is 4x4x8, and it is a good idea to know how much wood you burn. continue laying level pallets on the ground in a line until your wood is all stacked. lastly i cover my wood piles by nailing a piece of plywood to the top logs. this will keep most of the rain and snow off the pile. i have never had good luck with drying firewood in a non split block, and in a heap. i hope this method helps
Great suggestions! We actually have this exact setup. Pallets at the end of our cabin face the prevailing wind so when it blows it goes right through the wood. Our cabin is 12ft wide so when our stacks are 8' high we know we have 3 cord per 4' pallet. Works really well! Especially now when the rain is coming and the ground is swampy. Keeps the bottom of the pile dry. :)
I would love to hear more of that story!! Great episode... I can't wait for more!! Cheers!!!
Thank you for your channel been watching a while and love what you are doing! Off grid is the way to go.. Have fun and continue YouTubing!
I know that the wood stoves with a secondary burn method are expensive but they would help with your build up problems even with lesser quality woods.
I warm 90 % with wood and every wood is burning good and making not mess in chimney when it is enough dry. Do it early in spring or late on winter and chopp it min 2 pieces and get the autumn inside or under tarp and even then so that air can pass on sides, you have good burn wood for winter. I am living in Finland land of forests and cold winters. We are more north than Alaska.
Your tips and observations ARE super helpful! Thanks!
You need a woodstove that will recirculate the VOCs (volatile organic compounds) back through the burn chamber and incinerate them. When those VOCs burn you will get a ton of heat and the exhaust smoke is fairly clean. Those pines and other conifer types have lots and lots of VOCs, aka creosotes.
Idk if you guys read this, but with wood stoves be careful with your smoke stack cuz wind pressure can blow your smoke right back into your cabin. That happened to us a few winters ago and it's not fun lol
You can use your pine needles around your property to start a fire instead of using newspaper.
In a foresting workshop I attended, one of the wood specialist said to throw an aluminum can in the fire weekly and it will clean the creosote out of your pipes. Then you can burn whatever you have.
Great video, very informative. Really like the way you have prioritized. All steps are to make life easier, which is how it should be.
For your stove there is a thing called a Magic Box. Fits right in the chimney. It reclaims some of the heat that you loos going out of the chimney. Also it has a fan that blows the heat back into the room. I am not sure how much power it would use. I have use them before with a very good out come.
Great video keep up the good work.
LOL, the story at the end about your neighbor thinking you were dead because there was no smoke and no tire tracks. Classic.
there are tutorials on how to make your own stirling engines on here using household materials, bottles, cans, balloons. If you want something to just work and not take power, might be worth doing that.
Love watching your videos. I have a few suggestions for your Fisher Stove. I heated a 2000 square foot rancher in Maryland for 30+ years with my PaPa bear Fisher stove. You do not need a door gasket or a flue damper.. The door should close tight enough to trap a dollar bill in the seal grooves when the door is closed. I found that when charging the stove with fresh wood I needed to leave the door slightly open to get the new logs started and dry them out. You can't get distracted or you will burn your house down. I actually got the lower part of my stovepipe to start glowing before closing the doors and damping down. I coud hear the creasote falling off inside the flue as it cooled. The temp. gauge on the flue is a good idea just get the fire good and hot before damping down and it will not creasote as much. I think your stove was called the Gandma Bear because it has double doors and you load the logs sideways like a fireplace. My PaPa bear had one door and took up to a 31 inch long log and they went straight in and burned like a cigaret from the door end back. For us in Maryland, below zero temps are rare and I used oak or locust logs mostly so the house was 74 by the stove and 65 in the farthest bedrooms some 40 feet away. I would think that stove should be capable of driving you out of that little room. Mine also had red hot coals after 8 full hours of burning. I set my two air control knobs to a half turn open after getting a good hot fire started. Stay warm.
Thanks for the good video. Hope you guys have a great winter.
Just a suggestion, but typically, black iron stove pipe will corrode out for you in a year or so. Stainless steel will cost a lot more up front but last almost forever.
I am remembering some thing my dad used to do with our fire places we had an open fire in the lounge and a cold range in the kitchen. All our vegetable peels he uses to burn in the fire places and it kept our fire places clean he never ever had a need to clean our chimneys. just a thought.
Good stuff. I am learning a lot. Thanks to you both. Happy Holidays!
we love watching your videos. Winter has finally arrived. I did a couple of videos on firewood types, uses and storage that may help you if you are somewhat new to using wood. There's so much to learn about firewood.
+Dave And Purdy Cool! We all have tons to learn. Unless you're a know-it-all. We sure aren't! Haha
no I am far from a know-it-all. Hope it didn't come off that way. I come to watch and learn from you like many others do. Watching your video you talked about some struggles with wood last year, moisture and pipe issues, just hoping I could be of some help in return for what I learn from you.
Not what we meant at all! Meant that we all have a lot to learn! :)
As I moved my and my families life happily deeply towards Permaculture we build a Rocket Mass Heater last winter and are using it already for the second cold period now. For the record: It is completely unbelievable how little wood we are using (1/7th) compared to a wood stove. The wood burns extremely hot with relatively high air flow, so all problems with creosote or inefficency are solved, as all smoke and volitiles get burned, and nothing can condensate in form of creosote on the flues inside or leave your flue as unburned smokes and therefore wasted energy. Flue temperatures before wall-exit are around 50°C to 85°C after the thermal mass sucked all the heat out of the exhaust gases. We light one to two fires of 1hour duration each per day and have a really warm house around the clock (plus a nicely warm bench to sit on an fry your but a bit if your really cold).
I know this video I am commenting on is old and its just a shed your heating here, but I was thinking on how you could realize such a Rocket Mass Heater for your new (real) home. Your garage ceiling must be able to carry about 500kg (or half a metric ton) per m² (or about 100pond per square foot, if I do the calculation right) to carry the weight of such a heater. If this is possible I promise you a truely confortable cozyness experiance for the rest of your life and generations to come. Like a masonry heater the great thermal mass will radiate out the fires heat time delayed and spread over up to 24 hours. Some people here in the comments falsely refer to a Rocket Stove, which is actually a cooking device and not meant ot heat a house, yet same ultra efficient way of wood combustion.
Check out this great book about building your oven Rocket Mass Heater id your interested. Its with this book that I learned all about these super intelligently designed heating system. "The Rocket Mass Heater Builder's Guide - by Ernie and Erican Wisner" Feel free to ask any questions.
Moritz
It might be a little early, but wishing you guys a VERY VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS !!! Looking forward to 2017 and hopefully the barn coming together....
you guys should go to DIY box store and pick up the thermal foam insulation and staple it to the walls of the cabin. This would increase the R value and you would burn less to make heat in winter. it will keep drafts from blowing through those cracks.
Hahahaha @ the end. I love the silliness that you all have been introducing lately. I'm still envious of you two :)
Robert Rittenhouse We gotta remind ourselves not to be so serious and lighten up. It helps to laugh and share those laughs. :) Thanks for noticing!
your walls have inch gaps all over, you need to plug those gaps up to get any warmth.
i guess it just a temporary structure but i bet you could find some cheap gap filling material. maybe some carefully applied builders foam, messy but cheap and quick?
Hey Jesse, Alyssa ! As always, your v-logs are well done, and much appreciated. Seems you've already figured this out, but the energy logs are slow, even burners. Cord wood by day, energy logs before bed - great combination. Merry X-mas to you both!
You should add a flue regulator and add a heat exchanger.i think that would help get the most btu's out of your fuel.i have been heating with wood exclusively for at least 20 years and these two items made the biggest difference for me :)
Do you every watch Life in Farmland? He's in Minnesota, and he has a GREAT video about firewood, the how's and why's. Loved this video!
I just installed a small wood stove as a back up source if heat. It has a catalytic converter to burn cleaner, more efficient. Gives a second burn to your fire. It's cold here in NC but not brutal. It has been know to have bad winters sometimes. Ice/snow. But any time I use it to keep our common area warm, It does help bedrooms too. If I can keep my normal propane gas heat from coming on, I feel I'm saving money. I would love to cut my fuel cost in half this year. We'll see what happens.
Have you looked into a back boiler system for your log burner? One of the canal boats I took through France in midwinter had one that fed three radiators in the cabins from a small Morso Squirrel stove in the galley.
Stay warm guys, Rob.
Where can I get one of those cool "blinky-light-thingies"? ;-) That's awesome!
such a beautiful view around :-) Love your videos, thank you very much for sharing!
I make pine needle and sawdust fire logs lovely flame and little ash.
how about digging a charcoal pit for the crappy wood?
blinkylightthing looks very Star Trek :)
I'm in Newfoundland Canada and the prefered wood for good heat, that we use, is seasoned Birch. It's a native tree here, I don't' know if it's the same where you are.
What about all the cracks in those walls?Looks like the wind would blow right through
loved this in depth look.thanks. I always find that I burn 1 soft (crap) wood to 2 hard (good) wood for my open campfires and it helps keep the fire going. I know it is different in a wood burner. and splitting it while ideal is very time consuming but may pay off for having a better hotter fire.
I would definitely go with one of those heat exchanger blowers that mount between the sections of your stove pipe. A friend of mine had one and it's amazing how much heat they capture from going out your stove pipe. The blower has a low setting for less current draw too.
you want 15% moisture content in the wood, use mix fire and pine/spruce
and burn way hotter
Fisher stoves do not use gaskets or packing. I had a smaller model and a friend who had the same model you have here clued me in to that fact.
winter dries the air out which makes heating the air extremely difficult moist air excepts heat a lot better always have a pot of watter on the stove putting steam into the air
Almost forgot. Video# 100, congratulations
+Mike Griffin Omg! Totally didn't notice! Gosh how does one celebrate this milestone!?!?
Hot tub.
Merry Christmas from Oklahoma!
Just came across your channel. My wife and I are looking to do the exact same thing you all have done. Buy some land in the mountains, rough it out for a couple years while building a log home... And let the rest be history. Awesome stuff. Interested to see where you all go from here.
you should plug the gaps to help keep the draft out
Merry Christmas you two!
Hey there, maybe it would be nice to show some daily life things. Like, how do you cook now (I would totally try to cook/slowcook on that wood burning stove), using the canned things, how is your night (do you sit by the fire, in the camper, just a sweater or all bundled up). I am a more homey and dreamy follower. I live in a small and crowded country with a "yard" of 50 square metres, I don't need the technical stuff but love to live vicariously through you.
Pine is ok for an out door wood stoves but you don't have one, so your best wood to burn is Oak or Elm that has been seasoned, last year you burned slab wood and yes it does have a lot of bark on it but if you can get it cheap enough and be able to pick your own slab wood cut it up in the spring and stack it so that its ready for winter, use it as day wood,
I woke up to -6 this morning in Kansas City. Brrrrr!
Just something to think about: routing the flew low and creating thermal mass around it (brick or other materials that can take higher temperatures) will increase the amount of usable heat inside your cabin. I've seen this done with rocket stoves used in cabins and homes. Also putting an "H" (made of three tees) on the top of your flew will increase its draw so rerouting the flew isn't such a big concern. This might make using less desirable woods not mess with your sleep.