Paper logs..

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Woody girl

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Mar 31, 2018
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Exmoor
I live in a high radon area. I've done the 6 month scan and it was marginally under the limit. So I'm ok.. just the work needed to dig a sink was just not worth the upheaval for the benefits.
As regards the oil heating smell. The air here is very good due to being on the moor. Lots of moss and lichen on tree branches. I suffer from asthma big time and was regularly having to call an ambulance for severe attacks. Since I moved here I haven't had to call for the last 15 years. I had a home asthma machine thing it was so bad. (So long since I used one I've even forgot what it's called) maybe I'm just super sensitive to the smell. I can smell mushrooms from quite a distance. I can tell if someone wearing perfume or aftershave has walked down the path 10 minutes before me. Maybe I was a dog or bear in a former life.
 
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Robson Valley

Full Member
Nov 24, 2014
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McBride, BC
From what all you say, I think bear, not dog.

I've forgotten. If the Radon (from the limestone in the concrete foundation walls) threshhold was 15 units
my place was maybe? 2 units after 6 months.

McBride air is quite clean of organics but the dust-fall off the mountain stone is an everpresent gray dust.
It glitters on the dash in the truck and inside the window sills.
Being a very long and deep valley, there is rarely any calm air. Always a breeze so the smoke from
round wood fire isn't much of a factor in air quality. We got ash-fall from the bad wild fires these 2 summers past.

Various homes in the village do use round wood for heating. About 5 cords per winter.
Sometimes we see an entire logging truck unloaded in somebody's front yard.
Take a lot for chainsaw gas to cut that up (usually spruce/pine/fir and birch if you're rich.)

I'm sure that some people still make a habit of burning all sorts of paper beyond kindling.
Every once in a while, there's a whiff of burning plastic in the air.
 

Janne

Sent off - Not allowed to play
Feb 10, 2016
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Grand Cayman, Norway, Sweden
A modern woodburner used as it should is very efficient and hardly produces any particulates.
The smoke you see on a cold day from a such burner is in fact water vapour.

A cheap way to heat up your home is a heat exchanger.
Plus, the cheapest way is of course to keep the heat inside the house, so triple glazing and additional insulation.

Can you get a Government subsidy to improve the energy efficiency of your home?

No such subsidy existed when I lived in UK.
 
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Woody girl

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I have heat exchange central heating installed last year. Storage heaters were the worst. These much better constant warmth. Toasty... almost too warm now. Have to turn the rad right down in bedroom or I'm a melted mess half way thru the night. Love my burner though will never give that up. Nothing like a cosy log fire for that hugge.
 

Robson Valley

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Nov 24, 2014
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McBride, BC
That's the problem = most of the round wood burners are not modern.
You can't see the sub micron p[articulate stream that is the cause of considerable respiratory distress.
On a cold day, for "steam", it sure smells like wood smoke to me, color and taste, too.
Nobody here wants to burn wet wood.
Thermal energy up the chimney and creosote for fires.
 

Janne

Sent off - Not allowed to play
Feb 10, 2016
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Grand Cayman, Norway, Sweden
Cooking oil is best to convert to fuel to be used bu a diesel engine.

Even dry wood has a % of humidity.
My woodburner in Norway has a secondary combustion or whatever it is called.

I check the flue twice a year, before and after winter, and it looks virtually like when I had it installed. Clean. It is supposed to be safe fir the (wood) house even if you get a chimney fire, but I do not want to risk anything.

It is our secondary heating, the primary is a Panasonic Inverter Aircon.

Fantastic tech, so much better than the AC system which are common here.
 

Woody girl

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Mar 31, 2018
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My chimney is also checked twice a year in autumn and spring. Sweep chappie always comments how clean mine is and it's hardly worth his time comming. My landlord pays so I don't mind as we spend the allotted time having a cuppa and a chat. Burn dry logs and you don't get a lot of smoke as they burn hotter and cleanerwith less soot. I'm no firewood expert or scientist but that much is just common sense to me..
 

Janne

Sent off - Not allowed to play
Feb 10, 2016
12,330
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Grand Cayman, Norway, Sweden
Yes, hot and with plenty of air.
The cozy flickering fire is the worst.


Btw, I wonder if the geniuses occupying the chairs in State departements understand that the CO2 is needed for growth of everything green?
 
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Woody girl

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Of course the type of wood is very important too. Burn pine and it will give you a nice tar problem in your chimney. I like to burn silver birch for the smell. Hard to get here unless you buy it. Hardwoods are best. Oak and beech is mostly what I get foraging.
 

Robson Valley

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Nov 24, 2014
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McBride, BC
Carbon capture is a cavalier notion to the Members of Pig in many jurisdictions.
Here, inspected reforestation is the law. Noncompliance? You can lose everything but the clothes you stand in.
Want to test that? It's been done.

Burning wet wood will send 540 calories of heat energy up the chimney with every gram of water evaporated.
Air dried woods are normally 12-14% Equilibrium Moisture Content.
Manufactured wood pellets have no EMC.
The MC is maybe 2% or less and you must take measures to prevent the pellets from sucking up humidity.
Sitting 6 months indoors between winter pellet stove seasons and the old pellets burn slow with maybe 2/3 of the expected heat.
They literally suck the humidity out of my already dry house air.
 

Woody girl

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Mar 31, 2018
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I'd realy love a wood pellet system but I have to go with what landlord decides to offer. The design of my bungalow doesn't help with this option either. I'd also like some solar water heating and electric but I'm not allowed for some strange reason even tho the national park agreed and I offered to pay. Nuts if you ask me as my roof is perfect for it. .....sigh
 
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spandit

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 6, 2011
5,594
308
East Sussex, UK
Of course the type of wood is very important too. Burn pine and it will give you a nice tar problem in your chimney. I like to burn silver birch for the smell. Hard to get here unless you buy it. Hardwoods are best. Oak and beech is mostly what I get foraging.

If you are burning dry pine you shouldn't get tar problems. People don't dry it enough. Shouldn't be any smell from a woodburner, either. Birch is a good fuel as it grows quickly on poor soil and has a low moisture content. Very susceptible to rotting, though, so need to extra careful to keep the logs dry
 

Tomteifi

Nomad
Jan 22, 2016
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Carmarthenshire, South Wales
If you are burning dry pine you shouldn't get tar problems. People don't dry it enough. Shouldn't be any smell from a woodburner, either. Birch is a good fuel as it grows quickly on poor soil and has a low moisture content. Very susceptible to rotting, though, so need to extra careful to keep the logs dry

I totally agree. What you need is a properly built weatherproof log store with a breathable waterproof sheet over the wood too. Seasoning times for woods vary according to their hardness and some woods you can even burn 'green.' Google is your friend and will supply you with all the info you need. Burning your fire using properly seasoned wood only will ensure that if you do it right you will not creosote up your chimney. Anyone who has, is doing it wrong and should research the right way.
 

spandit

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 6, 2011
5,594
308
East Sussex, UK
...some woods you can even burn 'green'...

Please don't. Some woods, like ash, holly and birch, are low in moisture content and/or high in volatile oils that mean they will catch fire without proper seasoning but you'll still waste energy boiling off the water and your flue won't thank you for it. All firewood should be seasoned, some woods just season quicker than others
 
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gonzo_the_great

Forager
Nov 17, 2014
210
70
Poole, Dorset. UK
I've just build a rocket stove for the workshop. The previous burner (pot belly stove, made from a gas bottle) was OK, but once the workshop was extended, the heat was just not getting to the working areas.
Testing the new burner, it is so much more fuel efficient than the old one and all I get from the flue is moist warm air. Only the finest of ash to clean out, and a few nails/screws!
It's only had a dozen or so test burns, but so far it really does seem to live up to the claims.

Next I need to get the water heater side of the project completed. I added copper water pipe coils in the heat exchanger, which will feed a tank and some reclaimed car heater units. Also I may add a hot air collecting cowl to the main exchanger, and a fan, to pipe the heat to my working area. All work in progress.
 

gonzo_the_great

Forager
Nov 17, 2014
210
70
Poole, Dorset. UK
On the diy log thread.....

I've started to look again at making biodiesel, from waste veg oil.
And one of the bi-products is glycerine. Some people mix it with paper or sawdust and pack it into tubes. (Cut up carpet rolls, loo/kitchen towel rolls etc, or anything else that will burn) Apparently it works quite well, once you have a good bed of embers.

So that will occur, once I'm up and running.


I ran up the wood burner in the other workshop last night. That is a reclaimed domestic wood burner.
I was a bit shocked how much wood it burned, now that I am getting used to the rocket stove!
 
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spandit

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 6, 2011
5,594
308
East Sussex, UK
Metal rocket stove or something else? I'm trying to construct a hybrid rocket stove mass heater inside an old Esse range. Decided to use cob for the riser and spent hours purifying the local soil to extract the clay. Left it in a wheelbarrow and somebody chucked it away so I never finished it. Freezing in there...
 

Robson Valley

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Nov 24, 2014
9,959
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McBride, BC
Expensive but the thermoelectric fans might be what you need for shop air circulation.
Quite common here even with the forced air blowers in the pellet stove heat exchangers.
Moreso for those still burning round wood.
Only -11C at sunrise here. Further east on the plains, it was -30C at sunrise.
 

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