As the summer ends and the winter begins to show its cold face, heating starts to come to mind. As with everything at the moment in my life I am delayed, delayed in getting to do the things that need doing when they were supposed to be done. It's not out of laziness. I work damn hard, and even find it difficult to sit down. There is always something to do around my little homestead. I confess that even writing these posts gives me guilt. I could be doing something more important. Tangible, something to make my family's life better.
But, this Blog is just for me. An escape valve to keep me sane. So that when I have to reentered real life again I can deal with the pressure. And, oh my God is there pressure. My wife's illness is a constant heartache of worry. So, I need to take a few minutes to get away and write my rambling thoughts. To enter a virtual reality where I have some sort of control. For that I am very thankful, it's a place to absorb all my senses and cushion them. If I didn't have it I am sure I would be mad by now....madder! Even in my none creative posts, I can find joy and the topic of firewood preparation is the topic of this week's ramble.
Survival
In most survival books the three most important things are Shelter, food/ water and fire. and that is pretty much the reality of being a human. Passed down through millennia. once we get these things sorted all else is gravy. Luckily I have shelter and food. My Water is on tap but probably the biggest outlay each winter is going to be on heat. My mission is to reduce these costs to as little as possible.
Last year I installed a stove with a back boiler so that I could heat my whole house with the one source. It was a learning experience and I took videos of the progress which I will post when I have a moment to edit it down to something watchable. It is great and works very well.
Fuel
Luckily just before Christmas I got a call from my friend Lisa's father. He said he was taking down some trees and did I want the wood. I jumped at it although I had no clue how I was going to shift it from his place to mine.
He was clearing some land that was getting overgrown and although most of the trees were Laylandii, which is a conifer, some were ash.
Laylandii is not great firewood as the trunk has a lot of knots and it really doesn't give you the heat compared to hardwood. Also the green growth which is there all year round takes so much time to wade through to get to the wood of the tree.
I spent a few days at his place and we cut the trunks and branches into more manageable sizes. There was still so much green growth that we needed a way to dump that aswell. I found a company with a truck and crane attached. He would do two loads for us one would be to remove and dump all the crappy branches and the other would pick up all the logs and bring them to my garden for later processing.
It has been sitting in my garden since late December and has dried a bit. I could just not find the time during the summer to cut it into firewood, Until a couple of weeks ago when I began the mission.
I made this handy dandy measure stick for my chainsaw. Very simple really, a plastic tube cut to the length of my fireplace and a magnet out of a car phone holder glued to the end.
This sticks onto the chain saw bar and allows me to quickly mark out the best length of round to suit the fire,
I also made a simple saw horse with two pallets interlocked together.
I began cutting with an electric chainsaw but with the work I put it through it soon broke. All the gears inside got stripped and I wasn't pushing it too hard. So I had to resort to a petrol chainsaw which I also have. I didn't want to use this to begin with because I was worried about trying to start it with each log I put up on the horse. In the end it was a dream to use and made quick work of it all.
Anecdotal evidence
Let me interject with another little tale here. When we had logged the trees in my friend's garden we had rolled them all into a pile for pick up. After a weekend my friend returned and discovered that a lot of the ash wood was gone. Luckily he had a security camera and could see someone drive up with a car and trailer and proceed to cut it up into smaller logs and then take it away. That was my wood, God damn it!. He contacted the Garda (Irish police) and they found the perp and got them to bring it all back. No charges were made and nicely they had cut about two tonnes of my wood for me into nice manageable pieces. Crime doesn't pay but it did make my job easier.
That was the easy part done. Now it came to splitting.
Let's split
I'm pretty good with an axe and enjoy the workout. It means you get twice the heat out of the wood. But, as I said most of the wood was Leylandii and it would take me at least 10 strikes to break a log up into wedges. The wood is stringy and lots of knots. The ash was a joy to split with just three belts.
While trying to split a log the axe got jammed and so I lifted again with the log still attached and as I brought it down the axe came loose and swung to hit my ankle. I was very lucky as I didn't get cut or broken because of my work shoes but it left a bad bruise and I hobbled back inside and put some frozen peas on it. I was very lucky.
As I was sitting there, nursing my wound I made a decision. This job was not worth the hard work and possible further injury. Also as I get older I may not be able to keep the home fire a burnin' with my physical strength. I did some research on youtube and decided to buy a log spltter. It would be a good investment.
Man and machine
After lots of research, I found what I thought was a pretty good one for €450. From the company Hyundai. it has a strength of 5 tonnes. I could have gotten a bigger one of 7 tonnes but that was in stock in Dublin.
I picked it up the next day and got straight to work with it. It was a revelation. Put The log on the top and press the button and what was taking me several minutes before now happened in seconds as it sliced through the logs like butter. Knots and windy grain are no match for it. and the 5-tonne pressure is more than enough. The whole thing is quite small for storage also.
It still took me a few days to fill my wood store but it was much more fun and easier on my ageing body. I still have some to do but this should keep me going for a while. The moisture level is around 18% which isn't great but good enough.
I'd like to finish this post with a poem I found in my research.
By Lady Celia Congreve
Published in The Times: March 2nd 1930
The Firewood Poem
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.