A few photos of smokey fire

[Puy de Dome]

Hi all,

This post is nothing to do with the top-down method to reduce the incidence of smoke, but rather to do with me perhaps not using seasoned wood.

I bought my current supply from a nice chap out in the country a couple of months ago. He said that the wood was seasoned. I could tell for myself that the wood was not green, and it felt 'light' considering the size.

But if you see the photos I have attached, you can see how much smoke was being produced. In fact, this was my second BIG fire, and cooked some great pizza last night.

To illustrate the question further, when I had finished cooking last night, I put a bunch of logs into the oven, because I had read here that this would dry them out further.

So this morning I made another little fire in the oven and put on the dried-out-further-in-the-oven logs and then hardly any more smoke!

Perhaps I have answered my own query? Extremely dried out and pre-heated logs = rapid combustion and the minimum of smoke?







And that's the neighbour's house in the photo.



P de D

[mpjfitz]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

Hello

I'm in the UK as well. We tend to have our houses a lot closer to each other than the USA or Oz. So getting the smoke-free(ish) fire is essential eh?

I was wondering if you ever resolved your problem?

Mick

[Puy de Dome]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

Hi, at the last firing, not long ago, I did get a pretty much smoke-free burn.

Not completely, of course, but pretty good.

What was this down to? Im not sure... I tried to avoid putting wood with bark on it in the fire, and AFAIK, the wood was very, very well seasoned wood, and hard wood at that.

My starter fire was made from small kindling, a few fire lighters and that was it.

As you can see, I am pretty close to the neighbours, but in fact the risk lies in the other direction where Mr and Mrs Stroppy live, and the wind goes in that direction much of the time.

[mpjfitz]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

Thanks for the quick reply. I also have a 'Stroppy' family close by

They waited for my first fire! which was mainly paper and it did kick out smoke. Unfortunately for me another family was having a large garden fire at the same time! So they reported it to the environment people at the council. It did back-fire on them. When environment guy came to visit it was blazing away with hardly any smoke. I was using off-cuts (mainly pine) from several years of DIY. It burned fast with little smoke. He was very impressed :-)

However, all my DIY off-cuts are gone now and I need to get some wood. I've 'GOT' to get it right!!! I really don't know where to start, but I'm researching big-time.

Mick

[david s]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

Bake a few loaves of bread and give them one. If your oven is new or the wood is damp or unseasoned you'll get more smoke. Always maintain a flame too.

[brickie in oz]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

Use charcoal, its available here and comes from Argentina, I cant remember the cost off hand ($10 per bag maybe?) but there is almost no smoke whats so ever and burns as hot as hell, Ive clocked it at 700c in my oven

[david s]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

The best wood is free wood.

[brickie in oz]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

The best wood is free wood.

Doesn't it smoke?

[david s]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

I use quite a lot of fallen Eucalypt branches and twigs. They burn extremely well with little smoke provided they're not too barky or damp. I usually reserve a few solid, dense, split heart-wood pieces to place near the end of the firing to really get some serious heat in there. The finger sized sticks are excellent for maintaining the "fire on the side"

[dmun]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

Skids are super-dry hardwood. Someone mentioned a marking to show ones that are untreated, a search might reveal it. They're a pain to take apart, but they burn like the furies.

[fornax hominus]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

what you have to remember is you are not burning wood , you are burning a mixture of the wood gas that comes off the heated wood and the air/oxygen mix that enters the oven ... so it's about carburation ... the space between your wood .. too far apart not enough heat to produce gas.. too close together ..not enough room for the air ..
tricks to reduce smoke ;
I use two largish lengths of wood as andirons to hold the burning wood up to allow the air in .
I also pull coals to the front to re-heat the cold incoming air entering through the lower part of the door .
Split your wood , exposed corners heat up and ignite much faster [with less smoke] than rounds
tim

''man who finish oven ...die'' with apologies to Confucius

[drogers]

Re: A few photos of smokey fire

When burning wood in any enclosure remember that one needs enough room for the air and gases give off by the wood to mix properly so combustion can take place completely. When I owned a sawmill and burnt wood chips in our boiler I always figured 1 cubic foot of space for each 25,000 btu's. This was with a firebox made specifically for burning wood. If you place to much fuel in the space you displace the air needed for good combustion.