White ash firewood drying time.

[Motor Devil]

Hi, I cut and sell a lot of firewood, mostly white ash.  I've been letting it cure for about a year with excellent results.  Last summer I cut some in June, split it and stacked it in the sun.  I burned it that winter and it was excellent.  Just wondering if anyone else has had similar results with ash to make sure I'm not crazy.  If it dries that fast I could sell a lot more each year than I do now.  Thanks

[beenthere]

I guess if you split if fine enough, cut it short enough, and keep it from being rained on, and have it exposed to the sun, etc. it could dry in that time. But can one count on such good drying conditions year after year?  what is the risk in customer loyalty if you supply wood that isn't 'dry'?

How do you test your wood to see if it is dry? and what moisture content do you shoot for to know it is dry? 

[Buzz-sawyer]

Ash is unusual in my experience...unlike other hardwoods it burn well green and does not take much to dry.

[beenthere]

Buzz
Hickory is a wood reported to put out a lot of heat without much drying but didn't know ash was. Interesting.

[Jeff]

You should be aware when talking about ash fire wood about the emerald ash borer. In Michigan and Ohio, and probably more states to come, moving ash firewood is problematic at best, and in certain instances, illegal!

[beenthere]

Buzz-sawyer
Motordevil
Pardon me. 
I just did some looking around, and found this site that lists ash top-ranking for burning green in a pinch.

 http://mb-soft.com/juca/print/firewood.html

Take a look. I learned something and will keep it in mind, as I have a lot of ash to burn (I don't sell firewood, just heat the house with it).

[Motor Devil]

Good site, very informative, I've never been able to get a straight answer about the weigth of seasoned cords of wood until now.  As far as emeral ash borer, there are no laws or restrictions in my area with regards to moving ash, and there is an abundance of it so all is well there.  Besides, I sell most of it within 20 miles of where it's cut.   I think the moisture content of ash is one of the lowest, especially in winter when the sap is out.  It's not the densest or heaviest wood, but it seems to throw good heat and make nice hot coals.  Last summer was very dry in my area so that could have contributed to the wood drying so fast.  My customers know I sell a good product and wouldn't appreciate getting wet wood when they think they're getting dry wood.   I won't risk selling wood that isn't going to make them happy.  I do split my wood reasonable small and sell it in either 12" or 16" lengths.  The 12" stuff dries noticably faster than the 16" stuff.  The way I check it to see how dry it is isn't very precise, but it works.  I take a piece that's of average size in the pile, split it in half and feel the wood for moisture.  Not precise, but it works.   

[Minnesota_boy]

You need to be specific about the type of ash you have.  White ash is normally low in moisture content when fresh cut and doesn't need to loose much to be good to burn.  Black ash has a much higher moisture content and will take longer to dry.

[kilndry]

You might find it useful to have a moisture meter on hand to test the wood now and then. It would be a useful tool if you wanted to rotate your inventory faster. You could also use it to compare drying rates of the various woods, once they are below FSP.

It can also be handy if you are advertising your wood as "seasoned" or dry, in the event a customer (or competitor) challenges your claim.

[shopteacher]

That's some good info on the firewood. Printed it out so I can keep it out by the mill. I was going to as what moisture content was considered dry for firewood, but found it on the site. I guess this means the big box stores are selling lots of firewood?

[bitternut]

Welcome to the forum Motor Devil. I heat my camp and my house with wood so I have a little experience in using firewood. I usually have my wood cut and split before July. I cut it 16" long and split everything that is over about 4" diamteter. I cut black birch, beech, eastern hophornbeam, maple, oak, hickory, cherry, ash, elm, and thornapples. In other words I cut and burn what ever needs to be cut out of my woods. I stack my wood under a canopy of white pine trees within 50' of the south shore of Lake Ontario. The stack is uncovered. By the time heating season arrives in the fall my wood is down to around 12% moisture. I have a Lignomat mini Ligno dx that I check the moisture with. My wood is in the shade and being so close to the lake one could say the relative humidity is generally high. Even so my wood will be dry in one summer and the key reason is because the wood is split and there is good air circulation. There is usually a breeze close to the lake.

So my advice to you is to cut it into blocks as short as possible ( 16" ), split it early, and stack it in the open where you will get good air circulation. Do not just pile it up in a heap.

[Don_Lewis]

Ash has a low moisture content when dead green. Has less than half as much water in it as Oak, for example. Therefore it is reasonable to expect it to dry faster

[Den Socling]

I don't think it's quite as little as half the water of Red Oak. We use 42% for average green MC of Ash and 70% for the average green MC of oaks.

[bitternut]

Here is a picture of next winters wood sitting under the white pines about 50' from Lake Ontario. It was cut and split this spring and will be nice and dry by this fall. The blank areas in the background is the lake. It is a mix of ash, oak, beech, maple, birch, ironwood, etc. Been drying it like this for at least 13 years and never had a problem with it not being dry. Sits just like that till it gets burned.

[kilndry]

It's not a straight line relationship where 80%mc in one wood means there is twice as much water as another wood that is at 40% mc.

Since the formula is based on the oven-dry weight of the wood in question, it would take less water to give a high mc of a very light wood than it would with a very heavy wood. 

[Den Socling]

Bob,

Good point. Red Oak has about 4.49 gallons per mbf per 1% while Ash has about 3.40 gallons per mbf per 1%.

Den

[Don_Lewis]

A cubic foot of NRed Oak at 70% will have about 25 pounds of water and a cubic foot of Black Ash will have about 12 pounds of water at 42% (rounded)

But it only requires removing 6 pounds of water from the Ash to get to 20% while about 18 pounds has to be removed from Oak and it is the difference that is telling.

So water moves more slowly through Oak and three times as much has to evaporate, hence a huge difference in drying time.

[maple flats]

An old saying was " Ash wood wet or ash wood dry a king shall warm his slippers by". I have white ash and it will burn in my maple evaporator when I run out of wood. I can cut it, split it and burn it the same day. I get good evaporation. Believe me the evapoation rate will tell you if the moisture is high and white ash at least is good green if cut during the winter, not sure about other times of the year but I only need to burn it in the winter and only evaporate in very late Feb- mid to late April. My evaporator will lose about 20% in rate of evaporation if you put in wood with higher than desired moisture and all wood is split to about wrist size for a real fast fire, the faster the evaporation the lighter grade the syrup or translated the longer any drop of syrup spends in the evaporator the lighter the color and grade. (however there are other factors that affect the color, ie- fresher sap, cleaner lines, and so forth.)

[UNCLEBUCK]

My experience with burning ash is that if its dry it burns up too fast even in airtight fireplaces so I burn it green or else add some dry white oak to the fire to make it chug all night long . Also I never split wood , I just cut nice chunks that can be carried or tossed into the loader bucket and a nice chunk of wood wont desinegrate in the fireplace as fast as split wood . Split wood seems to be all that is advertised in the local papers here .