We installed a Nature’s Comfort outdoor wood boiler in 2010 and have used it every winter with little upkeep. It’s starting to show some age, springing a leak last year. But we really enjoy a wam house in winter. And I like cutting wood. So I don’t see us changing our heating any time soon.
What I will tell anyone is these outdoor wood boilers, at least this one, use a lot of wood. I don’t mind, as the old way of having a fire inside your house, while more efficient, is much more dangerous, with chimney fires always a risk. The pallets in the above photo, filled with firewood to a height of five feet in the fall, give a rough estimate of how much wood we have already burnt this winter, plus a few pallets still frozen to the ground, and wood I cut and used without stacking. A lotta wood!
It wasn’t until 2021 before I actually had any wood left over in the spring. I always cut as I needed it. But I did pull dead trees out of the woods in the fall, which helped immensely, versus trying to go into the woods when the snow is deep.
I had some pallets lying around and got the notion to stack the wood on pallets to keep it off the ground, as any wood on the ground slowly but surely picks up moisture and turns to dirt. With my new protocol, I felt confident adding to my pile. As my pile grew, I felt rich in wood, and the pressure of cutting every week relaxed.
As so often happens when one is relaxed, I didn’t slow up my wood cutting at all. I focused on reopening paths through our woods and cleaning up trees which fell on fences. We have a lot of fence to maintain on our farm and Mom’s.
And I realized I had a new problem. After a time of drying, wood stored outside begins to age and actually starts to lose some of its heating power. I guess after drying, moisture will return to the wood and decay begins. A person could combat this by putting dry wood in a shed or under cover.
So I’m rotating this year. I’ve focused on burning my old pile while making a new pile to season for next year. It’s a challenge to site the piles close enough to carry, yet far enough away.
Posted by Curiousfarmer 
Curiousfarmer 