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These new log burner rules.......


nairb123

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1 hour ago, Goliath said:

Will/Am I not allowed to send smoke signals?

I don’t have a mobile phone or any WiFi or gadgets and only communicate with a smoke signal, especially in an emergency.

Will it still be ok?

 

 

Burning a grateful of raw house coal might well turn out to be a quicker way to get the police to turn up than dialling 999, from the way things are going these days.

 

 

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5 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

Burning a grateful of raw house coal might well turn out to be a quicker way to get the police to turn up than dialling 999, from the way things are going these days.

 

 

It’s getting your hands on the stuff though. 
 

Green wood is a better bet

 

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2 hours ago, Goliath said:

Will/Am I not allowed to send smoke signals?

I don’t have a mobile phone or any WiFi or gadgets and only communicate with a smoke signal, especially in an emergency.

Will it still be ok?

 

Wait for a foggy day, they won't see the fire........

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26 minutes ago, magnetman said:

It is wise to have some real coal. 

 

I'm interested to see if prices go up or down as the ban of sale of the stuff approaches. 

Pass wanna buy some real coal? Going cheep or is that sheep?

1 minute ago, Cheshire cat said:

Sorry Peter, I've only just revisited this thread. I was empathising with your statement about guns.

Thank you

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2 hours ago, Ronaldo47 said:

My understanding is that the legal requirement for wood to be (kiln-) dried to a minimum percentage moisture content, only applies to the condition it must be in at the point of retail sale.

 

Only for quantities of <2m^3. I suspect this means retail outlets such as garage forecourts and DIY sheds.

It's just about impossible to enforce for sales where the vendor brings the wood to the home although I think most firewood merchants are aware of the law and will take steps to be seen to be complying.

 

2 hours ago, Ronaldo47 said:

The law does not say anything about what the moisture content should be subsequently, nor does minimum moisture content apply to wood that, for example, you have harvested from trees you have grown yourself, and so has not been sold.

 

It's impossible to check. How does anyone know whether the wood I'm burning now is from a kiln dried load, a bulk load of >2m^3 or given to me by my friendly local gardener. And the storage once it's been delivered makes a huge difference to its subsequent moisture content.

In the interests of not blocking up my chimney with crap I burn the driest wood available to me and it gets stored for 2 years if it wasn't delivered kiln dried. But you have only my word for that.

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Regardless of what harm pm 2.5 particles might do, most people wouldn't complain if they don't see the smoke. Unseasoned self foraged wood might still be legal but it does leave a hell of a trace if used soon after harvesting, Smokeless fuel and seasoned logs less so. 

You can often tell the difference  with what's burning when checking if someone is at home on their boat. Sometimes there's just a heat  glimmer/distortion around their chimney, sometimes there's a pile of smelly smoke coming out .

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22 minutes ago, Ianws said:

Regardless of what harm pm 2.5 particles might do, most people wouldn't complain if they don't see the smoke. Unseasoned self foraged wood might still be legal but it does leave a hell of a trace if used soon after harvesting, Smokeless fuel and seasoned logs less so. 

You can often tell the difference  with what's burning when checking if someone is at home on their boat. Sometimes there's just a heat  glimmer/distortion around their chimney, sometimes there's a pile of smelly smoke coming out .

 

The amount of smoke is often to do with the degree to which the fire has been shut down. Even using smokeless, if the oxygen supply is strangled you will get a lot of unburnt gases and debris coming out of the chimney.

 

Our house installed, defra approved stove has an air vent that cannot be completely closed. That is how it got its approved ticket and there are instructions in the manual not to modify it. 

 

The downside is that it gets through fuel faster than the Morso on the boat. It's impossible to keep it in all night.

 

 

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Our house stove isn't defra approved. The later model is and the only difference is the air vent stop as you mention. We burn smokeless ⁹anyway so not a problem currently. 

 

On the boat it's smokeless and kiln dried logs. No massive smoke after starting the fire. Liveaboard neighbours use salvaged logs which give off lots of smoke. I don't blame them and understand why they do it. We are in a rural area and there is nobody apart from a few other boaters to be bothered. It's different doing the same in an urban location.

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When we used to burn coal in our open fire in the 1950's, mum used to lay the fire the traditional way: newspaper first, wood on top of the paper,  and coal on top of wood. It always smoked heavily until the coal was well alight.  Following a hint in a  book, when  I used to burn coal in my own open fire, the coal went in first, and a wood fire of thinly-cut kindling was lit on top of the coal. Once the coal got hot enough to start releasing the gases that produced  smoke in the traditional method, the smoke got ignited by the flames of the wood fire, and the coal got burnt from the top downwards.with minimal smoke production. I still use the same method with smokeless.

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7 minutes ago, Ronaldo47 said:

When we used to burn coal in our open fire in the 1950's, mum used to lay the fire the traditional way: newspaper first, wood on top of the paper,  and coal on top of wood. It always smoked heavily until the coal was well alight.  Following a hint in a  book, when  I used to burn coal in my own open fire, the coal went in first, and a wood fire of thinly-cut kindling was lit on top of the coal. Once the coal got hot enough to start releasing the gases that produced  smoke in the traditional method, the smoke got ignited by the flames of the wood fire, and the coal got burnt from the top downwards.with minimal smoke production. I still use the same method with smokeless.

Mum and dad fire never went out at home when on coal, when they were transferred over to smokeless briquettes it was a gamble whether it would be in come morning 

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The thing with boats is to have a fire which is smaller than you would think is needed. The last thing you want is an enormous fire not working hard. 

 

If you need it to stay in overnight then a small fire will do this as effectively as a larger fire if you fill it up with less smoke fuel. 

 

I suppose it is a bit like engines. Get a bigger one in case you need the extra power. You never actually do need it but the psychological effect of availability is comforting even if all that actually happens is you get a less efficient system. 

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40 minutes ago, Ianws said:

Our house stove isn't defra approved. The later model is and the only difference is the air vent stop as you mention. We burn smokeless ⁹anyway so not a problem currently.

In my house in the defra multi fuel stove, there is an opening at the rear of the stove at the lhs at the bottom.  It cannot be closed, and so the stove can only be shut down a certain amount.  It gobbles fuel and runs the flue hot.  There is reduced control over the fire.  In truth, it's probably more expensive to use with the gov approved fuels than to have the gas fire heating on.  I did modify the stove so its much better to use.  Of course it's now no longer a defra stove but can be put back as one within 5 mins.  I also found that burning smokeless fuel removed the smoke issue, but it won't pass the councilman's inspection as is.  But the fuel lasts much longer.

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1 hour ago, Cheshire cat said:

Our house installed, defra approved stove has an air vent that cannot be completely closed. That is how it got its approved ticket and there are instructions in the manual not to modify it. 

 

 

Same here. Bank up my Stovax with NewHeat and shut all the vents down for the night and five hours later the hovel is like an oven and the NewHeat has all burned out/away. 

 

I found the "vee" shaped plate that slides to adjut the bottom vent does not fully close. In the supposedly fully closed position, the point of the vee still allows a triangular hole of about 3mm each side to let air in. Blocking this hole with HR silicone fixed the problem!

 

 

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9 hours ago, nairb123 said:

In my house in the defra multi fuel stove, there is an opening at the rear of the stove at the lhs at the bottom.  It cannot be closed, and so the stove can only be shut down a certain amount.  It gobbles fuel and runs the flue hot.  There is reduced control over the fire.  In truth, it's probably more expensive to use with the gov approved fuels than to have the gas fire heating on.  I did modify the stove so its much better to use.  Of course it's now no longer a defra stove but can be put back as one within 5 mins.  I also found that burning smokeless fuel removed the smoke issue, but it won't pass the councilman's inspection as is.  But the fuel lasts much longer.

My son, finding his stove couldn't stay in all night like mine, heard there was a 'secret screw' that would allow him to shut it down completely.  So he phoned the manufacturers, and they cheerfully told him where it was and how to do it!

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11 hours ago, George and Dragon said:

 

Only for quantities of <2m^3. I suspect this means retail outlets such as garage forecourts and DIY sheds.

It's just about impossible to enforce for sales where the vendor brings the wood to the home although I think most firewood merchants are aware of the law and will take steps to be seen to be complying.

 

 

It's impossible to check. How does anyone know whether the wood I'm burning now is from a kiln dried load, a bulk load of >2m^3 or given to me by my friendly local gardener. And the storage once it's been delivered makes a huge difference to its subsequent moisture content.

In the interests of not blocking up my chimney with crap I burn the driest wood available to me and it gets stored for 2 years if it wasn't delivered kiln dried. But you have only my word for that.

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59 minutes ago, MtB said:

My next door neighbour just had 3 cubic metres of loose logs delivered.

 

 

Now he was stacked them up tidily, they are approx 1 cubic metre in volume and still there are some spaces!

Its always a con buying wood like that.

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We don't need to buy firewood, but yesterday at our local farm shop, I saw net bags of hardwood on sale at £7.50 each, slightly cheaper if you bought three. 

 

I thought back to the aftermath of the 1987 hurricane. We have a lot of trees in our area, and the council brought the fallen trees to a field in a local park where they were mostly disposed of in a massive bonfire that burned continuously for more than 3 months.  Many of the trees had been sawn into medium-sized logs for ease of handling, and anyone was welcome to come and help themselves for free to get rid of them. Not many log-burning stoves in use then! 

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19 minutes ago, Cheshire cat said:

What other way is there. I've had builder's bags and they aren't particularly tightly packed

One of my local suppliers will do it in uncut lengths, 4 to 6 foot or so each, process yourself. You need to buy a reasonable amount off him though as it has to be over the 2m3 cutoff for dry wood sales as there's no way he can guarantee it being dry at that length. Works out about 2/3 of the price for the same amount I'd get loose in dumpy bags. Still extortionate compared to what I was paying when we put the stove in 25 years ago though and firewood was at giveaway prices to take it off people's hands!

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