When we get new customers calling us from the Surrey and West Sussex areas or coming to our yard to stock up on fuel for their fireplaces, wood-burning stoves or log burners, many of them ask if there’s any difference between kiln-dried logs and seasoned logs. In all honesty, there isn’t much separating these two types of firewood because the moisture content of both should be below 20% for them to burn properly.
The major difference is, naturally, the drying process. Instead of using specialist equipment to forcefully remove water contained within the wood, as we do with kiln-dried firewood, seasoned logs stay out in the air to dry naturally.
While this takes a lot longer than the kiln drying process, some of our customers prefer to use logs seasoned the traditional way. This explains why we stock seasoned logs of the highest quality, sourced from trusted local suppliers around Cranleigh, Guildford, Dorking, Leatherhead and the surrounding areas.
Please contact LJN Firewood to arrange deliveries to your doorstep, made locally from our own yard in Ewhurst.
Any freshly cut firewood contains a high percentage of moisture, which means it struggles to burn and creates too much smoke. The drying process is crucial to producing quality firewood because it allows for a clean and reliable burn. The difficulty in air drying wood, rather than using a kiln drier, is that the type of wood determines the duration of the seasoning process.
While softwoods like Pine take around 6 to 12 months to season, hardwoods like Oak need at least 1 to 2 years. The time of year a deciduous tree falls is also a factor to consider. This is because, during the winter months, sap moves towards the roots. This means that chopping down a deciduous tree in winter will leave you with wood containing a lower moisture level than chopping down the same tree during the summer months.
If you live in Cranleigh, Dorking, Guildford, Leatherhead or the wider South East area and wish to produce your own seasoned logs, the following steps will be of help to you:
Unless you want to season deciduous trees, it is best to gather wood in the summer because the warm weather starts drying it out immediately. This reduces the overall seasoning time.
We tell customers around the Surrey and West Sussex areas to chop wood to around 15cm to 20cm in diameter and to somewhere between 40cm and 45cm in length for easier wood and log storage.
We recommend using a woodshed with a roof and open sides to allow for maximum air circulation. It isn’t too difficult to build a suitable shed for temporary storage with a few basic skills.
Use a pallet to raise your wood stack off the ground so that it doesn’t rot in pools of rainwater. We offer stacking services in the Cranleigh, Guildford, Dorking and Leatherhead areas.
Use a wood moisture test meter to determine the percentage of water contained in logs. We stock quality seasoned logs, but we find that kiln-dried logs offer consistency to a higher level.
