Getting firewood INTO the house.

[beowulf]

This is what I did 40 years ago. Family room fire place with wood box, heatilator, outside air make up, cold air return full length of house, blower in basement, 2 heat registers to family room,heat registers to (2) bed rooms up stairs, one heat register to garage, wood storage and fill wood box from garage burn approx 9 cord a year, 1.25 sq tubing for book ends no end rowsView attachment 540373View attachment 540374View attachment 540375

Sweet - the same kind of set up we have in our house except that our set up loads from outside the house.

 

[farmeratheart]

I say I have visions of a ramp on the other side of the porch I could use to drive the tractor up alongside and raise the bucket to porch level. That would be killer. When we changed our patio to a deck several years ago I had the deck framed by a contractor friend and my wife and I covered it with synthetic decking. When my friend asked what kind of steps we wanted to gain access to the deck I quickly told him that I wanted ramps. When I told him of my desire to deliver firewood to the house with the tractor he changed the framing from 2 x 10s 16'' OC TO 2 X 12s 12" OC. I simply drive up onto the deck with a load of wood in the bucket of my tractor and unload directly into one of those tubular steel log hoops that others have mentioned earlier. One 53" bucket is about 3/4 of the rack and enough for 2-3 days burning depending on how cold it is and species of wood dominating that particular bucketful.

 

[BoylermanCT]

Just be careful when bring wood into house to store your not bring in deer ticks.

I have found my 3 dogs bring them in, so I don't worry about the firewood! :smiley_aafz:

 

[FreedomFamilyFarms]

I have the cheap Chinese wood cart. It’s ok for our purposes but I’d buy a better built American one if I could do it over again. The wood shed is 24 feet from the man door on the garage across a gravel drive. The cart gets loaded and brought into the garage where it sits until I load the heater. It’s different from a wood stove because I load the firebox with up to 70 pounds at a time. The garage is about 8 inches down from the house so I just pull the cart up the “step” and wheel it right over to the heater across porcelain tile.

Next year I’ll be heating with a Jotul stove downstairs. Obviously, no cart down there. Planning to use the canvas bag method to get the wood from the garage to the basement. I have two and will probably get at least 4 more so I can load and stack the bags on a cart at the woodshed and tote them down the stairs one at a time as needed.

The difference between garage temperature wood and outside temperature wood is huge for lighting cold fires. As soon as I empty the cart it gets reloaded and usually has at least 8 hours in the garage before any is burned.

The cart i have is junk. I’ve JB welded the top portion to the bottom because the fit was so loose and the axle bends occasionally to where I have to bend it back. For a backyard fire pit its probably fine but I won’t buy another for daily use. There are some much nicer ones made here in the US for about $100. I may try to covert a hand truck to a wood cart. They’re built very sturdy and could easily handle a full load of seasoned hardwood at 22” lengths.

The attached photo is my wood cart with a small fire left on it next to the newspaper and kindling supply just outside the door into the garage from the house.

 

[goeduck]

I have the cheap Chinese wood cart. It痴 ok for our purposes but I壇 buy a better built American one if I could do it over again

The difference between garage temperature wood and outside temperature wood is huge for lighting cold fires. As soon as I empty the cart it gets reloaded and usually has at least 8 hours in the garage before any is burned.

The attached photo is my wood cart with a small fire left on it next to the newspaper and kindling supply just outside the door into the garage from the house.

I have a Chinese cart like that but do not use it, too flimsy. I try to keep a fire going non stop if possible but you are correct, in that indoor 70 degree house dry wood does light up much better. Here our winter humidity is regularly in the 80% range and wood, while seasoning gets it to below 20%, does feel a little damp.

 

[BLSXJ]

if you search "my fire wood life cycle with hoist" you'll find the thread I made documenting how I go from standing trees, to 40ft from my fire place. I'm lucky enough to have a large covered porch which I store 3 years of fire wood under.

but getting the wood from the covered porch to the fire place is not simple. I ruled out any sort of wheeled contraption becasue I have hardwood floors and anything that rolls outside, will bring is sand and other debris that will destroy the wood floors.

I have realized the only way for me is one arm load at a time.

 

[Garandman]

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/rural-living/389785-my-fire-wood-life-cycle.html

 

[bcp]

I had a dream last night based on this thread, and awoke realizing the solution to our problem is a small indoor version of a Kubota BX with front loader, sized to fit through 32" door frames and with non-skid tires and electric motor. Oh wait, that is sort of like my daughter's little ride-on Deere tractor....

Here it is.

Bruce