How many cubes of firewood do you need for the winter

Not all rural residents are lucky enough to install gas or electric heating. Many still heat stoves and boilers with wood. Those who have been doing this for a long time know how much stock they need. People who have recently moved to the countryside are interested in the question of how firewood is harvested for the winter and how much it needs to be chopped.

Factors affecting the calculation of the amount of firewood

Calculate how much firewood you need, at least approximately. After all, it’s good when you can chop up extra logs at random. And suddenly there will be few of them and then this hard work will have to be completed in winter in the frost.

It is necessary to independently calculate the amount of firewood for heating a house, taking into account many factors. Here they pay attention to the efficiency of a wood-burning boiler or stove, the size of the heated room and the duration of the heating period. But first you need to find out which firewood is better for heating, because each type of wood differs in heat transfer due to different densities.

Let’s take a closer look at the factors affecting the calculation:

• Humidity affects the heat transfer coefficient. Anyone knows that dry wood burns well, which means that it gives off more heat. If firewood was collected in damp weather or sawed green trees, then it is advisable to store the chopped logs in a ventilated barn. It makes sense here to make blanks for two years. During the season, the stock of firewood will dry out, and the coefficient of their moisture content will be no more than 20%. These logs should be used. Another fresh chopped stock will dry up until next season.
• The heat transfer coefficient depends on the type of wood. The best logs are hardwoods such as oak, birch or beech. Dense wood burns longer and gives off more heat. Pine is less dense. It is better to use such wood for ignition. Pine logs are also suitable for a home with a fireplace. When burned, an aroma is released that fills rooms with the scent of essential oil. If there is an opportunity, then it is necessary to harvest firewood from different types of wood. By combining logs during combustion, you can achieve maximum heat transfer and less soot clogging up the chimney.
• The amount of firewood is not calculated by the area of ​​u100buXNUMXbthe room, but its volume is taken into account. After all, to warm up a house with an area of ​​​​XNUMX m² and a ceiling height of 2 m will turn out faster than a building of a similar size, but 3 m high. Usually, when making calculations, a ceiling height of 2,8 m is taken as the norm.
• When calculating the required amount of cubic meters of firewood, you need to take into account the duration of the heating period. Moreover, they take into account the year with cold autumn and late spring. For most regions, the heating period lasts up to 7 months. In the south, the cold season can be limited to 3-4 months.
• When calculating the amount of firewood for the winter, it is important to take into account the efficiency of the heater. The most effective are pyrolysis boilers. Bridging furnaces are characterized by high heat losses. The more heat goes through the chimney to the street, the more often new logs will have to be thrown into the firebox.

Using these simple rules as a basis, you will be able to calculate the optimal amount of firewood.

Calculation of the amount of firewood for heating a house

The calculations, taking into account average values, show that for heating a house with an area of ​​200 m² You need up to 20 cubic meters of firewood. Now we will try to figure out how to calculate the required stock without an online calculator. We take as a basis the efficiency of the heater – 70%. We take a house with a standard ceiling height of 2,8m. Heated area – 100 m². Heat loss of walls, floor and ceiling is minimal. The heat released during the combustion of any fuel is measured in kilocalories. To heat the house taken as an example for a month, you need to get 3095,4 kcal.

To achieve this result, you need:

• birch logs with a moisture index of 20% after a year of storage in a barn – up to 1,7 m³;
• logs from freshly cut birch have a moisture index of 50%, and they need about 2,8 m³;
• dry oak firewood needs about 1,6 m³;
• oak logs with 50% moisture will need up to 2,6 m³;
• pine logs with a moisture index of 20% – no more than 2,1 m³;
• firewood from wet pine – about 3,4 m³.

For calculations, the most common tree varieties were taken. Using this data, you can find out how much firewood you need to chop. If the prepared mass of solid fuel is used up ahead of schedule, then the heat loss of the building is large or the heater has a low efficiency.

The best time of the year for harvesting

Harvesting firewood for the winter is not just cutting down a tree and cutting it into logs. It is necessary to ensure optimal storage conditions that ensure good drying of the wood. In addition, you need to know that the most optimal time of the year to perform these works is the end of autumn and the beginning of winter. But the weather should not be rainy. The choice of this period is determined by the following factors:

• cutting down trees without foliage is easier;
• after the first frost, chocks are easier to split;
• in late autumn, the movement of juice stops, which allows you to get wood with a lower percentage of moisture.

All the forest cut down at this time of the year is sawn into chocks, chopped, and the logs are sent for long-term drying until next autumn. Do not immediately throw them into the oven or boiler. From raw solid fuel, you can only get a lot of soot, which will settle in the chimney as soot. For heating, logs from last year’s harvest are used. They give off maximum heat and minimum smoke. New firewood will go next year. In order for the logs to dry well, it is important to provide good ventilation and protection from precipitation.

On the video you can see the process of harvesting firewood:

When harvesting firewood, it is not necessary to cut the forest yourself. After all, then these logs still have to be transported home. There are many companies providing this service. For very lazy people, hired workers can split logs into chocks. In this case, own labor costs will decrease, but the cost of solid fuel will increase.