Steam & Excursion > Wood Burner Question

So in the Northeast for example (New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Vermont, etc.)

What types of wood were preferred for wood burners and what size wood ?

I've read many stories about wood burners of old, and farmers cutting the wood, wood yards, etc.  but don't seem to come across any mention of the type and size of wood they were working with.

How about other areas of the country ?

Thanks



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/22 05:43 by train1275.

In my experience, all 'hard woods' would be fine.... but, they  should be allowed to get
good and dry ...like 8 to 12 months, covered..

Pines, not so much... too much gooey tar in the pine woods..
Gums up things like stacks and such..

Size:
Quartered-chunks about the size of your fore-arm, elbow to finger-tips.
Placement on the almost-bare areas of grate can be crucial.

​W.

OOOPS..
My supposition about burning pines seems to be wrong ...after poking around on the wwweb,
it seems a useable fuel, maybe not 'ideal' , but, workable..
W.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/22 12:34 by wcamp1472.

What is typical steam presure on a wood burner?

When the B&O museum was operating their Wm Mason wood burner, I always thought that they should have placed a bunch of racks of ribs in the smokebox while operating her.  Then sold the ribs.

My guess, for today's use, would be 175 to 200 PSI (gauge),  boiler pressure.

You'd want a 'good' steam pressure to operate the air compressor for
train air brakes...  and you'd want to carry 130 PSI, and over, on the
air brake's Main Reservoir.

Looks like the new construction 'Leviathan'  ( 4-4-0) loco's boiler operates at 160psi

​W.

 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/22 08:31 by wcamp1472.

For a lot of years, I heated most of my home at Emporia with a big Estate 285 coal stove that I bought from Santa Fe for $50. It had come out of the Eskridge, KS depot when they tore out the Alma Branch in about 1970. I never burned any coal in it, always seasoned Hedge, and I can't imagine coal being much hotter.

You burned whatever was available nearby. In northern Minnesota pine forests you burned pine, not imported hardwood.

(Same for coal. Union Pacific burned Wyoming, Northern Pacific burned North Dakota, Milwaukee burned Montana coals - the lowest btu/lb in North America.)

In the 19th century standard brake pip pressure was 70psi for freight, 85 or 90 for passenger. After 1906 it was 90 for freight, 110 for pax.

Absolute minimums for boiler pressure is 20 psi above those figures to get reliable operation of the pumps.

So, in the era where woodburners were the norm I'd expect minimum boiler pressures in the 110 to 130 range. Later engines, for woodburners, would likely be up in the range a previous poster suggested.

-LD

Date: 12/01/22 09:37
Re: Wood Burner Question
Author: LarryDoyle You burned whatever was available nearby. In northern Minnesota pine forests you burned pine, not imported hardwood.
___
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Agreed, but there are in that region multiple types of wood. If I were procuring a wood contract, what might my preferences be ? I probably would not want pine if I had hickory available, even if pine or hemlock were cheaper.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/22 13:39 by train1275.

From a 1917 report on logging railroads in California:

Where fuel oil is not obtainable at a reasonable cost, which is usually at mills with lumber flumes, wood must be used—either slab wood or split white fir. The cost is from $1.75 to $2.25 per cord, besides the time spent in loading it on the tender. A 42-ton geared locomotive working fairly hard requires about 7 cords per day. Thus it appears, eliminating the extra efficiency of oil and loss of time on the part of the train crew, that the daily cost is much the same. One operator whose wood costs $2.50 per cord calculates that he saves $1.50 daily on a 35-ton locomotive, and states that the oil-burning locomotive handles 16 cars and a wood burner but 14.

Slab wood refers to unmerchantable byproduct of the milling operation.

 

So, in 1917 prices & data ...how would you calculate those prices in terms of 
today's prices?

​W.

"Wooding up" or reloading fuel played a role in the Great Locomotive Chase during the American Civil War.  The Atlanta area locomotives had to stop to take on more split and dried wood, losing precious time.

Many locomotives in the yellow pine area of southern Alabama and northern Florida also burned pine. That's one reason they had huge stacks with spark arrestors.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/22 16:49 by Lackawanna484.

Any chance the 'General' ran out of wood & got caught?

When we lived near Cooperstown, NY... in our family room I had a caboose stove,
used, ex-D&H caboose, ..... some of the firewood I used was White Ash,  
WOW, that burned white hot...
The best I've seen..

​W.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/22 07:49 by wcamp1472.

Woody:
Various species of pines produce varying amounts of pitch (not tar). Out west, Ponderosa, Sugar Pine and Jeffery Pine are not too bad, but Coulter Pines and Bull Pines produce copious amounts of pitch and alsohave twisted grain making splitting them very tedious. I agree that pines should be allowed to dry for at least a year and two is better. As for the forests back east I'll leave that to someone with knowledge and experience "back there".

John Mills

wcamp1472 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Any chance the 'General' ran out of wood & got
> caught?
>
> When we lived near Cooperstown, NY... in our
> family room I had a caboose stove,
> used, ex-D&H caboose, ..... some of the firewood I
> used was White Ash,  
> WOW, that burned white hot...
> The best I've seen..
>
> ​W.

Our friends had a ski home near Hawley PA. There was mill which processed white ash timber for baseball bats. Back then you could get a pick up truck load of wood scrap for $50. Mix that in with the oak for the wood stove and it would heat the whole house.

To answer the question about wood costs in todays dollars: Depending which inflation calculator you use, the increase is btween 2200 and 2400%, thus a cord of wood was about $60 and the seven cords required per day would cost around $420. 

It was mentioned elsewhere in the report that sugar pine limb wood was prefered for firing the steam donkeys. 
 

You can get all your answers with one visit to the Clark's Trading Post at N. Lincoln, NH and the White Mountain Central RR when the Climax steam locomotive is running.  You often can get an invite to ride the cab and throw a few splits into the firebox.  Their piles of split wood sit for years and its get it replenishment by bid and contract purchase so that gives a current price.
https://clarksbears.com/

I grew up in a late 1700s house (expanded in the 1850s) and largely heated with wood. The overall preference for any wood burning activity  would be for nicely seasoned hardwoods , maybe 2 years dried. Oak, ash, maple, chestnut back when there were such things as chestnuts. 

But reality intrudes, and no plan survives contact with your opponent. In this case the opponent is the freakin’ cold outside. We burned whatever got cut down in the course of farm activities. Anything standing dead flor a couple years was fair game, along with anything we needed to clear out of our fence rows.  

You tried to stay away from freshly cut, unseasoned pines and other conifers. They have a high moisture content which lowers their fuel value and they tend to generate creosote, which would accumulate on the sides of the chimney and create a chimney fire risk after a few months. Thus the need for chimney sweeping. 

It would be interesting to know if similar creosote accumulation problems occurred in pine-fired locomotives, and how it was dealt with. 

I've burned a lot of Walnut in the past, lots of creosote buildup with it too.

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I have read stories in the past that told of trains stopping in the priairie lands to gather cow chips for fuel.