steve terplak
Member
So, yesterday we nearly had a disaster.
I use an Outdoor Wood Boiler. It is 75 feet from the house, 30 feet from the first barn.
I have had it for 10 years and have been perfecting my system of wood management, ash disposal etc...
I have a covered wagon (open sides) that stores a week's worth of wood. I load up at my woodpile, bring the wagon over, park it next to the OWB for easy loading. That way, I am only messing around with wood movement 1x per week, on a weekend when I have time.
I shovel out ashes from the bottom of the stove into a metal wheelbarrow and when wheelbarrow #1 gets full, I fill up #2 while #1 cools and then disposes of #1 into my ash pile which is in the midst of a dirt pile for final dispoasal in the spring/summer.
Yesterday was very windy and, to my best guess, I had a hot ash jump into my wood wagon and start a fire which burned the wood wagon completely, the nearby outhouse and melted the ETC on my OWB.
The ash had been cleaned last night and I believed it to be cool but I guess it was not. This has never been an issue before, so I need to refigure my system so it is never an issue again.
Luckily the fire department came pretty quickly (as did I, I was in-town and got a panicked call from my wife) and we did not lose any major buildings - I needed to re-inforce the wagon structure (or re-build), and was thinking about disposing of the outhouse anyway...though we will miss it...
So how do I take care of ashes?
Portability is important - we can get pretty snowed in, so something on wheels (a wheelbarrow) is ideal.
Is there a lid I can use or make for my wheelbarrow?
I was thinking about welding a small tube on the edge of the barrow to make a barrel style hinge with a pin, to put a metal screen-door like structure over the top...would this work? Would I need a solid door? Is there something better I can use?
Just looking for thoughts...
I use an Outdoor Wood Boiler. It is 75 feet from the house, 30 feet from the first barn.
I have had it for 10 years and have been perfecting my system of wood management, ash disposal etc...
I have a covered wagon (open sides) that stores a week's worth of wood. I load up at my woodpile, bring the wagon over, park it next to the OWB for easy loading. That way, I am only messing around with wood movement 1x per week, on a weekend when I have time.
I shovel out ashes from the bottom of the stove into a metal wheelbarrow and when wheelbarrow #1 gets full, I fill up #2 while #1 cools and then disposes of #1 into my ash pile which is in the midst of a dirt pile for final dispoasal in the spring/summer.
Yesterday was very windy and, to my best guess, I had a hot ash jump into my wood wagon and start a fire which burned the wood wagon completely, the nearby outhouse and melted the ETC on my OWB.
The ash had been cleaned last night and I believed it to be cool but I guess it was not. This has never been an issue before, so I need to refigure my system so it is never an issue again.
Luckily the fire department came pretty quickly (as did I, I was in-town and got a panicked call from my wife) and we did not lose any major buildings - I needed to re-inforce the wagon structure (or re-build), and was thinking about disposing of the outhouse anyway...though we will miss it...
So how do I take care of ashes?
Portability is important - we can get pretty snowed in, so something on wheels (a wheelbarrow) is ideal.
Is there a lid I can use or make for my wheelbarrow?
I was thinking about welding a small tube on the edge of the barrow to make a barrel style hinge with a pin, to put a metal screen-door like structure over the top...would this work? Would I need a solid door? Is there something better I can use?
Just looking for thoughts...