Owners of private suburban housing, not being able to be heated through centralized heating, equip their houses with an autonomous heating system based on individual boilers. The obsolete "potbelly stoves" were replaced by high-tech boiler units capable of generating heat from the fuel for a long time.
In view of the greatest distribution of firewood as fuel, the most convenient heating boiler on solid fuel for long burning. Such units are equipped with special chambers that provide high heat transfer efficiency, almost complete combustion of firewood.
When choosing a solid fuel heating boiler, you need to remember the efficiency of the harvested firewood. Wood should burn as long as possible, creating a high thermal effect. Each tree species has its own qualities. In this regard, you need to know what kind of firewood is best for a solid fuel boiler.
In addition, the required amount of wood fuel for the heating season should be taken into account. Otherwise, in the middle of winter, you can be left with one "bundle" of firewood, which will lead to an inevitable emergency, due to the defrosting of the entire internal heating system of the house.
Firewood quality: basic principles
An important nuance in improving the quality of firewood is the organization of storage of firewood. Special places (fireboxes) for storing sawn wood allow you to keep firewood in the required condition, facilitating not only the initial ignition, but also the subsequent combustion process. The importance of such auxiliary structures is due to constantly changing weather conditions throughout the year (long rains, snowfall in winter, frosts), which are crucial for the quality of harvested firewood, and therefore for the very efficiency of an individual boiler unit.
When choosing a particular type of wood, you need to know its main characteristics: density, calorie content. The higher the density of the wood structure, the longer the firewood will burn through, the more heat transfer will be created. It is advisable for the owners of country cottages to keep two types of firewood: one for kindling, which has a lower density, which will facilitate quick ignition; others - for the main combustion process with a high degree of calorific value.
Important characteristics of logs, depending on the type of wood
Asking the question “what kind of firewood is better for a solid fuel boiler”, you need to know their most significant characteristics. In particular:
- calorific value;
- ash content.
A long-burning solid fuel heating boiler, which uses firewood with a high ash content, will often have to be cleaned. Without taking this moment into account, the grates of the boiler unit will quickly become clogged with ash, which will lead to a decrease in the efficiency of the boiler. Of course, if a solid fuel long-burning wood-fired boiler with a fully automated mode is taken as the basis for private heating, then there is nothing to worry about. Otherwise, you need to change the type of wood.
Another important characteristic of firewood is its calorific value. Using wood logs with a high calorie content, a long-burning solid fuel heating boiler will withstand the necessary heat load for a long time, creating the desired temperature regime in the interior of a country cottage. This characteristic largely depends on the density of the wood itself.
As a result of experimental tests, the following results were obtained for the most common types of firewood (list in descending order):
- oak - 3106 kcal;
- birch - 2805 kcal;
- pine - 2128 kcal;
- from alder - 2095 kcal;
- spruce - 1847 kcal;
- aspen - 1764 kcal.
Despite the fact that oak firewood is the most efficient in obtaining heat, their cost is much higher than all other types of firewood. Thus, it is more profitable to heat a solid fuel heating boiler, based on the cost of wood fuel, with birch firewood.
The degree of humidity of firewood
A solid fuel boiler for long burning on wood, having a high efficiency, will still not be able to produce the desired thermal effect due to poorly dried firewood. Ignition with a high moisture content in the furnace, in this case, will be very difficult.
When purchasing the required volume of freshly sawn firewood, it is imperative to dry them, as their calorific value decreases sharply. Such logs, at 50% moisture content, are able to give only 1860 kcal. For clarity, wood for boilers, having completely dried with zero percent moisture, is capable of delivering up to 4400 kcal. A close indicator of such calorific value can be provided by firewood that has been dried indoors or is under a well-protected canopy during the year. Their indicator is in the range of 3900-3380 kcal.
Naturally, the entire annual supply of firewood cannot be placed in the boiler room, so you need to take care of the firebox in the backyard. To maximize the efficiency of the boiler, part of the fuel volume for the current 1-2 days should be placed directly in the household part of the cottage. The rest of the harvested part is stored either in a special shed or under a street shed. To avoid soaking firewood with moisture, it is advisable to place the firebox on the sunny side of the site. Storage should be carried out on a well-ventilated pallet so that the poles do not collect unnecessary moisture from the ground.
The required amount of fuel per day
To accurately determine the optimal consumption of firewood in a solid fuel boiler, you should know a few mandatory characteristics:
- power required for a given heating system (Q);
- calorific value of logs depending on the breed (q);
- boiler unit efficiency.
Based on these parameters, you can calculate the daily volume of firewood. The formula is:
V=24*Q/ (q*0.01 efficiency).
The formula is easy to apply in practice, so it is very difficult to make a mistake with the resulting volume. This mathematical hint will not only give an answer which wood is better for a solid fuel boiler, but will also help determine the power of the boiler itself.
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