Fire Challenged

Over the years my attempts to build fires have failed miserably for a variety of reasons. As a child my parents did not use their fireplaces and I was not allowed to build fires in the fireplaces my parents owned. However, my family did enjoyed regular outings to the campground where my grandparents had a trailer and a firepit. The firepit itself consisted of two wheel rims welded together with the centers cut out and holes cut in the bottom to allow air in. Starting fires in the firepit was easy, it involved putting in wads of paper, some smaller sticks on top of that and a couple of logs on top of that. The firepit held everything together and you simply lit the paper through the airhole. That was a good experience as we simply grabbed wood from the wood pile and through it in as necessary.

As I got older I tried on several occasions to build fires on my own without the firepit and the trusty woodpile. These attempts usually produced a lot of smoke and no flames. The recipe went womething like this: buy wood from some guy at the park / location where I was staying. Use some newspaper and whatever twigs / sticks are lying around. Place all materials in a heap with paper first, twigs second and logs last and light with matches on the ground, usually where a fire had happened before. Once the flames of the paper have gone out I may have had a tonne of smoke or I had to find more paper and matches. Usually a master firestarter, like Peter (read: Pyro), would come along and have a roaring blaze going in very little time. Usually I was unable to replicate the success of the firestarter on future attempts and I never caught on to my major problem: damp/wet wood and no heat sink. Peter finally criticized my choice of wood purchase several years ago and I tweaked into these issues.

When I moved into the River Road house I was excited to build fires. Finally I had a fireplace insert and I was going to make serious fire. The cheapskate Tom Steka who owned the place before had burned almost an entire cord of wood between the beginning of Oct and the end of Nov and left me with almost no wood. Still, I was determined and brought in a few logs to try and burn. I let them sit inside to aclimatize before burning and then tried to burn them. I also carefully read the fireplace insert manual and talked with the chimney sweep before trying to build a fire. My first attempts were awful. I had lots of smoke, little fire and a log did not burn for long. I was of course wary of "over fueling" the insert which the manual had said could be an issue. Frustrated and certain I had green (i.e., not dry) wood Michelle and I ordered a 1/2 cord of seasoned (i.e., dry), split birch. The fires had been so bad and smelly that Michelle was almost ready to have the insert as decoration only. That is when I heard that my brother-in-law Jonathon is a master firestarter (read: Pyro).

Certain that I would not put in enough wood (because of the stupid warnings) and that would I be unable to establish a long term fire (15 hours+) I called in an expert. Jonathon, Amy, Lyvia and Jack all came over a week ago to start a fire and visit for a while. Jonathon laid down two logs ("rails") running into the fireplace insert from the door and about a foot apart. He then put paper between them and across the paper (on the rails) he put kindling and then a couple of logs on top of that. As instructed by the chimney sweep we opened the draft fully and burned a piece of paper near the flue to establish a warm flow up the chimney. Then Jonathon lit the paper and closed the door.

I have followed this recipe for a week now and it works fabulously. I actually replace the paper with birch bark as it burns faster and hotter than paper (less smoke too). The key to a good fire is to have split, seasoned logs with good kindling and material to light. It also helps to have a good bed of dry coals and possibly a heat sink. The coals heat up quickly and get the fire going, while the heat sink (rocks, tire rims, ceramic insert bricks...) heats up slowly and allows the fire to keep going. Once hot, a good heat sink and coals can burn wood slowly and doesn't need much oxygen to keep going. I am not yet a master firestarter but I am getting there. I am considering a firepit for the backyard I just don't know how to tell Michelle.

Furnaces & A Cold, Cold Winnipeg

So everyone enjoys ribbing Winnipeggers by calling Winnipeg by its alternate name: Winterpeg. Winnipeggers generally accept this and actually use the name as though it deserves to be on a roll of honour. As I mentioned in my article on The Great Flood of '06 the weather this year has been warm. In fact it has only been cold twice since I arrived into the city. however it has been cold in the apartment 3 times...

The day I arrived was during the beginning of the warm spell, but the apartment was cold. When I got to the house I went into the apartment and it was colder than it should have been, how odd I thought. We raised the temperature on the thermostat and the furnace kicked in. I was resonably vigilant and every time I checked the temperature was normal.

That was until the temperature dropped to an average daily temp of -23.9 on Jan 22^nd when the pipes froze and subsequently thawed. Again when we went into the unit the temperature was too low at 33F with the thermostat set to 50F. The furnace ignited while I was standing there pondering why it was too cold. That is when I discovered the electric heater in the first floor of the apartment and subsequently turned it on.

Last Wednesday, Feb 8^th, was the second cold day outside since my arrival. The average daily temp was a shivery -16.6C and I did not get home until 8:30pm after a long day and then a nice massage. When I pulled into the garage Michelle's sister was immediately there saying: "it's cold in the apartment". My thought was to restart the furnace and call a furnace guy in the morning. But the restart instructions include a warning that if you smell gas after shutting everything off (including the gas switch) and waiting 5 minutes then you should not restart the furnace but rather call in a repairman. I smelled gas so we waited for a repair guy.

For the record it was 55F in the apartment, the little electric first floor heater was nicely producing heat and the smell of gas was only apparant near the furnace. My sister-in-law did not want to move the kids into the house so they all stayed in the apartment and waited, and waited, and waited. The first repair company had a tech call us 1.5 hours after we called, only to learn that he had never heard of a Rudd furnace and that they wouldn't have the parts. What a waste!!! The second company advertised the furnaces they fixed and the guy showed up around 11:30.

The ignitor was reliable and there was sufficient gas pressure so no problems there (the smell of gas was probably my over-reacting). It turns out that the furnace could no longer consistantly sense if the ignitor was successful. So after the furnace turned on, it would check "did it light?" and get no response. The furnace then shuts down for an hour and tries again. This isn't a problem if it isn't cold out and the sensor is working at 75%. But when the temperature is low outside and the sensor doesn't work a number of times then it gets cold in the apartment.

I was up until 12:45 and I learned more about electronic furnaces than I had known before. Oh and last Friday I had a 1/2 cord of wood delivered so we don't have to rely on the house furnace as much. My story about being fire-challenged will have to wait until tomorrow.