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.