A wood fire always seems to give that homey, natural feel. Wood stoves are often an integral part of people’s homes during the winter months. But starting a fire can be quite difficult for many people. It can be frustrating to have to keep returning to the wood stove light a fire…again!
But, with just a little bit of know-how, you’ll be able to start a fire in no time!
Fire Basics
As basic as it sounds, you get a fire going by raising the temperature of the material high enough for it to support flame. To get firewood to burn, this takes several steps and several materials.
To get a roaring fire, you need fuel, oxygen, and heat!
Fuel
Your fuel is essentially your firewood. It’s your carbon source that converts to heat. And, as we will talk about later, it starts with tinder, then kindling, then the firewood itself.
Oxygen
Fire needs to breathe. It needs oxygen as a part of the burning process. Thus, we will discuss air supply both in regards to stove mechanics as well as the fire lighting process.
Heat
Finally, you need heat! Firewood does not spontaneously combust. So we need a heat source to get started…like a match or a lighter. If you’re a survivalist, you might be able to generate friction heat by rubbing two sticks together, but for most of us, we need a device to get the chain reaction of hat going in the wood stove!
Either way, we need a way to raise the temperature of the fuel to “ignition level!”
What do I need to start my wood stove?
Tinder
As mentioned earlier, you need to raise the temperature of the material enough so that it bursts into flame. Firewood, depending on the species, ignites somewhere between 570-920 degrees Fahrenheit.
Now, according to my copious research, a match burns at almost 1300 degrees Fahrenheit. It seems like that would do the trick to heat up firewood enough to ignite.
But it won’t.
It doesn’t have the staying power to stay hot enough for long enough to burn larger pieces.
If you’re storing your wood outside, it could be coming into the house at a cold 15 degrees. A match might burn for 15 seconds before setting your cuticles on fire. That’s not enough to raise the firewood temperature enough.
So you need an intermediate material to build up temperature…
Tinder! (Not the dating app…although that might raise some temperatures…)
Newspapers are the most common and effective tinder. If you remember from your high school days and Ray Bradbury, paper ignites at 454 degrees Fahrenheit…at least 120 degrees lower than wood.
Plus, it has significantly less thermal mass than wood, so it’s easier to increase its temperature.
So the idea is, ignite several pieces of crumpled-up paper (we’ll talk about that later), which will burn and increase the temperature to a point beyond what a single match could do.
Make sense?
In a survival setting, many things make good tinder…birch bark (much like paper), pine cones, dried pine needles, lichen, etc. Anything thin, dry, and flammable!
With ready access to recycling materials, I find that combining thin and thick materials work best. In other words, I start with newspaper and stack corrugated cardboard, (or egg cartons) on top of the paper. The paper lights easily, but burns quickly. The paper ignites the cardboard, which is heavier thus has more “thermal mass” and burns a bit more slowly.
And if you really want added support, you can use fire starters!
This slower burn but increased heat raises temperature enough to ignite wood!
Kindling
While your tinder has increased the igniting power of a match, we still don’t have enough sustained heat to reliably light a fire.
But, it’s enough to start dry, fine kindling…or small pieces of wood.
Kindling is firewood or twigs and small sticks split down to ¼-¾” (approximately!). Like the match to paper relationship, the kindling ignites from the paper and builds enough heat to ignite the firewood.
Fire Wood
Once the kindling is burning, it puts off enough heat to raise the firewood temperature to over 600 degrees and get it burning.
I still find, however, that starting with small logs, (around 2-3” in width…and split) then moving up to large logs (also split! increases the chances that the fire will catch with limited fussing and poking at it!
And, I’ll mention here, split wood catches and burns better than unsplit wood. Not only does it dry better but all the little splits, cracks, and crannies of split firewood create more surface area, enhances airflow, and allows the material to heat up better.
And, though it seems obvious, I’ll point you that it’s easiest to light a fire in a wood stove when the wood is dry!
If there’s too much moisture in the wood, it’s much tougher to raise the temperature of the logs. As the fire burns around the wet log, it boils any water in the log. Boiling water can only get to 212 degrees Fahrenheit. So, wet wood will only steam…and you’ll see water boiling out of the ends of the logs. When the water has boiled off, the fire will continue to raise the temperature of the logs to the burning point.
You can check to make sure your logs are dry enough by using a moisture meter. This nifty device sends a low electrical current through logs and measures the resistance to determine the moisture percentage.
Your stove will like firewood in the 15-20% range!
Lighting the Fire
Bottom-Up or Top-Down?
Traditionally, most people light a “bottom-up” fire…meaning they lay the tinder on the bottom, then stack kindling and wood on top.
And, it works pretty well.
I’ve come to build top-down fires, though. I criss-cross my large firewood on the bottom, then small wood, then newspaper, then kindling on top.
As the dry kindling burns and creates coals, the coals fall into the small wood and ignite it.
The advantage is that the weight of the firewood doesn’t squash the air out of the newspaper.
Experiment with both and see what works best for you!
Log Cabin or Teepee
It seems that in all the Western movies, the cowboys (ironically) are sitting around a teepee fire. You know…all the firewood is stacked up on end leaning against each other like a teepee.
But “log cabin” fires work much better.
“Teepees” collapse, scatter the fuel and restrict airflow.
Log cabin fires provide structure to evenly distribute coals and fuel while allowing maximum airflow…perfect for it all to burn efficiently!
Laying the Fire
I usually keep a thin layer of ash under the wood stove great because I was always taught that this bit of ash helps insulate the stove against too much heat.
- Start by crumpling up four sections of the newspaper (full pages!) into the size of softballs and lay them on the grate of the woodstove
- Criss-cross your kindling on top of that (I like 3 layers!)
- Criss-cross small firewood on top of that. (Don’t put on too much or you won’t get enough airflow.
Checking the Air Flow
Before you light the fire, check your air supply. Check to make sure that the damper (that controls airflow to the chimney) is open.
Also, make sure that the air vents to the stove are open as well.
To add to the air vents, sometimes you can leave the stove door open to get it started. The door slightly open will increase the draw. But be careful to not leave the stove open too long. Too much air intake can lead to a chimney fire.
In some cases, negative pressure from the chimney can cause a downdraft that blows smoke back into the house. Usually, this happens when the chimney is cold and the wind blows over the roof.
One trick is to warm up the cold air in the chimney. Take a piece of newspaper crumple it up the long way making kind of a torch. Then light the end on fire, and hold it in the back of the stove near the fully open damper.
The hot air from the fire should warm the air in the back of the stove and create a better draft.
Fire Making Devices
It’s unlikely that you’ll want to start this thing by rubbing two sticks together.
So…you’ll need matches or a lighter.
We use long matches at our house as opposed to disposable lighters.
Either way, I do prefer long matches and long lighters that allow you to reach into the tinder without burning your fingers!
Lighting the Fire
Okay…it’s go time!
You’ve got the tinder, kindling, and firewood properly set out!
Using your lit match or lighter, light the newspaper at each “corner” of the fire. This will help with an equal burn and keep your log cabin somewhat level.
As the flames and create a bed of coals, add more wood to the top of the log cabin.
Once you have a solid bed of coals, you can fill the stove with wood, close the door, turn down the air control, and let the fire do its thing!
Conclusion
It’s clear from the article that there are a lot of ways to build a fire correctly. Be sure to use effective tinder and dry wood (green wood with high moisture content won’t cut it!)
And build a structure that supports airflow! This detail in itself will help make starting a fire even easier!
In addition, our blog is full of helpful information on how you can leverage these different principles through online marketing strategies. If you have any questions about anything else related to this post, please don’t hesitate to reach out!