I was in a race with the generator, because if it ran out of gas before I ran out of wood to be cut to stove lengths I’d not only have to add more – only to pour it out at the end of the job – but there’d be this big sweaty hassle getting it started again. With gas in the carb bowl, the Honda starts like a sweet dream. Empty, it’s kind of a pain in the ass to restart.
Anyway, I spent an hour and a half this morning finishing every scrap of wood in my pallet pile that wasn’t eaten through by termites…
…and it made a nice final pile in the trailer.
Another hour stacking, and there it is…
And I don’t know for sure what I’ll do for firewood next winter. Probably tune up the chainsaw and go back to juniper. But for this year, except for some side jobs like cleanup and Landlady’s wood, I’m done with woodcutting.
So you don’t have any mesquite trees in your desert area? Lucky you (for the ranchers at least!)
What? You mean you have denuded the land of free-ranging pallets?
When does the next migration of pallet herds occur? Maybe you need to set up a pallet jump.
Is there such a thing as a pellet adapter for a boxwood stove?
A pallet once insulted my mother before my very eyes. A very few twisted, shattered survivors remain, which will be demolished and chopped to pieces in the fullness of time. Desert pallets fear my pitiless chopsaw powers. No prisoners, no mercy.
I doubt it very much. Pellet stoves are complex; boxwood stoves are iron boxes. And if I’m going to import fuel from town I’d probably prefer propane to pellets. Frankly I’ve never understood their charm as heating fuel.
You may have exceeded your quota for this winter, but this is Planet Earth and Stuff Happens here (just by itself, 2020 is damn good proof of that). I’d stay on the lookout for pallets, even from other sources – there might be some in “town” lurking behind someone’s dumpster – and other sources of suitable combustible cellulose. One never knows what evil the future brings.
National forests are good for pine or where 40 years ago when I was out there. They let anyone harvest the dead stuff. 1 or 2 pine trees should yield enough wood for a time. Or if you can get some coal. that would burn slower and a tad warmer.
Propane is the easiest though.
If you run the Honda out of gas after you refill the tank turn the on/off switch on and crack the carb drain until fuel runs. It should start right up!