Most cost effective Briquettes for wood stove

hubb

Having just got a multi fuel burning stove (very timely when gas is so expensive) I have been reading that recycled wood  and Irish peat blocks or briquettes are excellent, and are supposed to last longer than more expensive hardwood logs. Various places sell them like Aldi, B&M, Lidl etc as well as Amazon but can anyone please tell me if they have good experience with any type sold for a long burn time, heat and price when purchased.

Thanks.

hubb

Anyone please ?

hubb

Well that's a disappointing result considering log burners are so popular 

MrsStepford

When you say briquettes are you meaning things like compressed fir tree foliage or other briquettes designed for BBQs ? You shouldnt burn those because of the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning, my chimney sweep told me. Peat is used as fertiliser here and is probably to wet. You would have to let it dry out and it's not eco-friendly. 

It costs nothing to forage sticks and branches from parks, country parks and verges, As long as you let them dry out thoroughly, they will burn well. Some will spit eg chestnut, holly. 

hubb

MrsStepford said:

When you say briquettes are you meaning things like compressed fir tree foliage or other briquettes designed for BBQs ? You shouldnt burn those because of the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning, my chimney sweep told me. Peat is used as fertiliser here and is probably to wet. You would have to let it dry out and it's not eco-friendly. 

It costs nothing to forage sticks and branches from parks, country parks and verges, As long as you let them dry out thoroughly, they will burn well. Some will spit eg chestnut, holly. 

I already do the collecting branches etc but the briquettes I use are more like cylindrical logs, designed for open fires and wood burning stoves. The only thing with sticks etc is they burn very quickly. The peat however is sold as hard, dry bricks so not wet at all. 

Martin_the_Unjust

Try white horse energy, I’ve had some from there and they were pretty good. 

Especially if you have space in your garage to shove a pallet full in.


Not particularly cheap though.

hubb

Martin_the_Unjust said:

Try white horse energy, I’ve had some from there and they were pretty good. 

Especially if you have space in your garage to shove a pallet full in.


Not particularly cheap though.

I have just bought a pack from Lidl for £3.99. I shall give them a trial run.

anotheruser

Don't trust supermarket/petrol station wood to be any good.
It's not bad, just not good.
Ones in plastic wrapping are worse as they will sweat with the weather conditions bring brought into the warm overnight then cold outside.

The best approach is search for a local dealer.

We have an open fire and get coal from a local merchant a couple of miles away and bulk delivery of seasoned logs.  The logs come from a farm I see every day, no more than half a mile from my front door.  I see the tree trunks lined up drying for a few years before they chop them to the size I want.  It's about £100 for a third of a small tipper truck but that easily lasts us over the winter (we don't have the fire on every day).
So long as you have somewhere to store them (we have extra wheely bins), easy peasy.


You can also try https://www.lektowoodfuels.co.uk/

We tried the heat logs in the past and wouldn't say they're any better or worse than normal wood logs.  The heat logs are more expensive than seasoned logs but they are also "cleaner" in that wood logs are natural, so come in different shapes, types of wood and varying sizes (within the limit they're chopped at).  Manufactured heat logs like the ones from Lekto fuels are just that, manufactured - squashed together finely chopped wood that is then dried for a long time providing a compact log of wood.

Some supermarkets (including Aldi) will sell a similar version of the heat logs.  Again, not noticed a huge difference in performance, maybe because we have an open fire, not a log burner.

Lekto also do some overnight briquette things.
They basically keep warm overnight so it's eay to light a fire the next day.  We had a trial pack of these but wern't really that great for us.  If we build our fire right, the coals are still warm enough the next day to start another fire easily.