Chuck and cover
We found 4 snakes, 2 mice, and the keys to a '64 Plymouth in this stack.
Day two of charcoal-making began with moving the woodstack to the inner sanctum of the pit…
Pickst thou up sticks.
We always leave the initial build to W. Palmer (Mark). That cribbing of 3 pieces stacked around the pole forms a “chimney” in which the pit can be fired tomorrow.
The stack she groweth!
Anything can be charcoaled, but we tend to use a lot of maple, cherry, and oak for our burn. It’s all cut to an even length and stacked upright to maximize the coaling effect. Care is taken to fill in all the little gaps with smaller pieces.
A momentary diversion.
Good friends came to help. This is not a Maypole. Call it a September-pole, if you must.
Mark gets that second ring of wood started before the bottom ring is too large. Detail of the cribbing below. Live coals and small firewood will be dropped down this stack tomorrow.
Yearning for a burning.
More friends came to help out as the stack started to take shape…
Hacky stack! You have a knack, Jack.
We were visited by angels of mercy again today…we ought to make coal more often!
What would Emily Post say?
Here’s the last time these billets of wood will see the light of day as firewood. Next stop, charcoal.
The Eagle has landed.
We cover the stack with a mix of hay and grass. It forms a veil between the wood…
Like some cupcake gone horribly awry...
…and the blackened earth called, “breeze”. Breeze is a mix of ash, ground up bits of charcoal, the tars which come out of the wood in coaling, and the angst of many a collier. It’s the ideal cover for a new burn.
The breeze is only about 2-4 inches thick over the stack.
A board is placed over the top of the cribbing to keep the breeze from filling the hollow.
Windscreen? Check. Woodpile? Ready for action. A day well spent, Goodman Palmer.
Tomorrow morning, we’ll open up the chimney and begin to charge the stack with fire. Depending on the wind and other unknown factors, it can look very dramatic–a little like a space shuttle launch. We’ll try our best to get video.
Tags: blacksmith, Plimoth Plantation
Can’t wait to see this in action!
hi so gimme some of these and I’ll tell you which ones I need–thank you–
You mean pictures, not coal, right Marie? Will do!
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I do the annual charcoal burn at Grayhill living history farm in Wales (Year 1599) and have always struggled using brackern to cover the stack: the dirt covering just falls straight through and leaves lots of air holes – hay makes soooo much more sense! Next year we will be using hay for sure!
Also how long are your wood billets cut to? They look about one foot long?
James, Woodcollier (part time), England
Send pics James! When do you do your burn at Grayhill?
We cut the billets to 2′–the shorter lengths are mostly brands that didn’t fully coal out from last year’s burn. They make great fillers when we’re rounding up the stack and filling in places.
A part-time woodcollier beats a full-time hash-slinger any day!
Rick, we burn in our open week which is the last week in June or first week in July. I was thinking 2′ makes sense, many books talk of 3′ lengths but our stack is no way near the size of a ‘commercial’ stack so 2′ makes more sense. How long do you season the wood for? We tend to cut in the winter and leave for a summer then use the following year? Great to be in contact with another early modern woodcollier…. now I will try to find some photos.
Hi James, Mark gets wood for the burn from a couple of farmers locally. It’s a perfect diameter for coaling. It’s definitely seasoned by the time we use it–I’m thinking at least a year–but I’ll check again with Mark. He’ll also tell us when the farmers cut it–but it’s likely a fall/winter harvest.
Remember the A.A. Milne poem “The Charcoal Burner” ?
Thanks for the reminder, Rob. Mark has a sooty copy of it posted to his “Charcoal-burn” guide library!
Thanks for this great series of posts. This is the first time I have seen the process in detail like this.
I am trying to learn blacksmithing using charcoal so this is very interesting.
Rob
I’m really glad we could help, Rob. Good luck and stay in touch!
Thanks so much for posting the pictures! It makes the whole process so much easier to understand. I know you folks have enough physical work to do, so I really appreciate you taking even more time at the end of your day to upload the photos and text so the rest of us can follow along.
I can’t wait to see photos of the burn, and yes, video would be sweet!
That’s awfully nice of you to say, L.M. It’s much appreciated. Getting such a fantastic response from readers fuels our fires!
James – so glad you posted. I didn’t know you were there. We coppice and make charcoal in modern kilns near Abergavenny. When do you burn? can you use extra hands? (aged female, still useful!)
Hi Marianne, in short: YES! We would love you to come and help… The only thing is we do our burn in the last week of June/first week in July when we open to the local school kids, i.e. in 16th Century kit. We would be able to help you out with stuff if you feel brave enough to try. We also do various work weekends (coppicing, walling, hedging etc.) Throughout the year (in 21st century clothing!) email me james.biddlecombe@gmail.com and I will make sure you are on the mailing lists for dates… we are all volunteers so any (especially local) interest is more than welcome. Look forward to hearing from you, James
Is there any runoff, like pitch. Is it collected?
Hi Jim, sorry for the delay in responding. There’s no run-off, mostly because we don’t coal the pitchy woods. Though you can put a leaf or weed in front of one of the vent holes and collect small amounts of black, sticky tar. We were talking about someday doing a burn specifically to make tar…maybe someday–we could collaborate with the crew from Mayflower!
Nice touch using a wooden spade! Really brave of you to do all of this out in public view, and yes, I agree the pictures really clarify everything.
John, I’m not sure if it’s clear in the pics, but the shovel is shod with an iron shoe. It’s a common way in the period–a fair amount of archaeology finds shovel shods. We’ll do a post in the future about shod shovels.
Tis a lovely post, wish B were there!
Come out next September, Katie! Mark is indeed polite. It’s a Kansas-thing.