So, on to other ideas... we wound up with what you see in the attached photo:
- Bottom: Wooden Pallets (free)
- End: 2x6's (free - had these laying around)
- Fastening: 3" deck screws (free - had these laying around)
- Cover: Tarps and bungie cords (cost varies by tarp size / thickness)
- Spare logs (or tires) to hold the tarp down
Advantages compared to how we stacked last year:
- The wood is held tight, we tried to stack the corners "free-standing" in a criss-cross pattern, but we probably had to restack the corners that fell down 5 or 6 times during the winter - no fun!
- WIth the pallets, the wood stays off the ground, nice and dry. Last year, we stacked it directly on the stone in our driveway, and the bottom row stayed wet the whole winter. Now, the snow will melt off of the piles and the firewood stays dry.
- If you start with one end, you can simply stack the firewood and let it slope towards the non-finished end. This way, the water flows down off the tarp easily, and you can keep adding pallets to extend the stack.
Here is a photo of this with wood stacked in it:
