Stacking Styles

Sometimes there is a fine line between a stacking style and a wood rack. In this particular case I chose to combine the 2 concepts. No matter how you stack the wood, you never want it to touch the ground due to moisture. Plus, this stacking style, although excellent for drying wood, is time consuming. Therefore, you want as much reusability as you can.

Holz Hausen

Although the Holz Hausen method (A German stacking style) is not new, turning the style into a rack is and as with everything, I want to see if I can take it to the next level. 

For those of you who haven't tried this stacking method, a fair bit of skill is required. Otherwise, the wind will knock your stack over much to your great dismay, and I speak from experience when I first learned this style. Stick with 3 feet in height until your stacking skills grow and then go to 4, 5 & 6 feet high. I would not go over 6 feet if you don't have additional supports.

High wind

I have built 7 Holz Hausen circles and in a high wind area, the firewood dries significantly faster. In future revisions of this project, I will show an example of internal firewood in the center of the circle. People say that the wood inside also dries faster but I haven't test and internal stack myself yet.

The Holz Hausen Build

In V1-0-0 you see the basic layout of the Holz Hausen method. A 12' foot diameter ring laid out on a 4x4 matrix of pallets (4 x 3.33). The pallets will be anchored together (on the sides using 1x4's) to keep them from jostling about with the weight of walking on and off of the pallets. The ring of firewood pieces will be anchored down to the pallets (depending on thickness of the firewood, use 4" to 6" screws. You may want to leave the brown pallets out of the setup until after the circle is laid. Pound in a stake at the center of the green pallets and put a 6' piece of twine tied around a 3" screw in the end. This will help you keep your circle round.

V1-0-0

Learn the math behind this project

V1-0-1

For V1-0-1, you see how to start your stack by placing pieces of firewood perpendicular to the ring. Depending on the length of your foundation ring piece you can put 3-5 pieces of firewood on each segment (though when using 16" wood, its typically no more than 3). Once you have laid your perpendicular wood on each ring piece, then go back and fill in the spaces between the stacks and work your way up.

V1-0-2

In V1-0-2 its all math. I upgraded the features in MathCompiler3D for the Encircle functionality to enable the image you see below (then retrofitted V1-0-1 & V1-0-0). As great a art is, it would have taken along time to layout the Holz Hausen in 3D by hand due to the fact that there are 150 pieces of wood per ring level. Now your wood can dry in excellent fashion with great airflow and you gain some firewood art in your backyard or woodyard which will be pleasing for the customers to see.

V1-0-3 - Vertical Supports

With the addition of vertical supports, you no longer have to be as careful when stacking. In this design there are 16 vertical supports with 16 base 4x4's and 16 header 4x4's. The angles (not seen in this image) you would cut on your 4x4's in the ring section would be 360/16/2 ( / 2 because of one on each side). Now this rack becomes more and more reusable. 

V1-0-4 - A way in

One drawback is you can no longer get on the inside. There are a couple solutions to that problem. Have you ever walked by a cow pasture and saw a steep vertical stair case up over the fence? How about a painters ladder, I believe its Little Giant that has a ladder with lockable positions and that could easily allow you to go from outside to inside. 

V1-0-5 Have a seat

No ladder climbing required - walk on in and have a sit down. This would be a great decorative item for a woodyard or a backyard as well.