Firewood that Burns the Hottest and the Longest

Purpose:
Does the species of wood affect the rate at which it burns and how much heat it gives off?

Hypothesis:
If the burning time and heat temperature relies on the type of wood, then oak and maple should burn the longest and give off more heat because they are dense hardwoods.

Research:
The terms hardwood and softwood refer to the density of wood, how hard it is, and how much weight it has. A dense hardwood like oak or maple has high energy content per cord, so it releases more heat and produces long-lasting embers. Hardwood is the best type of firewood for long lasting warmth and cooking but can sometimes be hard to ignite and split …show more content…

The maximum temperature reached by maple was 245 degrees Fahrenheit and it burned for 10 minutes and 56 seconds. This was slightly higher and longer than the red oak wood. So the maple must be denser than the red oak. The spruce and cedar woods both averaged a time of 5 minutes and 45 seconds, but spruce burned slightly cooler. The pine wood also reached the same temperature as the spruce wood, but it burned much longer for 7 minutes and 52 seconds. From these results one can deduce that these five woods in order from most dense to least dense would be maple, red oak, pine, cedar, and spruce. The temperatures and times for each wood differed in each trial. This could be due to the fact that wood burns differently each time. Sometimes the flames would be higher on the end closer to the thermometer, thus giving a higher temperature reading. Wood naturally burns differently each time, so the optimal would be to get an average of the three trials to determine an accurate