Fire Buggery, Old School Fire Pit, No Smoke

[John K BBQ]

So we all pretty much like fire pits. There are some other threads about fire pits and smokeless fire pits and the like. The smokeless fire pits are cool, no doubt, but if you don't have one yet, and tend to have smokey fires, try this method and see if it helps or not. I've been building fires like this for a while. It scares the wife a little bit because the flames go pretty high at the beginning but there usually isn't much smoke. On a day when it's not too windy the smoke goes straight up due to the high heat and airflow.

Here's how I stack it, log cabin style, 3 pcs of split wood on the bottom and 2nd later, 2 on the 3rd layer, 3 smaller splits on the 4th with kindling on top. It's important to leave at least two inches of gap between the splits so you get lots of air flow.



I didn't use quite enough much kindling on the top on this, but as you'll see, it worked anyway! I tucked one tumbleweed in with the kindling and lit it up.
Once the kindling has ignited, you can pretty much just sit back and watch it burn.



Here we are just about 20 minutes after light off. Lots of air flow, no smoke, embers dropping down into the unlit levels. I think I stuck one more piece of wood on top of this fire just to make sure it was going really good. Flames were probably 5' off the ground. You can build higher, but not really recommended...... if your wife is paying attention



Here's Brooklyn running around being crazy



Here's the fire about 2 hours in. Really nice bed of hot coals, easy to keep burning, no smoke, feet warm, full belly, glass of bourbon in hand, (not shown). listening to Stevie Ray Vaughn, and livin' the good life.

 

[BryanO]

Looks like a pretty evening. I probably would have added a decent stogie to the (unshown) bourbon.

 

[Dustin Dorsey]

It's very much similar to building a fire in a stickburner. You are going for as complete of a combustion as you can with clear blue smoke. I find myself gravitating more and more to a log cabin style fire, especially if I have wood with a little too much moisture in it.

 

[Ryan Burke]

Nice fire and good choice in music.

 

[Timothy F. Lewis]

It takes a while to get the hearth to clear smoke but, once it gets there, I have HOURS of pleasant time.




I have always lit my fire from the bottom given that heat rises. Have I been doing that wrong my entire life?


Gee, I think it’s time to sand and refinish the picnic table!

 

[John K BBQ]

A good friend of mine once said, "what works, works" another guy said "more than one way to skin a cat" but 10 out of 10 cats agree that skinning cats is a bad idea... The only bad fire pit fire is the one you don't build at all in my book.