Speaking of lump...

[Mmmmm]

I have one friend and one uncle who run cabinet shops. They always have a certain amount of nice 1" scraps of hickory, oak, cherry, alder, etc. They might be 3" to 4" wide, etc. I've been thinking about salvaging their usable size scraps and making my own lump. Has anyone here ever done this? I know that many have made lump charcoal out of seasoned logs but we don't have any hardwood around here to speak of which leaves me with the cabinet shop varieties.

Thoughts?

[mrbill]

as long as it's bare wood(not varnished/stained/treated in any way). it should be fine for coal makin.

[jcnaz]

Mr. cgaengineer mentions making his own lump in this thread earlier today: 

http://weberkettleclub.com/forums/weber-kettles-accessories/not-a-kettle-but-its-a-weber/

Maybe we can pull him away from his WSM long enough to fill us in!!

[Mmmmm]

I guess my main concern is I don't know how much the chunks shrink during the carbonization process and I don't want to end up with a bunch of too small lumps. Obviously you would have to be selective and not start with too small of scraps, but a piece of dimensional lumber is still a lot thinner than split chunks from a limb or trunk.