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Hardwood Ash
The grey-white ash left when clean hardwood burns completely is the starting point for lye and soap, potash, ash glazes and nixtamal, and a garden lime. Its largest part is calcium carbonate, with potassium salts, and it is alkaline: wet ash stings the skin.
Only clean wood: never painted, treated, glued or mixed with rubbish. How much ash a load of wood gives varies with the species and how much bark is on it, so weigh both and find out.
Beginner
1 day, plus 3 days cooling
Instructions
1
1
Weigh the wood
Weigh the wood
Weigh dry, clean hardwood logs such as oak, beech, ash or maple. Note the weight.
Materials for this step:
Hardwood Logs20 kgTools needed:
Weighing Scale2
2
Burn it down
Burn it down
Light a fire in a clean fire pit with tinder and kindling, and feed it the weighed logs. Keep it burning until no black charcoal is left, only grey-white ash.
Materials for this step:
Tinder Bundle1 piece
Kindling and Small Sticks1 piece
Matches1 pieceTools needed:
Fire Pit3
3
Cool it in metal
Cool it in metal
Shovel the ash into a metal bucket with a lid and stand it on bare ground, at least 3 m from any building. Leave it at least 3 days: ash hides embers that stay hot for days.
Tools needed:
Shovel
Metal Bucket with Lid
Leather Work Gloves4
4
Sieve it
Sieve it
With a dust mask and gloves on, sieve the cold ash through a coarse sieve into a second bucket. Throw back any black bits for the next fire.
Tools needed:
Coarse Sieve
Metal Bucket
Dust MaskLeather Work Gloves5
5
Weigh the ash
Weigh the ash
Weigh the sieved ash and divide by the wood's weight: that is your yield. Note the species.
Tools needed:
Weighing Scale6
6
Keep it dry
Keep it dry
Store it in the lidded metal bucket in a dry place. Damp ash cakes, and rain washes the potassium out of it.
Tools needed:
Metal Bucket with LidMaterials
4- Placeholder
- 1 piecePlaceholder
- 1 piecePlaceholder
- 1 piecePlaceholder
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