Wooden briquettes offer numerous benefits when it comes to heating your home during the cold winter months. It is important that you take some precautions when using our briquettes, ensuring your safety, and the safety of your family. Accidents are not common, but it’s still worthwhile taking note of our safety precautions, ensuring you have a comfortable and warm home, without worrying about your safety.

Keep Your Briquettes Stable

When it comes to building your fire, whether you are using our brick-shaped briquettes or our heat logs, you want to ensure that they are stacked well, reducing the risk of them falling out of your fireplace.

Take Care When Lighting Your Fire

Our wood briquettes are Ready to Burn certified for use in the UK, they do not include any dangerous chemicals, glues, or adhesives. As a result, we do not recommend using accelerators, such as gasoline or lighter fluid. As our wooden briquettes are very low in moisture, they light quickly and using an accelerator could result in your fire burning out of control, not to mention the dangerous gasses released by your chosen accelerator.

Use Protective Screens or Guards

If you are using an open fireplace, always ensure it is fitted with a protective screen or guard. These screens reduce the risk of embers and sparks flying out of your fireplace and ending up on your carpet, increasing your risk of a house fire. Ensure there is enough clearance between your fire and any combustible materials, this is usually around one metre distance between the fire and any curtains, carpeting, or furniture.

Stacking the Fire

Fires should be manageable and safe, including how you stack your briquettes. We recommend using our natural kindling to get your fire going. You can add a piece of newspaper under the kindling to get it started. Once your kindling is burning, add one or two briquettes, allowing them to catch alight, before adding another one, if you wish. Remember you should need no more than three briquettes or heat logs, as they have a long burn duration.

If you are using a wood burning stove, avoid using too many briquettes. Your stove manufacturer will recommend how much wood is used in the wood burning stove. If the fire is too big, it will burn hotter and faster than your stove is designed for, causing damage to the stove.

Wear Gloves

It is recommended to wear gloves when stacking and lighting your fire, along with when adding extra fuel to the fire. This will avoid the risk of burning your hands while you get your fire started, offering an added layer of protection.

Watch out for Hot Ash

Yes our briquettes offer a clean burn with minimal smoke, creosote, and ash. At the same time, when you are adding fuel to your fire, you can come across some hot ash. We recommend watching out for hot ash when tending to your fire. Always remove ash after your fire, once it has cooled down completely.

Additional Safety Precautions

In addition to the above, we also recommend you:

  • Have your chimney inspected and cleaned once a year
  • Install smoke detectors in your home and ensure you change the batteries on a regular basis
  • Always have a fire extinguisher in the same room as your fireplace, as a safety measure
  • Never leave pets or children unsupervised around a fire. Keep the fireplace tools, matches, and lighters out of reach

Conclusion

Our wooden briquettes are the perfect way to heat your home this winter season. Taking note of our safety precautions when using briquettes, will ensure your home in safe, comfortable and warm.