I know that! I was just trying to inject a bit of silliness into proceedings! 
As I said, maybe.
The diagram in that article is not especially convincing
How do we end up with denser packed wood just because we cut it into smaller lengths - that hasn’t changed the cross-sectional shape or diameter of the logs.
In fact if logs were perfect cylinders it wouldn’t change anything at all.
It’s only that logs are *not* perfect cylinders that makes this at all plausible, but I’m slightly sceptical that 30cm logs always pack into 70% of the volume they occupied when cut into 1m lengths.
Up here in the Grande Est every year the inhabitants of the village are entitled to what they call " a cut of the wood". regardless of if you heat by wood or not. It means that you are allocated a number of trees in the forest which will give the number of steres available for that year. it varies from 15 to 24 steres. You have to fell the trees. log them and cut in metre lengths and stack them. Any small branches less than 75mm diameter are not included in the final count of what you have cut. We pay 6 euros per stere. If any one doesn’t want there cut then you can have it. But of course you have to cut it.We normally use 22-25 steres per year. That is for a moderately large village house with wood powered central heating. We recently replaced our 50 year old boiler with a modern one and I can vouch for the fact that they do burn the wood more efficiently and economically. As our chimney sweep will confirm we are left with very little powdery ash. The fresh wood is bought down and left for 2 years to season. The 2year old wood is cut to length for the boiler and bought to the house. No time before moving to France did I ever imagine I would learn to be a treefella, or to own a tractor , trailer, tractor mounted splitter, chainsaws etc. Learnt that is why there are so many old tractors in France. The modern large tractors cannot get in amongst the trees. Mine is a 1964 Zetor.
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You do need to take into account the width of the chainsaw for each cut - but even with that the reduction seems extreme.
1cm at most surely - 2 cuts = 2% of the wood turned into sawdust, not 30%.
I give in have it your own way
You’ve tried this (cutting logs from 1m → 33cm) and it “works”, yes?
I mean, as I said before, with real logs, not cylinders I’m sure it does.
But 30%?
But… I order 3 brass, 12m… as 50cm… not 12 m uncut
i expect it to stack as 12m
you buy a 5kg bag of spuds, not 3 buckets full, or 2 saucepans when mashed?
Steak is 10oz before cooking…
it’s a 1940 law… about time it was revised?
Bob, it probably doesn’ though. You order the brass of wood (or 3 in your case ) and then it is your choice if it is cut or not. It is still the same amount of wood. I’ve watched my neighbour, all the wood is stacked on pallets in I presume 1m3 he then picks up and delivers as is or chops it as required and delivers that same amount. Is it smaller cut up? I don’t know I would never bother to check as it is clear to anyone driving past how it works. I would not expect him to chop my wood to 50cm (which he doesn’t charge me for) then grab a few logs off the neighbours pallet to make up the perfect stacked 1m3 - that makes no sense!!!
Tory du Bois 
Long ago, i bought wood as 1m lengths, stacked it as a line 1m tall, then run the chainsaw down the middle of the stack.the volume didn’t change, except for the 5
mm of the blade.
when you buy 1m3 of sand in a “big bag”. it may bulge, but it still has 1m3 when loaded?
maybe i should buy my wood at the local brico, they sell 1m3 pallet with sides. cut to 50cm
but at 70€, not 55€/m3
i’m still not happy to order 12m3 and get 10m45 for 690€… what ever way you cut it…
Maybe depends on the nature of the logs. Certainly the ones we buy are far from straight, so a couple of metre length logs laid on top of each other that bow in different directions have much more space between them than four cut half metre that can be packed down more efficiently bringing the concave/convex sides together.
My farmer has a trailer, he stacks the wood in the trailer.so irregularities will be compensated as he stacks
He delivers 3 trailer loads… that stack as 10m45
I need 12m3, or we’re freezing by end of February, that 1m55 takes us through into april.
it’s still a weights and measures issue?
The wood is mixed oak, hornbeam and chesnut
Good luck arguing this one with a supplier, it has always seemed to be somewhat approximate to me.
I think this topic must get a prize for most unexpected popular topic. Here we are more than 100 posts later.
The place I get my wood from is near the stables so I passed it today with renewed interest. I always wonder why they need razor wire round the place.
It’s a farming / natural products thing, as @j has tried to say. Natural products and at which point you can do what with them, don’t fit into neat sizes and containers. It’s a reflection of the rural life here in France, in a way.
Fake logs in supermarkets and diy stores, and pellets are available if you need everyrhing in fixed sizes and I’m sure many people have a use for them.
And we haven’t even started on the different ways to stack the wood!
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I am beginning to really appreciate this art - particularly having just dumped our latest batch of logs in our barn. Even my wife now spots well stacked logs when we are driving around.
Oh I just adore that!!! But surely in climates where it can pour from November until April without stopping (honestly it happened here a few years ago - it was miserable!) the wood would be soggy and unusable??
We are lucky we have a barn with old concrete cow feeding sections which are about 1.5m wide each so perfect for safely stacking up the wood in between each one. We have a slight over hang over the next section of our barn/house (will be a little gite one day!) nearish to the front door so I’m goign to try stacking some there this year and see if it stays dry enough, will certainly be a lot quicker and easier to get to - particularly now our 2nd big strong boy will only be home a couple of nights a week! I’ll get a pic when our wood man comes with the rest of our load (we told him not to as we’d not had time to stack the first brass!!
If you stack properly then no, it will be ok. And you can always put a hat on it! It is air circulation and orientation that is key to properly dried wood.
We no longer put wood in the barn because of wood boring insects deciding to make their home in our joists, rather than the cut wood…
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