I have a constant supply of wood and I am considering some kind of external wood burning stove that I can tie into the gas pack furnace.
Does anybody have this kind of system and is it worthwhile?
ANDYSZ2
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Replies
I am in the same boat as you. I have not installed it yet but will be before winter. The system I think I will be ordering the system from http://www.freeheatmachine.com/index.html. I like that they have everything included that you need. All of the other companies make you but all of the parts and pieces seperately. Good Luck.
chuck
Central Boiler in Minnesota makes a very good wood burning boiler. It has to be piped to a hot water coil in the duct on top of the furnace.
Is it worth it? Depends on if you're willing to cut and split enough wood every fall and go out and fill the boiler every day. The upfront cost is not small. Installation is not simple. However, with petroleum products increasing in cost, never to return to previous levels, a wise investment.
The Hardy brand stove is one I'm familiar with. There have been a few theads over the past couple of years about them. You can search if you dare. A summary of them is that :
They use alot of wood. But only need loaded about twice per day.
They are very smoky. They cycle from smoldering to full blaze as needed to maintain water temp.
They can provide unlimited hot water for showers, laundry, dishes, etc. faster than you can use it.
They use a little electricity for pumps and blowers to provide very cheap heat, either through the existing forced air ducts or hot water systems.
Did I mention they use a lot of wood? It can be green or dry, and can take large pieces, up to 24" and as big as you want to lift through the door.
Hope this answers a few questions. Let me know if you have any more.
Lefty - Lurker without an attitude or a clue
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maybe not what your looking for but seems interesting...
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Andy,
I have an Empyre stove and absolutely love it. I live in the nortern part of Michigans lower peninsula in an old (1920's) 5 bedroom house. We typically start a fire the latter part of October and burn well into May.
We use approx 25 face cords of good dry oak, it smokes very little, mainly when the draft blower kicks on, it is tied into my furnace with a heat exchanger and has another exchanger for the hot water. I have heated with wood for the last 30 years and have used all manners of stoves and furnaces, the outside stoves are far superior and give the most heat for the least ammount of wood. If you use good wood they don't smoke much, but the advertising most all manufacturers promote using any wood, garbage in, garbage out.
Alan
Bikeralan; You mention a face cord? How does that compare to a real cord of wood? Which is 4'x4'x8'.
That depends how long the wood is cut. A face cord is 4x8 but only face deep, so if cut 16" long, there are three face cords to a cord. Cut it 24" deep and you have two per cord
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Piffin; I know. I was trying to get an idea of the length of the wood he was using. Then I could get an idea of how many true cords of wood are used a year.I suppose he could have a 4' firebox and he actually is using 25 cords. But I doubt it.
Most I ever used in one year was ten cords - and that was a big old cold heat sucking house
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In our neck of the woods a face cord is 4foot high by 8feet long and approx 16" in length, last year I used 25 face cords.
Alan
FWIW, 5300 sq ft to about 73F, PNW (5500 deg days), R-13 wall, DI glass, R-19 roof, about 13 (128 cu ft) cords in worst year (1984?). Same house with HP, yearly heat bill typically $400. DW got tired of cutting/splitting/loading when she passed 60<G>.
Junkhound; What is "HP", and "DW". Are you saying the same house took 12 cords of woodto heat . Only $400 of oil now heats it?
Bikeralan; Sounds quite cheap . Less than 10 cord of wood for the year. Good deal!
DW is 'dear wife' or diminutive wife' or?
Never have heated with oil -- HP is heat pump, air to air in this case, $400 is at 7.5 cents per kW-hr, at 2.5 COP (coefficient of performance) at upper 30's F normally here, that is 7.5 cents for 3413 BTUs or $2.19 equivalent gallon of oil, so yeah, it was equivelent to $400 oil when oil was $2.19. Oil is around 100,000 BTU/gal after 80% eff furnace. Elec bill that year would likely have been closer to $800 than $400 (was only time it ever got below 15F in the last 40 year, Seattle area)
A caveat on that much wood - The last 5 or 6 cords that year was probably somewhat wet, as a normal year was only 7-8 cords; plus, a lot of it was trash/punk wood that I'd normally just plow under or let rot, say 6 Million BTU cord for the last 6 cords, 13 MBTU/cord for the first 7, so input was 127 MBTU of wood. 2(worst year factor) X 182 gal of oil is just 46 MBTU. Wood effectively free, chopping wood as exercise vs jogging<G>, but can see wood heat for my setup was only in the 30% overall efficient region when wet wood involved. In a good dry wood burn year efficiency measured about 50%.
J;
Gotcha;
Your electricity is half the price of ours in Maine. I too have considered getting an outside boiler. I have heated with wood for 30 years. Just a couple years ago I bought a Toyo kerosene stove direct vent. It compliments the wood and helps during times when the temps are in negative numbers. Primarily bought it to use when I am not around for a couple days or so. An outdoor boiler makes alot of sense if you own a good hardwood lot, . Around here tree length maple, ash etc. is going for 70-90 dollars a cord. Three years ago it was $50. I have heard that a cord of dry hardwood, cut, split and delivered was over $200. I always take care of my own wood, 5-6 cords a year. At $200+ the oil would not look to bad.