Comparing heating sources

[Tim Crowley]

Last year, we spent $9,000 heating our farmhouse with oil.  In the spring I installed a CB eclassic 2300.  I purchased 22 cords of wood (10, split and delivered, and 12 in log length which we blocked, split, and stacked).  IF (and I'm confident it won't happen) we were to burn every stick of that 22 cords, the total cost for heat THIS winter will be $3,000.  What I suspect will happen is, we'll burn about 11 cords or $1,500 worth of wood.  Now, of course, there is the cost of the boiler, however, two things I'm confident about:  we're WARM using the OWB, and the cost of the boiler will be covered in MAX three years, if not two.  We're just loving it.  Learning curve has been steep, but I'm paying more attention to my heating system and therefore know more about it than I ever had before.  Suffice to say, however, it has been this very forum that has made this transition possible.   Tim

[woodmills1]

and don't ya just love it out there on a clear night staring at Orion or marveling over the lighting power of a half moon............and we are warm

[moonhill]

Are those typical cordage number for OWBs?  How much of this depends on the size of and age of the house?

If you are using that much wood is you house new or old, large or small? 

Tim

[Tim Crowley]

Tim, my house is approx. 6000 sq. feet, built in 1860, three floors, stone wall basement under half the house and crawl space under half.  Insulation is good on half (renovated completely in 1990) and very poorly insulated on the other half.  The new half is baseboard. The old half is hot air.  The OWB covers both systems and the domestic hot water.  I'm in Vermont.  It's been a relatively mild winter thus far with temps. tonight dipping from 28 to 18.  Tomorrow night = 1!  We've hovered around zero a few times this year, but we've yet to have our annual 10-20 below zero, two-week cold snap.  Anyway, I'm figgerin' about 11-12 cords this winter.  I could be wrong.  Could be 13.  If so, total cost: about 1,800 dollars.  Last winter I burned 1,800 GALLONS of oil at over $4.00/gallon.  This year I would have burned 1,800 gallons at $2.75 +.  The constant, of course, tends to be the number of gallons.  The wildcard is the price. 
Tim

[woodmills1]

my house is a series of additions built behind the 4 room colonial from 1830's.

no insulation in the colonial rock basement, next is the kitchen, basically on dirt, with 2 rooms above with little or no insulation, third is a 40 foot living room with 3 rooms above, wall and ceiling insulated, floor over crawl space the rodents pulled all insulation down, last is the studio 20 by 30 on unisulated slab with wall and ceiling insulation

4300 sg ft total

hot air furnace is under the front room of the colonial, duct runs 25 feet across front then some 65 feet out under the kitchen and living room, no insulation on any of the duct work.


spent $3200 5 winters ago to be chilly and burned 7 cord in 2 stoves to keep from shivering constantly

I figure on using around 30 cord about 60% pine and poplar,  10% hardwood slabs, rest good partially seasoned hardwood

I could probably cut that in half using 38 inch long round hardwood 10 inch dia and under, but the stove helps me dispose of stuff I can't make any other money on.

[rpote]

Tim, my house is approx. 6000 sq. feet, built in 1860, three floors, stone wall basement under half the house and crawl space under half.  Insulation is good on half (renovated completely in 1990) and very poorly insulated on the other half.  The new half is baseboard. The old half is hot air.  The OWB covers both systems and the domestic hot water.  I'm in Vermont.  It's been a relatively mild winter thus far with temps. tonight dipping from 28 to 18.  Tomorrow night = 1!  We've hovered around zero a few times this year, but we've yet to have our annual 10-20 below zero, two-week cold snap.  Anyway, I'm figgerin' about 11-12 cords this winter.  I could be wrong.  Could be 13.  If so, total cost: about 1,800 dollars.  Last winter I burned 1,800 GALLONS of oil at over $4.00/gallon.  This year I would have burned 1,800 gallons at $2.75 +.  The constant, of course, tends to be the number of gallons.  The wildcard is the price. 
Tim

Tim, my house in Ticonderoga is about same configuration (the guy who had it built was the engineer on the Champlain Bridge they demoed yesterday!) and I averaged about 1800 gallons per year as well. Last year we were about 10 full cord but this year I redid the piping with ThermoPEX and we're keeping the EC2300 a little lower at 183. Two water/water heat exchangers - first to the water recirc on the oil boiler (50 plate heatex) and then discharge water from heatex goes to second 35 plate unit to heat domestic hot water - we have "abundant" hot water for showers, etc. and it's HOT. We're looking at probably around 8-9 cord this winter, maybe less - no more than $1700 per year for heat. It seems to be lots more efficient and we're only filling once per day or every 18 hours if colder. Although with cold snaps we see increase. I had my oil tank filed last week as backup - 140 gallon at 2.65 - ouch! I hate even paying that much for anything other then wood. PS - do you have the dual fuel? I had propane tank filled also this week and it cost me about $230 to top it off. Nice for restarting boiler and to give it a kick start raising temp quickly and avoiding slow startup from cold start. Course, we save a lot on propane when we just stay on wood but I take it down about once/month for a good cleaning and that seems to do the trick to get it back up to temp quickly. javascript:void(0); Keep us informed on your unit - glad we've taken a combined 3600 gallons of oil out of "circulation".

[tughill]

Wow...I didn't realize you guys all lived in huge mansions ...my house is about 800 sq. ft. well insulated, and I have electric baseboard and a small old iron woodstove in the cellar.  I use the woodstove to keep the electric bill down...it got up to about 80$ a month a couple times when I ran out of wood a couple years ago.  I cannot imagine trying to heat a 6000 sq. ft. house in vermont...I guess it's probably a bit colder up here, and I live on top of the hill so wind is a huge factor in sweeping away the heat in winter.

Next question is what actual temp. do you keep the house...I like mine about 64F...much hotter and I sweat like crazy coming in from outside, especially when it's below zero, then I feel cold.

[moonhill]

That was my impression, large old houses.  I have heard the back rooms were closed off in the winter and not used.  The back rooms served as a break from the cold though.  They condensed into activity into the front rooms.  My mom recalls when she was young having snow on their blanket in the morning, the kids slept in the attic. 

We are adding on to our house and will have a sprawl to heat.  We will have up to 4 wood stoves in different parts.  I expect our wood usage will increase.  We now use maybe two cord of cut and split, if that, for the winter, about 1600 sq' .  It is hard to put an exact number on it as we burn wood year round for domestic hot water in a small indoor wood boiler, lots of soft wood slab, gathered when needed.

It will be back to 0ish° in the morning here. 

Tim   

[T Red]

www.eia.doe.gov/neic/experts/heatcalc.xls

Here is an interesting spreadsheet I run across.  You will need to enter your local fuel costs and the efficiency of your hvac unit or one you would like to use. 

[Dean186]

Thanks for spreadsheet link Tim.  It will prove to be most useful.  Dean

[woodmills1]

The way my house was built, ( I didn't build it), no rooms can be shut off.  The outdoor free heat machine early non EPA, is a true free heat machine, a godsend from writing checks.  It works, we are toasty, around 70 in front and 66 to 68 in back.  Did I say I go outside often.