# Earth Mountain man outdoor boiler



## bhd21478 (Oct 21, 2013)

I getting ready to have my outdoor wood boiler installed here  in sw missouri. I plan on burning seasoned oak,hickory,and walnut. I know alot of people burn green wet wood in these things. Im an experienced wood burner that also has a jotul 450 insert. Im familar with what dry wood is. My question is if I burned seasoned wood in my outdoor boiler, will it smoke less. IM also going to be building a small building next to the outdoor boiler to keep the wood protected from the elements. I hear complaints about to much smoke and know people but really green wet wood in them. Of course its going to smoke. I would of loved to have got a gassification model but just was too expensive. My main question is will I cut back on the smoke withy dryer seasoned wood. thanks


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## maple1 (Oct 21, 2013)

Generally speaking - it should.


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## hobbyheater (Oct 21, 2013)

Burning dry wood will save some labor if in splitting  to season your wood, how much labor is a question mark.  If you are going to burn just green unsplit rounds, how much wood you will burn who knows?
If your boiler is going to have a sufficient load that it does not idle most of the time, dry wood will have many benefits - less smoke and lower wood consumption.
Any smoke at all coming out of the chimney and you are losing to the atmosphere at least 60% of the available heat that a lb of wood can  produce.
When a boiler goes into idle or smolder mode, the unburnt tars stick  to the relatively cold walls of the water jacket that surrounds the firebox.  When the fire reignites, it produces large amounts of white smoke for two reasons; one the fire is a very cool type of fire initially  and secondly as it gets hotter, it starts to burn the tars that are sticking to the water jacket walls of the firebox.  In most cases the fire goes back into idle mode long before the tars are burnt. When this happens, the boiler goes back into idle mode and continues to cycle.  With each succeeding cycle the white smoke continues with each of these cycles.

I have had a indoor boiler that functioned much in this way and it would burn up to 22 cords per year. Our primitive gasification boiler with heat storage burns 4 1/2 cords per year carrying the same load.
I'm letting my imagination run a little wild here. If with an outdoor boiler most people sooner or later give up on the large amount of labor required to stay ahead with dry wood and switch  to green and if possible unsplit wood.

The file below explains the difference consumptions for burning wet verse dry wood.


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## bhd21478 (Oct 21, 2013)

hobbyheater said:


> Burning dry wood will save some labor if in splitting  to season your wood, how much labor is a question mark.  If you are going to burn just green unsplit rounds, how much wood you will burn who knows?
> If your boiler is going to have a sufficient load that it does not idle most of the time, dry wood will have many benefits - less smoke and lower wood consumption.
> Any smoke at all coming out of the chimney and you are losing to the atmosphere at least 60% of the available heat that a lb of wood can  produce.
> When a boiler goes into idle or smolder mode, the unburnt tars stick  to the relatively cold walls of the water jacket that surrounds the firebox.  When the fire reignites, it produces large amounts of white smoke for two reasons; one the fire is a very cool type of fire initially  and secondly as it gets hotter, it starts to burn the tars that are sticking to the water jacket walls of the firebox.  In most cases the fire goes back into idle mode long before the tars are burnt. When this happens, the boiler goes back into idle mode and continues to cycle.  With each succeeding cycle the white smoke continues with each of these cycles.
> ...


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## bhd21478 (Oct 21, 2013)

I think the gassifciation method is great and works. I also think that the outdoor wood boiler designs are not as spot on with the indoor boiler designs. I have talked to empyre boiler,central boiler and earth about gassification. The only one that advised was the empyre dealer. I just couldnt justify the extra 3 to 4 grand that it costs, otherwise I would of put one in. Our setup will provide heat to 3 different hvac units. Its a 3800 sq ft house well insulated but has been added on twice, thats why the hvac units are split up. thanks the informaton


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## heaterman (Oct 21, 2013)

hobbyheater said:


> There is Portage & Main Optimizer 250 locally . The home that it supplies has half the heat load of ours, it burns twice the amount of wood that we do , and it is just a smoking tar ball .
> Unless your boiler has near to a continuous load ,white smoke is going to be a concern if you have neighbors close by .
> 
> This boilers combustion cycles are so short that it cannot achieve gasification temperatures consistently enough to be able to burn clean .



As always, burn time/storage is the key to clean operation. Most OWB's are run without storage so best advice is to not oversize the boiler.


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## bhd21478 (Oct 21, 2013)

I live on 25 acres in the middle of nowhwere. I have neighbors maybe 1 mile away on one side, and one half mile away on the other side.


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## hobbyheater (Oct 21, 2013)

bhd21478 said:


> I live on 25 acres in the middle of nowhwere. I have neighbors maybe 1 mile away on one side, and one half mile away on the other side.



You have good place to experiment . Pick a time when your heat load is going to be fairly even , measure out two similar stacks of wood in volume ( three or four days worth) , one dry and the other green . See how long each stack lasts and also watch the smoke for color and volume . This little experiment should give you the answer.

Myself and many others on this forum have been where you are now ,  personal experience is a very good , but sometimes an expensive teacher .

The boiler pictured below is  like our first boiler  much like a outdoor unit ,less insulation and the metal roof.


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## sjfrench (Oct 21, 2013)

I'm also in SW Missouri. I'm in the middle of a Garn install - for some of the very reasons you mention. My dad had an OWB. He loaded frequently with seasoned wood and it still smoked a lot.

If you want to get an up close and personal look at a Garn - just PM and I'll let you come by for a look.


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## bhd21478 (Oct 22, 2013)

sjfrench said:


> I'm also in SW Missouri. I'm in the middle of a Garn install - for some of the very reasons you mention. My dad had an OWB. He loaded frequently with seasoned wood and it still smoked a lot.
> 
> If you want to get an up close and personal look at a Garn - just PM and I'll let you come by for a look.


 
Sounds great. Ive heard garn is a great setup. Garn builds their water storage around the boiler as well,correct. I would not be scared about placing a boiler in my basement provided I had an adequate setup. My basement is tiny with little room, so It just wouldnt work. Part of our problem is also the budget. When you take 3000 dollars in materials plus 2000 in labor that affects how much to spend on the water stove. I wanted to go with a central boiler setup. that was going to be 3000 dollars more than I could spend. So I came across Earth. They are local here in Mo. Seems to have great reviews. The stove should be in a good location for taking smoke away from the house and its 60 ft down from the house as we live on a hill. Im crossing my fingers that everything works well.


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## arbutus (Oct 22, 2013)

Do you have good underground insulated pipe figured in to the cost? Logstor/Logstar?, Thermopex, or a DIY pex and spray foam in a trench are common, and having seen the results of foam wrapped pex in a corrugated drain tile, I can only recommend spending good money on this part.


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## bhd21478 (Oct 22, 2013)

bhd21478 said:


> Sounds great. Ive heard garn is a great setup. Garn builds their water storage around the boiler as well,correct. I would not be scared about placing a boiler in my basement provided I had an adequate setup. My basement is tiny with little room, so It just wouldnt work. Part of our problem is also the budget. When you take 3000 dollars in materials plus 2000 in labor that affects how much to spend on the water stove. I wanted to go with a central boiler setup. that was going to be 3000 dollars more than I could spend. So I came across Earth. They are local here in Mo. Seems to have great reviews. The stove should be in a good location for taking smoke away from the house and its 60 ft down from the house as we live on a hill. Im crossing my fingers that everything works well.


 
Im going to use thermopex which about 60 ft to the house.


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## sjfrench (Oct 22, 2013)

A Central Boiler rep came to the house and estimated from $20-25k (install and E1400).  A local guy sells the Earth stoves - just about 5 miles from my house.  I went and took a look.  Decided to go with the Garn and do the install myself.  You are correct in that you couldn't put a Garn in a house basement.  Not sure about the new Garn Jr., maybe it would fit.  I ended up putting up an outdoor building (12x18) to house the Garn.  The Earth will probably be a fine system for you and I totally understand your decision.  I just was swayed to Garn over a couple of issues:  less wood and more heat.  I totally understand the Garn price issue.  For me, the Garn was a 30 year commitment to saving time and money.  On the money side, I just didn't see the other OWB's lasting over 30 years (my opinion).   In terms of time, the Garn seemed like it would burn less wood than the OWBs.  I'm fine with the work of cutting and splitting wood, however, I don't fancy it as much as some guys on this site.  Almost seems like some guys treat wood cutting like some sort of fun hobby.  I'd rather fish, hunt and hang with my family.  For me, wood is money and time, not pleasure.  The Garn saved me on both.

Again, I'm not a Garn salesman and I bet that Earth unit will be great.  If you want to come take a look, let me know.  I'm running the pex this week.  Bring your workgloves .


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## BoilerMan (Oct 22, 2013)

Man, I wish there were Garns and other setups close to me just for funzies!  No one around here has gasses other than Greenwoods.

TS


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## bhd21478 (Dec 30, 2013)

Hey everyone. I just wanted to post a reply to how my outdoor wood boiler setup is going. I have the earth mountain man outdoor wood boiler running for around ten days now. I really like it so far. I load it twice a day. It does use alot of wood. I have burned maybe one half cord in ten days. I do like the heat as it its been very even and even on the cold 9 degree night we have had has no problem staying warm. I know this isnt the most popular site for outdoor boilers because of their wood consumption but I really like my setup.


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