Just filled the Optimizer again for the coldest night this year. Filled it at 8 pm Sat. night and it went until 4 pm Sunday afternoon with temps in the low teens and some wind. House is at 72.
20 hr burn
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if you can really get 20hr burns out of it, it would be a cord every 8.333 days, lol. So, there! seriously. I agree that's a lot of wood.cptoneleg said:
To the OP, do you have a reallly reallly big house?
C'Mon you are telling me you have a stove that burns for 20 hours? Why doesn't everyone on this planet have an Optimizer?
lol, i just figured it out. He turned it down to a low smolder and turned the gas furnace up. BAM: 20hr burn, house at 72. DUN.
so with a firebox that is 11 cubic feet he should be getting well over 48 hours on a load, right?rdust said:
*** BEGIN RANT ***
Hmmmm.... seems you guys don't have a clue about how good outdoor boilers are when they are properly installed and operated. Mine heats my 1525 square foot home to an even and comfortable 72 degrees plus the full basement plus heating all my domestic hot water. At the peak of winter with outside temperatures running from a low of around 0 and highs around 20 degrees I only load the furnace once a day. I only load the firebox at most 1/2 full and let it burn down, that allows generous space for the smoke to more fully burn and heat the water jacket. My worst case wood usage so far has been about 1 cord a month during the coldest weather. When outside temperatures are above 40 degrees I usually only put 4 to 6 splits in the furnace in a 24 hours period, that handles taking the chill off in the morning and heating the domestic hot water for the day. I do not burn "logs", only the best CSS seasoned hardwood I can get my hands on, although it is really nice to have the option to fall back on less than desirable wood in the event I run out of the good stuff and still be able to heat my home without ever using the electric furnace. Yes, there is some smoke but it is kept to a minimum by using properly seasoned wood and burning it correctly. Once the fire is going good the smoke is almost nonexistent and no, it's not an epa furnace.
Since I have farm animals that require daily feeding and watering I am out at the barn everyday anyway and loading the furnace only adds 5 or 10 minutes to my daily chores. It is wonderful to have my full years worth of wood stacked only 15 feet from the furnace and not have to continually carry wood into the house all winter long. I do not have to deal with smoke in the house, or bugs or ash clean out mess or power post beetle mess or bark and wood chips in the house. All the mess stays outside and all the wood is near at hand when loading without having to be constantly moving wood all winter long.
I have had a baby to raise in the past and had the constant day and night feedings and cleanup. I am done with that and don't care to have to "baby" a wood heating appliance. My setup allows one feeding a day that is a small part of my regular farm chores and clean up is only a weekly occurrence of no more than 30 minutes at the most. I never come home to a cold house and never wake up to a cold house in the morning. Other than the furnace and wood pile out by the barn you can't tell the difference in the house between running the electric furnace and heating with wood, the central heating system runs exactly the same except for the source of the heat. In mine and my wife's opinions, it doesn't get any better than that!
I know this type of set up is not practical for everyone because of space limits, close neighbors and government controls, but it is ideal for my situation and needs. It is a very valid means of becoming much more self sufficient and vastly reducing use of fossil fuels. Over the past year I have reduced my electricity usage by 52% and expect it to be even lower this year now that I know how to run the system efficiently. I believe that 5 to 6 cords of wood is a very reasonable usage to keep the house at a constant 72 degrees 24/7 and heating all domestic hot water.
*** END RANT ***
*** BEGIN FLAMING ***
Hmmmm.... seems you guys don't have a clue about how good outdoor boilers are when they are properly installed and operated. Mine heats my 1525 square foot home to an even and comfortable 72 degrees plus the full basement plus heating all my domestic hot water. At the peak of winter with outside temperatures running from a low of around 0 and highs around 20 degrees I only load the furnace once a day. I only load the firebox at most 1/2 full and let it burn down, that allows generous space for the smoke to more fully burn and heat the water jacket. My worst case wood usage so far has been about 1 cord a month during the coldest weather. When outside temperatures are above 40 degrees I usually only put 4 to 6 splits in the furnace in a 24 hours period, that handles taking the chill off in the morning and heating the domestic hot water for the day. I do not burn "logs", only the best CSS seasoned hardwood I can get my hands on, although it is really nice to have the option to fall back on less than desirable wood in the event I run out of the good stuff and still be able to heat my home without ever using the electric furnace. Yes, there is some smoke but it is kept to a minimum by using properly seasoned wood and burning it correctly. Once the fire is going good the smoke is almost nonexistent and no, it's not an epa furnace.
Since I have farm animals that require daily feeding and watering I am out at the barn everyday anyway and loading the furnace only adds 5 or 10 minutes to my daily chores. It is wonderful to have my full years worth of wood stacked only 15 feet from the furnace and not have to continually carry wood into the house all winter long. I do not have to deal with smoke in the house, or bugs or ash clean out mess or power post beetle mess or bark and wood chips in the house. All the mess stays outside and all the wood is near at hand when loading without having to be constantly moving wood all winter long.
I have had a baby to raise in the past and had the constant day and night feedings and cleanup. I am done with that and don't care to have to "baby" a wood heating appliance. My setup allows one feeding a day that is a small part of my regular farm chores and clean up is only a weekly occurrence of no more than 30 minutes at the most. I never come home to a cold house and never wake up to a cold house in the morning. Other than the furnace and wood pile out by the barn you can't tell the difference in the house between running the electric furnace and heating with wood, the central heating system runs exactly the same except for the source of the heat. In mine and my wife's opinions, it doesn't get any better than that!
I know this type of set up is not practical for everyone because of space limits, close neighbors and government controls, but it is ideal for my situation and needs. It is a very valid means of becoming much more self sufficient and vastly reducing use of fossil fuels. Over the past year I have reduced my electricity usage by 52% and expect it to be even lower this year now that I know how to run the system efficiently. I believe that 5 to 6 cords of wood is a very reasonable usage to keep the house at a constant 72 degrees 24/7 and heating all domestic hot water.
*** END RANT ***
*** BEGIN FLAMING ***
i may not know a LOT about OWBs...But what I do know is Math. if you have an 11 cubic foot box and you are getting 20hours off of that, then you are burning a full cord every 232 hours (or 9.7 days). I don't care what you say, but that is a lot of wood.
If the original poster would come back and clarify that he is only filling it 1/3 full, then he'd be right in line with a cord a month. I'd be surprised if that was the case.
If the original poster would come back and clarify that he is only filling it 1/3 full, then he'd be right in line with a cord a month. I'd be surprised if that was the case.
Danno77 said:
"I don't care what you say....." There in lies the problem. Too many people are stuck on their "great" little stoves to see that there are many ways to burn wood to heat your home. Each system has its pros and cons and are only suitable for certain situations and people. You admit you don't know a lot about OWBs yet you are quick to jump to conclusions based on your assumptions. Instead of piling on the OP it would be much more civilized and educational for all if you were to ask him some specifics and maybe offer some suggestions on how he could improve his burning experience. I for one am having great success with my OWB without burning a huge amount of wood because I took the time to read this and other forums to learn how to use it properly. If you think my 5 to 6 cords is a lot, keep in mind that I am heating 24/7 at a consistent 72 degrees and I am heating all my DHW as well. If you take the DHW out of the equation I am using about 3.5 to 4 cords to heat the house. I believe that is very much in line with heating a house like mine to a consistent 72 degrees 24/7 with an in-house wood stove. In addition to that I don't have the mess or the work moving the wood so much and I only load once a day.
With that said, the primary focus of all here is to heat our homes with renewable fuel at as little expense and hassle as is practical. As I see it, the purpose of this forum is to help each other accomplish that goal with as little difficulty as possible. Deriding a person's chosen method helps nobody and only serves to exclude others instead of helping them and learning from them.
there are lots of ways to heat with wood. agreed. that being said I imagine that most people would say there are efficient and inefficient ways of doing it. I'm still trying to figure out if his is a very efficient way of doing it. If he says that he is heating a 1500sq ft home (kinda like yours) and he is burning 20 cords a winter to do it, then I'd say he's going about it wrong. If he says he's heating 4000sqft and going through 15 cords, then I might be more inclined to be impressed by the 20hr burn.
I certainly don't think your numbers are out of line. Your system seems to be working well.
I certainly don't think your numbers are out of line. Your system seems to be working well.
Raptor said:
I Think you are miss reading here alot.....Everyone would like to have the facts. Even Your numbers seem very low compare to any other owb. I have never heard numbers this low. I been running 12 cords a year for over 4 years. To me I could careless if it took even more. OP left a simple statement now its just a bunch of guess work.
Improve what we all want to know what he is doing and even yourself. 6 cords a year I could find scraps off my mill to handle that.
Damn! This new server seems to be mistranslating or sumpin . . .
The OP said - I think - something about the coldest temps being in the teens . . . F or C? Pos or Neg?
Cause if it was in the Pos F teens at your place last night, that explains alot. And if that was C . . .
Those of us who burn in wood-fired hydronics tend to look down on 20 hour burns . . . that's a lot of wasted fuel.
And, um, we don't flame here. We leave that to our appliances and GF's :smirk:
The OP said - I think - something about the coldest temps being in the teens . . . F or C? Pos or Neg?
Cause if it was in the Pos F teens at your place last night, that explains alot. And if that was C . . .
Those of us who burn in wood-fired hydronics tend to look down on 20 hour burns . . . that's a lot of wasted fuel.
And, um, we don't flame here. We leave that to our appliances and GF's :smirk:
That is still an interesting design for a gasifier. I like the extra heat exchangers set up to extract more heat. The flat bed for the wood is kind of confusing as it allows coaling of the wood in an area that is not in direct association with the gasification air flow (perhaps a carry over of standard OWB construction?). The size of the tamarack logs is something that I don't usually see in gasification fire boxes either. Eventhough the sales rep says "seasoned" tamarack he doesn't really say that "well seasoned wood should only be used with this boiler" as most gasifiers recommend.
The propietary gasification air flow is not that new but nothig is said of primary ignition either. Since no mention is made of storage I would be inclined to think this boiler is carrying enough water in its jacket to supply a small amount of storage (150-200 gal?) but the over all design says semi-idler!? The firebox on my EKO40 would go several days on the capacity of that fire box. Very iteresting post coolidge thanks for sharing.
The propietary gasification air flow is not that new but nothig is said of primary ignition either. Since no mention is made of storage I would be inclined to think this boiler is carrying enough water in its jacket to supply a small amount of storage (150-200 gal?) but the over all design says semi-idler!? The firebox on my EKO40 would go several days on the capacity of that fire box. Very iteresting post coolidge thanks for sharing.
Hmmm, well having designed and installed several 'classic' starved-air type OWB hydronic systems that I also used myself for several years, there are just way too many variables to consider in the "I get so and so many hours per firebox load of wood." In many cases they are just not comparable as there are so many factors that are highly varied. These include type and dryness of the wood species being burned, the size and insulation of the house or space being heated, the size of the boiler system used, the water and/or other space heating appliances also in the heating loop, the amount of water in the boiler system, the average and extreme temperatures in the area that you live in, etc., etc. I know people that installed CB systems that complained that they could never fill them enough to keep the house warm. Upon investigation they had heated greenhouses in places like Ontario, Canada growing flowers in January, or pools heated in winter to keep the wife happy.
After several months of using my last starved-air type of OWB, I figured out that it was more efficient to load it more often with less wood. This is becasue if you cook more wood in a classic OWB starved-air system it will just turn to charcoal and the wood gasses will waft off before it is burned. Load/hold times also depended greatly on hot water use (there wss a 50 gallon hot water heater in the loop) and outside temperatures. That system mainly heated a hydronic floor loop in a 2200 sq. ft. house with a ton of windows and skylights in a cooler region of central Oregon. Firewood species had a big effect on burn time. Seasoned madrone or oak typically lasted 12-16 hours with 40 degree highs and 30 degree lows. Grand fir, willow and cottonwood lasted at most 8 hours, no matter what the temerature. Overall most types of wood with average temperatures lasted about 12 hours, and we typically loaded the box half full once in the morning and once at night. If temps dipped into the low teens, firewood use went up and we would have to add more wood in the wee hours of the morning. Also if we did a lot of laundry and took showers, wood use increased and hold times dropped. We typically burned 10 cords or mixed species a year (mostly madrone, CA black and OR white oak, red alder, doug fir, grand fir, and apple). Many variables to consider wiyth many different results.
After several months of using my last starved-air type of OWB, I figured out that it was more efficient to load it more often with less wood. This is becasue if you cook more wood in a classic OWB starved-air system it will just turn to charcoal and the wood gasses will waft off before it is burned. Load/hold times also depended greatly on hot water use (there wss a 50 gallon hot water heater in the loop) and outside temperatures. That system mainly heated a hydronic floor loop in a 2200 sq. ft. house with a ton of windows and skylights in a cooler region of central Oregon. Firewood species had a big effect on burn time. Seasoned madrone or oak typically lasted 12-16 hours with 40 degree highs and 30 degree lows. Grand fir, willow and cottonwood lasted at most 8 hours, no matter what the temerature. Overall most types of wood with average temperatures lasted about 12 hours, and we typically loaded the box half full once in the morning and once at night. If temps dipped into the low teens, firewood use went up and we would have to add more wood in the wee hours of the morning. Also if we did a lot of laundry and took showers, wood use increased and hold times dropped. We typically burned 10 cords or mixed species a year (mostly madrone, CA black and OR white oak, red alder, doug fir, grand fir, and apple). Many variables to consider wiyth many different results.
Sorry for the delay, had too work. The house is 3300 sq ft this includes the basement, i store stuff from freezing down there. Then there is the woodshead that is insulated and heated with the summer kitchen above it totaling 480 sq ft. So all in all almost 3800 sq ft. House is pretty well insulated with 4"(R28) closed cell foam in walls and 7"(R49) closed cell foam in attic.Basement walls have roughly 2.5"(R 17) closed cell foam. All windows have been replaced with Anderson 400 series. Main floor is all radiant, basement is baseboard hung around the perimiter and upstairs is all baseboard.
Wood boiler is the Portage and Main Optimizer 250 gasification, hold 240s gallons of water no other storage anywhere. YET
Wood is 3 years seasoned oak, beech, rock maple, locust. Cut to 22"
NO other source of heat.
Temps were 10 to 14 degrees F at time of 20 hr burn -11F at 830 last night at feeding time, with -15 at 5 am boiler was still about quarter full.
Loading schedule is between 7 and 830 pm full fire box 6 to 630 am fill the box half full for the day. Keeping in mind the length of the wood (22") i am only putting maybe 8 cubic feet in there at fill up and roughly 4 cubic feet in the morning.
Last year the old MB55 took at least four full fireboxes a day which did add up too about a cord a week(too much for me) and it wouldnt heat this shack for nothin, so my estimates are last year 13 FULL cord, this year i am hoping for 6 with a average house temp of 68 to 72.
Wood boiler is the Portage and Main Optimizer 250 gasification, hold 240s gallons of water no other storage anywhere. YET
Wood is 3 years seasoned oak, beech, rock maple, locust. Cut to 22"
NO other source of heat.
Temps were 10 to 14 degrees F at time of 20 hr burn -11F at 830 last night at feeding time, with -15 at 5 am boiler was still about quarter full.
Loading schedule is between 7 and 830 pm full fire box 6 to 630 am fill the box half full for the day. Keeping in mind the length of the wood (22") i am only putting maybe 8 cubic feet in there at fill up and roughly 4 cubic feet in the morning.
Last year the old MB55 took at least four full fireboxes a day which did add up too about a cord a week(too much for me) and it wouldnt heat this shack for nothin, so my estimates are last year 13 FULL cord, this year i am hoping for 6 with a average house temp of 68 to 72.
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