Laying in bed listening to my bank account go empty.

[DavidV]

I have my thermostat set on 62 at night and set to bring the place back up to 67 at 5 am if it should fall below that. I awoke at 530 to the sound of air being pushed thru the ductwork. I came down and reloaded the stove. It was dead. after sifting the ashes I had enough coals to get it fired back up but it certainly took a while. It's slowly climbing back up to operating temps now. Yesterday morning it was 24 degrees outside and the fire held us till about 6 am. right now it's 20 degrees and the fire didn't make it thru the night. I wish my fancy thermometer could give me some statistics of temps during the night. it would be even better if the thermostat could do that, then I'd know when I was spending money on gas.
Correction.....just looked at the outside thermometeer. 15 degrees.

 

[BrotherBart]

Yep same here this morning. I was so absolutely whipped last night that I just had to hit the bed around seven o'clock so I put in some wood and got a level burn going with the blower on high. Let the one in the basement burn on down. It was around 73 upstairs since I had been burning all day. Woke up at four to the blower off and a pretty much cold stove. Just a few small coals left, 17 outside and 64 inside up stairs and 51 in the basement office. The house is coming back up through 69 and the office is back up to sixty five.

Cold night. In fact it is still 17 now at 7:30.

 

[elkimmeg]

I think many are unrealistic to think area heaters/ wood/pellet stoves are whole hous sollutions. This is How I go about it. My main central FHW heating system has set theromstat temps. I do a pretty good job feeding and regulating the stove, so that my furnace does not come on. Days like yesterday, extremely windy and cold, are the worst. Wind causes positive and negative pressures around your home. On the negative side, it drags heat out. possitive side it pushes cold in. All windows and doors a compromise our walls. They all leak to some extent
and we open them for passage. Last night My final load up included a very dry large chunk of maple. I knew it fit in a way it created space and I knew it probably would not burn the night.
I lost 4 degrees, because at 11:00 ,I was too lazy to go back out to the wood pile and get some oak ( 15 degrees bitting wind might have made me bit more lazy)
At what percentage are we happy with supplemental heat? Me I think I probably do 60 to 80%. Really I do not know. I have had wood stoves since day one when I built this place
I could have gotten up in the night and feed it.

What is a productive heat range, not burn time? To me when I want heat, it is the temp range between 450 and 650 (stove top griddle location). I have gotten 8 hours of productive heat out of the encore and 5 to 6 out of the Intrepid II but the intrepid II falls of rather quickly after that, small fire box and and less metal for storage of heat

Point being do not frett an occasional burner firing you are still doing the job with your stove

 

[wahoowad]

Up in here in Charlottesville I managed a little better, although my temps are struggling to keep up too. I was able to reload at 1 AM so had nice coals when I awoke at 6:30 AM. My family room was still 66 degrees, which is surprising since the woodstove ran all night. My heatpump keeps cycling. Whatever, I do what I can.

14 degrees this morning, coffee is made and my family room is up to 72. It's a-nice. Unfortunately the rest of the house is not benefiting from the excess stove heat that much whenit is this cold (I have poor ceiling structure to facilitate good room-to-room flow).

Maybe those gum logs will pslit easier today.

 

[laynes69]

It was down in the teens here last night. I loaded the wood furnace at 9:30 and went to bed. Woke up at 5:30 and the house was 70 the LP furnace is set at 68, so I loaded a few pieces of wood on the hot coals that were left over and went to bed. Woke up at 7:30 this morning and the house is 75 degrees. Our LP furnace hasn't ran this year, and if I dont want to use any propane, I have to wake up in the middle of the night and re stoke the furnace. Sometimes its hard to heat 100% when the temps fall around 0 or below, but here we do pretty good with the wood. We have a 500 gallon tank, which 400 is full and we used 30% from last november to this november. We have a gas furnace a gas stove and a gas dryer. Thank god for wood. I've debated on putting in a hot water loop in my wood furnace, because the water heater is right behind the wood furnace so I could set it up to thermosiphon. Thats my biggest cost.

 

[precaud]

I think many are unrealistic to think area heaters/ wood/pellet stoves are whole hous sollutions. <snip>
Point being do not frett an occasional burner firing you are still doing the job with your stove

Good points, Elk. I'd go a step further and say; unless something has been done at the ceiling level to allow heat to move to adjacent rooms, the warmest air will not go there...

 

[BrotherBart]

Point being do not frett an occasional burner firing you are still doing the job with your stove

If I wake up and hear something that sounds like an oil burner firing, we are outta here. Don't have one.

 

[Swamp Fox]

I awoke at 3:00 am this morning (as I typically do [perhaps most 55+ year old males do). I felt a bit more chillier than usual. I checked all the temps. It was 19 degrees outside. The back bedroom was 62 degrees (usually around 64 to 68 degrees). The Great Room was 72 degrees (usually around 74 to 81 degrees). The stove top temp was 350 degrees. I turned the thermostat from the middle (#2: Normal) setting up to the 2.5 setting and I watched it for about 30 minutes and the temp climbed to about 425. I turned the stove fans on and I went back to bed. I got up at 7:00 am. The back bedroom was 64 degrees (which is where I like it); the Great Room was up to 74 degrees; and the stove top was still at 425 degrees. I turned the fans off about 8:00 am and moved the thermostat back down to the mid (#2) setting.

It is now about 9:15. The outside temp is 27 degrees; the bedroom temp is 65 degrees; the Great Room temp is 75 degrees; and the stove top is a little over 350 degrees. The cat thermometer always remained in the active zone.

I got home late last night and reloaded the stove to the max at about 9:00 pm. The stove "looks" to have half the wood remaining...the back half still stacked & charred, with the front half down to red coals. Will reload just before going to bed tonight.

 

[precaud]

I awoke at 3:00 am this morning (as I typically do [perhaps most 55+ year old males do).

Off topic, but here's a suggestion: cut down or eliminate caffeine and alchohol from your diet. I did so, and it solved the problem you're describing.

 

[Swamp Fox]

I awoke at 3:00 am this morning (as I typically do [perhaps most 55+ year old males do).

Off topic, but here's a suggestion: cut down or eliminate caffeine and alchohol from your diet. I did so, and it solved the problem you're describing.

Thanks for the suggestion. Don't drink alcohol, drink maybe two cups of coffee two or three mornings a week. That's about all the caffeine (that I know of) that I take in. Will try going without any coffee for a couple weeks and see how that goes.

 

[precaud]

Thanks for the suggestion. Don't drink alcohol, drink maybe two cups of coffee two or three mornings a week. That's about all the caffeine (that I know of) that I take in. Will try going without any coffee for a couple weeks and see how that goes.

Wow, that's pretty clean. Good luck with it - we all know how important a good night's sleep is! Maybe lots of wild, crazy sex right before bedtime will do the trick?!? ;-)

 

[rouxzy]

Got down in the teens last night at my house as well. After a 12 burn on my stove my house was 73 degrees this morning. But then again I burn coal and only have to fill it twice a day. Is that cheating?
Tom

 

[laynes69]

Got down in the teens last night at my house as well. After a 12 burn on my stove my house was 73 degrees this morning. But then again I burn coal and only have to fill it twice a day. Is that cheating?
Tom

No thats smart! Thats what I do when the temps drop way down. That way I don't have to wake up at 4:00 am to reload the wood furnace.

 

[babalu87]

Times my boiler kicks on.

For hot water
If we are away from the house long enough so the thermostat, set at 62, kicks it on
In the Fall and Spring once for testing

We are heating the whole house, full time, with wood.
Living room is usually in the mid 70's, sometimes higher
First floor bathroom is the furthest and thus coldest room on the first floor but it is in the low 70's
Bedrooms are cooler in the mid 60's
Even on the coldest nights last year the above was true within a few degrees.

We do have the benefit of a full Southern exposure on trhe rear of our Cape so all those windows (including two sliders) really benefit on sunny days.