Hey everyone,
Long story short I was stationed overseas in Europe for 9 years both as active duty military, and eventually as a civilian employed by the military. I finally got sent back to the US about 2 years ago and bought my first house last april, in south east PA.
I setup my utilities but not knowing about propane buying season, price, etc, I didnt think much of my tank only having 400 gallons (of a 1000 gallon tank) left. My central heat is propane, forced air.
It started getting cold and I called the propane company and they said that based on the previous owners usage, they wanted $527 a month to fill the tank and refill as needed throughout the winter. I thought that was pretty outrageous and definitely an unexpected expense. So instead I did some research and found someone willing to cut me a deal on a fireplace insert. My fireplace was originally a wood fireplace, that the previous owners had installed a small gas kit in for looks. I took that out and had it capped proffesionally.
I read a bit on this website and ran 8 feet of stove pipe up the chimney and put the insert in. It's an old fireboss, which from my understanding is a generic one made back in the 80's, nothing special, probably could do a lot better with something else. It has a blower, which is one thing I wanted. One problem is my living room has 25 foot vaulted ceilings and a loft over looking it, with a ceiling fan in the loft. The total house space is 2700 square feet.
My goal is to use wood as my primary source of heat, since I've discovered that my neighbors all do the same, and eventually I plan on installing a wood stove in my dining/kitchen area by purchasing some triple walled pipe and a through-the-wall kit. I'm probably going to throw down for a propane tank fill in a month or two and set my thermostat to 57 degrees as a back up for the wood.
My neighbors burn about 4 cords of wood in the winter. I have a feeling I'm going to need more.
Also, relatively soon I'm going to purchase an outdoor woodstove, that feeds into the forced air, maybe from the Shaver. They have a model that does that. For now I'm on a budget. Buying a house is expensive and I'm just now starting to recover from all the costs, coupled with $5000 in medical bills after insurance.
So a couple of questions... does anyone have an outdoor wood furnace and can they provide any feedback on it?
Any other ideas on heating the place with the insert? Right now I can keep the living room close to 68 degrees, and the kitchen in the low 60s as it is, fireplace insert only. Master bedroom too, but the master bath is basically an ice box. Its about as effective at holding heat as a coat made of kleenex.
Any other ideas?
Long story short I was stationed overseas in Europe for 9 years both as active duty military, and eventually as a civilian employed by the military. I finally got sent back to the US about 2 years ago and bought my first house last april, in south east PA.
I setup my utilities but not knowing about propane buying season, price, etc, I didnt think much of my tank only having 400 gallons (of a 1000 gallon tank) left. My central heat is propane, forced air.
It started getting cold and I called the propane company and they said that based on the previous owners usage, they wanted $527 a month to fill the tank and refill as needed throughout the winter. I thought that was pretty outrageous and definitely an unexpected expense. So instead I did some research and found someone willing to cut me a deal on a fireplace insert. My fireplace was originally a wood fireplace, that the previous owners had installed a small gas kit in for looks. I took that out and had it capped proffesionally.
I read a bit on this website and ran 8 feet of stove pipe up the chimney and put the insert in. It's an old fireboss, which from my understanding is a generic one made back in the 80's, nothing special, probably could do a lot better with something else. It has a blower, which is one thing I wanted. One problem is my living room has 25 foot vaulted ceilings and a loft over looking it, with a ceiling fan in the loft. The total house space is 2700 square feet.
My goal is to use wood as my primary source of heat, since I've discovered that my neighbors all do the same, and eventually I plan on installing a wood stove in my dining/kitchen area by purchasing some triple walled pipe and a through-the-wall kit. I'm probably going to throw down for a propane tank fill in a month or two and set my thermostat to 57 degrees as a back up for the wood.
My neighbors burn about 4 cords of wood in the winter. I have a feeling I'm going to need more.
Also, relatively soon I'm going to purchase an outdoor woodstove, that feeds into the forced air, maybe from the Shaver. They have a model that does that. For now I'm on a budget. Buying a house is expensive and I'm just now starting to recover from all the costs, coupled with $5000 in medical bills after insurance.
So a couple of questions... does anyone have an outdoor wood furnace and can they provide any feedback on it?
Any other ideas on heating the place with the insert? Right now I can keep the living room close to 68 degrees, and the kitchen in the low 60s as it is, fireplace insert only. Master bedroom too, but the master bath is basically an ice box. Its about as effective at holding heat as a coat made of kleenex.
Any other ideas?