Will storage solve my problem?

[duraleigh]

Hey, everyone,

I am a VERY infrequent visitor mostly because my simple system has been perfectly adequate but I now have a problem.

I have an Empyre 250 outdoor wood furnace that I have used to heat my whole house for 7+ years. It has performed nicely in our mild NC winters giving us a 10-12 hour burn time on even our coldest nights. It is connected via a water-to-air exchanger in a standard forced air system.

However, we have added almost 1000 sq ft to our heated area and while the exchanger and blower is perfectly adequate to keep the house warm, my burn time can drop as low as 6-7 hours on our coldest nights.

It is still manageable but I would like to extend that burn time just for the convenience of not getting up so early. Obviously, I could get a larger stove but I am not willing to commit much more than $1000 bucks total to solve this issue.

The Empyre has a capacity of 150 gallons of water and I am considering doubling (or so) that capacity with an aux storage tank to see if it will let me continue to heat even though the wood supply may be exhausted or nearly so.

Any thoughts on the feasability of this idea? Problems?

Thanks in advance

 

[stee6043]

Adding thermal storage will in no way increase your ability to satisfy an increased heat load. In addition, adding a meaningful amount of storage is likely going to cost more than $1,000.

Do you have a good idea of what your heat load is vs the output of your current wood burner? This is step one. Thermal storage is used for convenience first and to improve efficiency (marginally, typically) second. Thermal storage does not enable "more heat" to be produced and it actually will usually decrease burn times FWIW...

 

[PassionForFire&Water]

Adding thermal storage will in no way increase your ability to satisfy an increased heat load. In addition, adding a meaningful amount of storage is likely going to cost more than $1,000.

Do you have a good idea of what your heat load is vs the output of your current wood burner? This is step one. Thermal storage is used for convenience first and to improve efficiency (marginally, typically) second. Thermal storage does not enable "more heat" to be produced and it actually will usually decrease burn times FWIW...

200% in agreement with Stee6043

 

[Singed Eyebrows]

Hey, everyone,

I am a VERY infrequent visitor mostly because my simple system has been perfectly adequate but I now have a problem.

I have an Empyre 250 outdoor wood furnace that I have used to heat my whole house for 7+ years. It has performed nicely in our mild NC winters giving us a 10-12 hour burn time on even our coldest nights. It is connected via a water-to-air exchanger in a standard forced air system.

However, we have added almost 1000 sq ft to our heated area and while the exchanger and blower is perfectly adequate to keep the house warm, my burn time can drop as low as 6-7 hours on our coldest nights.

It is still manageable but I would like to extend that burn time just for the convenience of not getting up so early. Obviously, I could get a larger stove but I am not willing to commit much more than $1000 bucks total to solve this issue.

The Empyre has a capacity of 150 gallons of water and I am considering doubling (or so) that capacity with an aux storage tank to see if it will let me continue to heat even though the wood supply may be exhausted or nearly so.

Any thoughts on the feasability of this idea? Problems?

Thanks in advance

The cheapest is to load up at night with the heaviest hardwood you can find. This should burn slower than light hardwoods, hopefully, Randy

 

[Singed Eyebrows]

Hey, everyone,

I am a VERY infrequent visitor mostly because my simple system has been perfectly adequate but I now have a problem.

I have an Empyre 250 outdoor wood furnace that I have used to heat my whole house for 7+ years. It has performed nicely in our mild NC winters giving us a 10-12 hour burn time on even our coldest nights. It is connected via a water-to-air exchanger in a standard forced air system.

However, we have added almost 1000 sq ft to our heated area and while the exchanger and blower is perfectly adequate to keep the house warm, my burn time can drop as low as 6-7 hours on our coldest nights.

It is still manageable but I would like to extend that burn time just for the convenience of not getting up so early. Obviously, I could get a larger stove but I am not willing to commit much more than $1000 bucks total to solve this issue.

The Empyre has a capacity of 150 gallons of water and I am considering doubling (or so) that capacity with an aux storage tank to see if it will let me continue to heat even though the wood supply may be exhausted or nearly so.

Any thoughts on the feasability of this idea? Problems?

Thanks in advance

The cheapest is to load up at night with the heaviest hardwood you can find & larger sections. This should burn slower than light hardwoods, hopefully, Randy

 

[maple1]

I think storage would help. If you went to bed with some additional fully charged storage, the heat would last longer - all else being equal. You might have to build a new fire in the morning, but things shouldn't be as cool. Not sure how you're operating now, but that would likely in turn require you to burn harder in the latter part of the day than you are now in order to get the storage charged up before bed time. Likely would require more wood being burned, but would beat getting up in the middle of the night all to heck - I absolutely hate having to do that. An alternative you could try right now is just charge the house up more in the latter part of the day, and let it set back overnight - that is what I try to do with my pig. Either way you will need to burn more wood than you are now.

 

[duraleigh]

Adding thermal storage will in no way increase your ability to satisfy an increased heat load.

I understand. The system I have can handle the heat load just fine. I also understand I will burn more wood.

However, my thinking. like Maple1 has responded, is that I will be going to bed with 300 gallons worth of 170 degree water rather than going to bed with currently only 150 gallons.

My thinking is the extra btu's might be enough to get me through the night even though it will likely exhaust the fire.

I am willing to rebuild the fire and burn extra wood during the day if I can store enough btu's in the extra water to get me through the night.

 

[maple1]

I'd go bigger on the storage though if I could - likely you're dealing with size constraints.

 

[martyinmi]

I'm not a huge fan of additional storage, but you should be able to resolve your issue with it- providing there are times during the day when your OWB isn't cycling. Also, the Empyres are insulated very well, so you might want to speak with your local dealer and see if it would be OK to raise your off set point up to 190 degrees or so. That should give you a little extra storage (25000 BTU). Empyres are very popular around here and that's where most of them run theirs.

 

[duraleigh]

raise your off set point up to 190 degrees or so

Excellent idea. I forgot I had that capability as I have never had a need to change it from 170.

I am limited in space for the additional storage so maybe if I can squeeze in 150 aux tank and go to 190 my issue will be resolved. I'll report back. Thanks for the input, everyone.