1st fire in the house this year

A

animal-inside

Well-known member
Trusted Member
Lite the wood stove tonight for the first time this year. We got a dump of snow today (snowed all day... and it appears to not be melting)..

Loaded the stove up with some tamarack I cut last winter.

There's a feeling you get when you light a wood stove to heat your home with wood you cut, split and stacked.


Been heating my home about 80% with a wood stove for the last 8 years. Furnace only kicks on around 4am until I wake up and fill the stove again.


Anyone else burn wood to heat their house?



Where I live I'm limited to poplar, spruce, pine, birch and tamarack. Birch and Tamarack can be tough to find though.

I switched from using my truck to go cut wood in the bush, so using a snowmobile and a huge sled. Sled can get deeper into the wood than my truck so I've opened up my access to tamarack and birch.
 
animal-inside said:
Lite the wood stove tonight for the first time this year. We got a dump of snow today (snowed all day... and it appears to not be melting)..

Loaded the stove up with some tamarack I cut last winter.

There's a feeling you get when you light a wood stove to heat your home with wood you cut, split and stacked.


Been heating my home about 80% with a wood stove for the last 8 years. Furnace only kicks on around 4am until I wake up and fill the stove again.


Anyone else burn wood to heat their house?



Where I live I'm limited to poplar, spruce, pine, birch and tamarack. Birch and Tamarack can be tough to find though.

I switched from using my truck to go cut wood in the bush, so using a snowmobile and a huge sled. Sled can get deeper into the wood than my truck so I've opened up my access to tamarack and birch.
Click to expand...


I also burn wood. Typically I burn 11-12 cords a winter. I lay in close to 20 cords just to be safe. I burn hardwood so it burns hot and slow.
Wood heat is fantastic. I keeps the house very warm. A tad to warm at times :)
 
Taureau said:
I also burn wood. Typically I burn 11-12 cords a winter. I lay in close to 20 cords just to be safe. I burn hardwood so it burns hot and slow.
Wood heat is fantastic. I keeps the house very warm. A tad to warm at times :)
Click to expand...
Holy crap. Thats alot of wood. We use to heat our house growing up with 4-5.. you must like it warm bull..lol
 
Taureau said:
I also burn wood. Typically I burn 11-12 cords a winter. I lay in close to 20 cords just to be safe. I burn hardwood so it burns hot and slow.
Wood heat is fantastic. I keeps the house very warm. A tad to warm at times :)
Click to expand...

I'm around 8 cords... I keep about 12 on hand though.

I have to ask, what square footage is your house and what stove are you running?

I'm guessing you either have a outdoor furnace, a massive house or a older traditional stove....

If you have a older or traditional stove you should consider looking into a "Blaze king" brand stove with catalitic converter.

I have a traidional stove and I'm switching to a blaze king. My buddy has one and its amazing techology. You use 30% less wood and its better heat. The BK have a thermostat internally. So you set your temp setting and the stove automatically opens and closes the damper to keep your temperature steady.

Most don't realize why the thermostat is important. Traditonal wood stoves get hot, then cool, then hot, then cool etc.... So as your adjusting your damper and adding wood to cause these ups and downs, the only room that really has a chance to properly be heated in the room with the stove.. Once that room gets too hot, you turn the stove down. Or you don't add wood until it cools down. The rooms outside the stove room get a touch of heat, but the ups and downs cause it not to get a consistent heat.

Add the automatic thermostat... It ensures you don't get those hot, cold, hot, cold cycles.. just a warm steady heat... Without the ups and downs, the warm steady heat spreads much better...

And the BK has huge run times.. It will burn on a low steady heat for 30 hours. Again, this reduces the hot/cold cycle.


I'm not tyring to sell you a stove, but the BK system is above and beyond better. I'm switching out my stove in october.. I'd do it now, but I just dont have the time.
 
My stove is a SCOTSMAN WOOD FURNACE Model DB-101. It's I would say 30 years old. It's in the basement and the electric furnace blower circulates the heat.It has automatic dampner. It works great. My house is a stone house. 180 years old.
 
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Yeah next move I’m getting a house with a fireplace. Last house had a gas one but it’s really not the same.
 
Taureau said:
I also burn wood. Typically I burn 11-12 cords a winter. I lay in close to 20 cords just to be safe. I burn hardwood so it burns hot and slow.
Wood heat is fantastic. I keeps the house very warm. A tad to warm at times :)
Click to expand...
That's a lot of wood lol!!!
 
A wood stove would be great but.... then my insurance goes up a couple hundred bucks, I have to buy a chainsaw, truck, & land with trees. I can't afford to save money lol
 
I may just build a little fire pit in my living room. I’m sure the hard wood would be fine with a bit of heat.
 
Taureau said:
My stove is a SCOTSMAN WOOD FURNACE Model DB-101. It's I would say 30 years old. It's in the basement and the electric furnace blower circulates the heat.It has automatic dampner. It works great. My house is a stone house. 180 years old.
Click to expand...

Ah... Thats why your burning so much. Nice system... In our new house we are building I'm doing the outdoor boiler... Basically its what you have except its outside and it heats a liquid which ciculates through a heat exchanger right infront of the furnace blower.
 
mbmuscle said:
A wood stove would be great but.... then my insurance goes up a couple hundred bucks, I have to buy a chainsaw, truck, & land with trees. I can't afford to save money lol
Click to expand...

My wood stove cost me about 2800$ with the chimney. I installed it myself.
Chainsaw was 700$, but they can be found for a lot cheaper.
You don't need to buy land.. I promise you that there's a permit you can buy for less than $10 to cut wood on crown land. If crown land is too far, talk to any farmer or land developer.. They love letting people clear trees for them. Arborists also love guys who are willing to scavenge the wood they cut because they are also responsible for getting rid of it

Buying a truck is the big ticket for sure.



My insurance goes up about $200 a year for the stove, but my gas bill each month is bascially the monthly fee we all pay just to be connected to the line. I don't use any gas except what the water heater uses and the garage furnace.

My new house will not be connected to the gas line so I will pay absolutely nothing.
 
FML...woke up to snow on the ground in Alberta...suppose to snow for the next 2 days and they call for 18 degrees next week. God, i miss living in the Maritimes when Fall was longer than a week.
 
Been 8 years i bought my house, only heated with a wood furnace, an old school SummerAir, this bitch take 28'' long log and for the nigh i can easely fit 12'' diameter log in there so i wake up 8 hour later and just put more wood in it and it barely goes under 20 celcius.

At first i was using 18 cords (4x8) and now with all the insulation done over the years i'm down to 11-12 smal cords

But i'm currently building myself an electrical radiant floor heating system for the ease.

I'll buy a little wood stove to replace my old furnace just for the beauty of burning wood and getting that nice heat in the coldest days. Oh and for the emergency if we loose electricity during winter.
 
You guys got my wheels turning, always up for cutting people out from digging in my pockets. Currently only pay power and gas, looked into solar panels this summer, no wholesalers around here for a DYI install and a quote for install was 18,000 little more then I wanted to spend but a wood burning stove may be affordable hmmm.......... is it worth it? Do I want the hassle? Will the wife be more cold then she already is? Hmmm so many questions must go into research mode now.
 
Treneth said:
You guys got my wheels turning, always up for cutting people out from digging in my pockets. Currently only pay power and gas, looked into solar panels this summer, no wholesalers around here for a DYI install and a quote for install was 18,000 little more then I wanted to spend but a wood burning stove may be affordable hmmm.......... is it worth it? Do I want the hassle? Will the wife be more cold then she already is? Hmmm so many questions must go into research mode now.
Click to expand...

My grandfather said wood heats you 4 times

once when you cut it
once when you split it
once when you stack it
once when you burn it


your wife will love wood heat. Its warm as can be :)
 
Anyone looking to really stop paying gas bills should looking into an outdoor wood boiler.

Easy to install and you use your current forced air system to distribute the heat. It heats the entire house just like your furnace, but without using gas
 
animal-inside said:
Anyone looking to really stop paying gas bills should looking into an outdoor wood boiler.

Easy to install and you use your current forced air system to distribute the heat. It heats the entire house just like your furnace, but without using gas
Click to expand...

only drawback is the units are darn expensive.
 
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