how much wood?

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Ok what stove, whats your homes square foot, size of fire box, and homes insultion?
 
My indoor stove will go through approx 6-8 cords this winter, however our electric heat will not run this winter except for possibly a day while we are away for x-max holiday.
 
I burn about 5 to 6 full cords a season here in lower Michigan. About a full cord a month. A little less in November/December but a little more in Jan/Feb, then again a little less in March/April.

I run a mix of oak, ash, cherry, and elm. Again use more oak in the colder months and at night, and the ash, cherry, and elm when I am awake or in the milder months.

1800 sq ft colonial, 2x6 outside walls, insulated to mid 1990's standards. KD
 
We heat a 2000sq ft log home with our OWB 100% of the time. I think we burned about 6-7 cords last winter. It was our first winter at our new home and first with the OWB. We burned a lot of "wet" wood (was all we could get) and I am sure we wasted a lot of wood with the learning curve as well. I noticed a HUGE difference in species, split vs blocked, and age of wood. We burned a lot of fresh box elder and some 6 month-1 year cherry / oak. The cherry/oak lasted a lot longer between load times, maybe 9-10 hours. Think we were getting about 7-8 hours burn out of the box elder.

It will take at least a season to figure everything out.

Now that I am 3 years ahead, I am hoping our consumption will decrease a bit. We have all our cords measured out this season, its seasoned, so hopefully we have have a much better estimate next spring on consumption
 
Fellow Hardy heater here. We have a 1500 sq ft slab home. Last year was our first year heating with our hardy and was thoroughly unprepared. I wanted a wood boiler and was "keeping an eye out" for a "good deal" when I landed a steal on a used hardy. Sooo long story short we had in no way enough wood on the ground and after burning our couch, end tables, chairs, my wifes china hutch, coffee table, the kids' bed headboards, and my poor old labs dog house, spring came and we started cutting wood for this year...... Lol no!!! But seriously we went thru about two sixteen foot car trailers of slab wood to heat from november to april / may. It was still cheaper than the proPAIN we had been buying tho.

Sent from my rooted and eclipse running X2--thanks nitro--
 
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We have a VC Defiant (stove) and we keep our 1800 sf home very cozy all season, only letting the furnace come on if we're out of town, etc. We burn about 5-7 face cords/season depending mostly on the weather.

FWIW, I've never used an OWB so I have no direct knowledge but I have a couple of neighbors who use them and one was just complaining that he goes through so much wood and has to feed it several times per day/night. I do seem to see larger wood stacks (more cords) where I see OWBs. But to be fair he is heating his 2000 sf house and 1000 sf shop with it.

We love the indoor stove ambiance, but I'm guessing many OWB users must not have a home suitable for a space heater type setup, or like bringing wood into the house, or they just don't have room or a suitable space for a stove? Many ways to skin a cat!
 
Oh and wood is the least of your worries wait till you get the uncurable saw collection disease. More saws and bigger and bigger!

Sent from my rooted and eclipse running X2--thanks nitro--
 
I used to work with a guy who ran a similar OWB, (non-gassifier). He would go through 8-10 full cords with that thing and insisted it worked better with green wood. He said dry wood just burned up faster and he would have to reload more often. I sometimes wonder if some of these units were actually designed to burn higher moisture content wood and just will not cut the air back enough to burn the dry stuff... just a theory of mine..

This proves what most people have known all along, that most OWB's aren't very efficient, no matter what the manufacturer says. For starters, it smolders quite a bit (due to the calling for heat by the thermostat, which opens and shuts the draft when needed). No matter what kind of stove you have, the drier the wood, the more efficient it will be. Like Sav said in his earlier post, it takes a TON of energy (possibly up to 1/3 of what's in the wood) to burn off the moisture. That ends up as smoke, to boot. Clogging your flue AND anyone's lungs in the nearby vicinity. Moral of the story? THE DRYER, THE BETTER!!
 
the statement is Probably true they do burn better with green wood my father in law has one and if he loads it with dry seasoned wood it will burn out quickly I think the water in the wood slows down the burn when the blower is off and conserves the energy he burns 10 cords a season I think in the next couple of years they will stop making the non gasser boilers they are really inefficient
 
it takes a TON of energy (possibly up to 1/3 of what's in the wood) to burn off the moisture.
I thought there was a thread a couple of years ago where that was addressed, with some numbers that supported the conclusion that when you figure the amount of BTUs required to boil the water weight of the split away, versus the BTUs contained in the piece of wood, the percentage of BTU loss wasn't too large when boiling away water. I will try to dig up that thread...
 
I thought there was a thread a couple of years ago where that was addressed, with some numbers that supported the conclusion that when you figure the amount of BTUs required to boil the water weight of the split away, versus the BTUs contained in the piece of wood, the percentage of BTU loss wasn't too large when boiling away water. I will try to dig up that thread...

There was also a study cited on here a few months back about how the best wood to burn to prevent creosote buildup is green pine. Studies can prove virtually anything. When I burned green wood back in the day, I did keep warm. However I had to keep the woodstove really hot otherwise new pieces would smolder more than burn. And I had to get up three times per night to keep throwing wood on the fire. I don't know what the loss of BTUs is, but one must also factor in the inconvenience of starting the fire and keeping it going. There is no doubt I used considerable more wood than I do now that I burn mostly dry stuff.
 
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There is no doubt I used considerable more wood than I do now that I burn mostly dry stuff.
Here's that thread. The actual BTU loss isn't very big between burning 20% vs. 30% wood, but the point is made that you have to give the stove more air to burn the wet stuff, so your stove is running less efficiently and a lot of heat is going up the flue. And there may be more loss from inefficient re-burning of the smoke, cat or non-cat...
https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/heat-loss-due-to-wet-wood.58445/page-2
 
There was also a study cited on here a few months back about how the best wood to burn to prevent creosote buildup is green pine. Studies can prove virtually anything. When I burned green wood back in the day, I did keep warm. However I had to keep the woodstove really hot otherwise new pieces would smolder more than burn. And I had to get up three times per night to keep throwing wood on the fire. I don't know what the loss of BTUs is, but one must also factor in the inconvenience of starting the fire and keeping it going. There is no doubt I used considerable more wood than I do now that I burn mostly dry stuff.
That study is a joint study by the Georgia forestry commission and the USFS. I have a hard copy in my office here right now.
 
There was also a study cited on here a few months back about how the best wood to burn to prevent creosote buildup is green pine.
That study is a joint study by the Georgia forestry commission and the USFS. I have a hard copy in my office here right now.
I read here a while back that hardwoods make more creosote than soft, so there may be something to that. I don't know what the "green" part would have to do with it...
 
We have a VC Defiant (stove) and we keep our 1800 sf home very cozy all season, only letting the furnace come on if we're out of town, etc. We burn about 5-7 face cords/season depending mostly on the weather.

FWIW, I've never used an OWB so I have no direct knowledge but I have a couple of neighbors who use them and one was just complaining that he goes through so much wood and has to feed it several times per day/night. I do seem to see larger wood stacks (more cords) where I see OWBs. But to be fair he is heating his 2000 sf house and 1000 sf shop with it.

We love the indoor stove ambiance, but I'm guessing many OWB users must not have a home suitable for a space heater type setup, or like bringing wood into the house, or they just don't have room or a suitable space for a stove? Many ways to skin a cat!
I know of people who have them because they have had chimney fires - one even lost his home - and are afraid to have a fire within their home, be it fireplace or wood stove....Personally, I don't like the amount of wood I see stacked near many of these burners...I'm a tree hugger and strong conservationist at heart.
 
Someone mentioned larger split size. I think that would be my solution to getting longer burn times.

Not much argument about burning dry wood is more efficient & cleaner; it is just a fact.
Additionally you would get better heat transfer to the water with a cleaner surface area for the heat to transfer to the water.
I wonder how much (how thick)the creosote builds up on the heat transfer area from burning green wood?

Wood management for every system is different. Larger split sizes means a longer time to season the wood.

You may have to get 3 to 4 years ahead on your wood supply to burn more efficiently, but it would pay off in wood consumption.
3 years to season 8" - 10" - 12" splits, but the longer burn times & more efficient usable heat from the wood would save you $$.

Just my thoughts, I have no experience with OWBs.
 
How many of the owb actually run a heat storage system of some type besides the domestic hot water function? The couple I know the owners of only run point of use with no storage other than the owb itself.
Years ago ( 70's ) I read an article about phase change material ( I think is was Mother Earth news) as a type of storage system for heat. It went liquid to solid or flip flop that at any rate one way was absorption the other was radation of stored energy in this case heat. ( course it would be on might difficult on the AC, but not everyone had ac back then) Anyone know of anything like that still is around.
 
I know of people who have them because they have had chimney fires - one even lost his home - and are afraid to have a fire within their home, be it fireplace or wood stove....Personally, I don't like the amount of wood I see stacked near many of these burners...I'm a tree hugger and strong conservationist at heart.

HehHeh . . . my father and mother lost their home to a fire . . . with an OWB. A large part of this however was due to my father placing the OWB too close to the house to save on piping, heat loss and so he didn't have to walk outside too far. Just having an OWB is no gurantee of better safety -- it all starts with the individual installing the stove correctly, running the stove correctly and maintaining the stove correctly -- whether it be a smoke dragon, OWB or EPA stove.
 
HehHeh . . . my father and mother lost their home to a fire . . . with an OWB. A large part of this however was due to my father placing the OWB too close to the house to save on piping, heat loss and so he didn't have to walk outside too far. Just having an OWB is no gurantee of better safety -- it all starts with the individual installing the stove correctly, running the stove correctly and maintaining the stove correctly -- whether it be a smoke dragon, OWB or EPA stove.
Agree 100 % --and the chimney. The OWB's I've observed are pretty far away from their respective houses.....
 
Not 100% certain but I believe hardy makes a spark arrester. I don't have one on mine and mine is about 35 ft from the house also. I also have no idea how well they work or if. My stove is set up down wind from the house but we all know how fast wind can change. I have seen my Hardy throw some sparks when she's got a hot one rolling on her belly!

Sent from my rooted and eclipse running X2--thanks nitro-- if im posting on here I'm probably supposed to be working! I can't help im addicted to HEARTH.COM!
 
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