** EDIT** EXTREME COLD!! WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO? NOW THATS ITS GONE HOW DID YOU DO?? WHAT WOULD YO

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I'll make a run for it with just the stove going. House will probably be in the 65* to 68* range including far rooms which is right about my comfort zone indoors anyway. Electric heat - haven't turned a single room on yet this year so may as well keep plugging away.

The problem with New England winters 'aint the cold, it's the humidity. Single digits or negative single digits doesn't qualify as "extreme cold", but add a little moisture to the air and tack some rime ice to your whiskers and it sure isn't comfortable.
 
Extream temps call for desperate measures.
I'm switching over from Michalob to Kentucky Burbon ;-P
 
Just wishing I had bought the Englander 30-NC instead of my Century, really could use the bigger fire box now...


Edit - Found a new englander on Craigslist for $799 hmmmmmmmm
 
Going to use Oak and Hickory. Drink a glass of water at 10:00 PM
 
johnsopi- got into the burbon a little early?
johnsopi- got into the burbon a little early?
johnsopi- got into the burbon a little early?
 
The cold is just starting to come in here. I got a little chilly out pushing snow this morning but not all that bad. In the wind it is nasty but out of the wind it just isn't that bad. Still in the teens.

We are blessed with having the Great Lakes around us and we usually don't get the extreme cold. We get below zero but even in this cold spell I haven't seen one forecast lower than 7 below for this week but very little above that for the daytime highs.

As for what we'll do, the only thing different is to put a light in the well pit and burn the best wood while it is cold.

Outside temperature now is 15 but was over 20 just a couple hours ago. Heading to -7 tonight.
 
Set up the tent in the living room ?
 
We're not going to get nearly as cold as most of your. Our lowest temp will be around 2F or 4F on Thursday night/Friday morning. By Saturday we're back to 40F, which works for me as I plan to split more of next years wood Saturday morning in my grandmother's barn.

I'll be feeding the Endeavor in the wee hours, though, as it really struggles to keep the house warm when we are in the teens or lower. I would love to have room for a Liberty, but that would mean sacrificing the use of that room, basically. If I ever build a different house, it will be designed around a stove with a 3 cubic ft box, at least.
 
EXTREME COLD!! WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO?




Sit by the fire and look outside. :p



Sure feel sorry for the wife to have to go to work at 3am though. I know my furnace will be kicking in though. My Ultima is a good heater for this house but not that good. I did check my gas barrel the other day and used a whole 5% since October. I can live with that.
 
I took my furnace to the shredder couple of months ago so if the old smoke dragon dont keep up. Its on to shuttin rooms off and blankets over doorways gets mighty cold takin a leak when you gotta do that. ahahaha
 
I am going to use my favorite Hearth.com tip, I will drink lot's of water during John Stewart at 11 p.m. and load the stove during my middle of the night pee breaks. :)
 
I just filled the front rack with ironwood for the Summit and some long splits and rounds for the back stove. I'll be staying up late and running both stoves.
 
My plan is burn. Burn BURN BURN! Burn hot, burn long..it is going to be one he!! of a fire!!! I'm talking scorched earth. Im talking primary burn, secondary burn and I may even go for tertiary burn if the chimbley gets hot enough. I'm gonna masacre this wood I got here. Poop fire and save the beans!!! Yeah who's with me.
 
Rockey said:
My plan is burn. Burn BURN BURN! Burn hot, burn long..it is going to be one he!! of a fire!!! I'm talking scorched earth. Im talking primary burn, secondary burn and I may even go for tertiary burn if the chimbley gets hot enough. I'm gonna masacre this wood I got here. Poop fire and save the beans!!! Yeah who's with me.
i'll be at work but i am with ya i am gonna run my summit hot not gonna close it down it'll waste wood but who cares!! the therm will be stuck at 750-800
 
Got 2 weeks worth of wood put up in the basement next to the wood stove so the only time I have to go out is to snow blow and go to work. I'm so cofident that I called the oil man and told him that no matter how much I beg do not deliver any oil (wouldn't do me any good since I took the boiler out to make space for the wood stove). I got a big stove and a small house, the only problem I am worried about is if it dosent get cold and I have a full load of wood in the fire box. It was -18 a couple weeks ago and I was able to get the house to 74 without much problem, I'm not worried at all, havn't used anything but wood to heat the whole year. The wife and kids are heading down state for the weekend so me and the woodstove will get some quality time to fend off the cold together. The high tomorrow is 2 and the low is -17 Ha I laugh in the face of the cold. Bring it on!

Mike
 
Backwoods Savage said:
The cold is just starting to come in here. I got a little chilly out pushing snow this morning but not all that bad. In the wind it is nasty but out of the wind it just isn't that bad.

It's 14 and very little wind...what's up with that?. I thought it was supposed to be coming in like a hurricane?.

Ayhow, 14 outside, 78 inside downstairs, 40ft from the stove :coolsmile:...subject to change >:-(
 
It had dropped to -41F here this morning. No idea what it was with wind chill. I get up before the wife so it's my job to resurrect the fire in the morning but having misjudged the coals, I put splits on the coals that were too large and it hadn't taken off well yet when she got up. The wife was out'n about most of the day so she choked down the fire to preserve the coals. She gets home before me so she had resurrected the fire but it was still only 70 in the house when I got home.
 
Step 1- load stove
Step 2- tend stove
Step 3- get in hot tub
Step 4- repeat as necessary
 
It appears the cold front that covered Alaska moved south....we've warmed up to plus 10. It was -62 last week in Tok. The interior caught the brunt of it (always do). Minus 31 is all I have seen here yet, and the F400 kept the house at 70-plus without the boiler having to run once.

This 10 above weather is downright balmy.
 
We're fine with using the boiler to maintain a minimum temperature in the largely unused first floor zones. We'll keep the Woodstock Fireview nicely stoked and keep our second floor "apartment" nice and cozy. There is plenty of seasoned wood under cover just outside the back door. I'll probably close the draperies on the windows after the sun goes down, too.

We may see below zero at night and highs in the the 10 degree range, but it will be nothing like the deep freeze in Minnesota or North Dakota... too near the Atlantic Ocean for that to happen.
 
a couple of weeks ago, it was getting down to 2 deg above around 5 am. So i hear that it could go down to zero or maybe -2 below later this week.

I brought some extra wood into the basement so that i would have enough.

What I did last cold snap was to run the oil burner (oil fired hot water radiators) for 1 hour in the morning & 1 hour at nite & get the house up to 72 -74 deg & then load up the stove for overnight or all day burn.

Normal to run 4 wood loadings in 24 hours.

I usually wake up to 60 to 67 deg, depending on when i loaded the stove at night & use the oil burner to restore temps (72) to the house. I use the stove to maintain temps so that I can enjoy 12 hours between oil burner runs.

Bear in mind that a wood stove in the basement, is a space heater not capable of heating a 8 room two story house all by itself. It does warm the house & help maintain temps for twice or 3 times as long as just the oil burner by itself.

Because of this, I am able to be very comfortable & only use 1 - 500 gal tank of oil for the entire year.

When I heated with just oil, I would burn 3 on a mild winter or 4 when its cold - 5oo gal tanks up each heating season.

This year, it looks like I will go the whole winter on less than 1 tank of oil.

I expect a 80 to 85 % savings over just oil heat.

I had used only the wood stove to heat the house up until just before christmas (sept through dec) , then we got that 5 days of 2 deg weather.

So, I bought a tank of oil because the wood stove could only keep just the kitchen & basement comfortable.
The other 7 rooms of the house were 48 to 60, & after a couple of days of that, I just didn't feel like living that way.

I had to put a coat on to go into any other room but the kitchen.
That was ok for when I was younger but not at 60.

So i burn a little oil & enjoy the heat. Still burning wood 24/7

I conside the wood as primary heat & the Oil Burn as cold weather backup.

Where the wood stove realy shines is sept through dec and march & april where it can easily safe you 2/3 rds of your heating season fuel bill.

Only in jan & feb do you need to run the oil burner, as well as the wood stove, to keep the house bearable.

And every once in a while, when I feel i need a full nights sleep, I set the oil burner to kick in when the stove cools off.

I must say that it is so nice to have a full nights sleep & be warm all night without the 3 to 5 am stove feeding.

Either the cold will wake me up (too cold to sleep without a ton of blankets) or the dog will wake me up if she gets cold.

Hard to teach a dog to use blankets.

so some time between 3 to 5 am the oil burner will kick in & keep the house warm until I wake up, turn the ob off & feed the woodstove.
 
Temp outside is about -30 F
Inside temp is 70F

Stove top temp is down around 400F, lettin her burn down before I stuff it FULL of Poplar and a piece or 2 of Birch.
In the morn, the stove top will be down around 300F, ane the housewill most likely be ~68F
We are a ways outside of WPG, so our temps are usually a bit lower.
 
Well, I guess I am the exception to the rule. This is our 3rd day in a row of 70F+. Lows are barely dropping into the 40's. Suffice it to say the stove is sitting idle. All kinds of temperature records have been shattered around the Bay Area the last couple days. It just does not feel right not burning in January.

Stay warm everyone.
 
No big deal here. We get this every winter. Haven't used my boiler in 2 years and don't plan to now. The Vigilant can still run us out of the house if I open it up full throttle. I stocked up the wood bin, bought in the White Oak & Sugar Maple (the nightly load will still be burning an hour or two after I get up, I throttle her down good before I go to sleep, lots of blankets on the beds). Just keep feeding the monster, all will be fine. I am glad I gave the stove and chimney a full colonic over the weekend... All tuned up and ready to go.
 
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