Wood furnace blues

[reaperman]

I recently built a new home and wrestled with the choice of putting a wood stove upstairs or a wood furnace in the basement. I chose the wood furnace to take advantage of the duct work. Figuring I may as well use the ducting for the gas furnace and get a more even heat throughout the house. In my previous (mobile) home I had a wood stove that heated the entire house plus half the nearest town. Sure felt nice on those cold Mn winter nights.

Now that I have began to use my new setup in my new house I have noticed a few things. First off, the heat in the new home is more evenly distributed. Its a different kind of heat than I'm use to with a radiant type stove. Its more like a regular furnace. I miss the radiant heat. And it seems like unless I really have a fire blazing the stove doesnt heat very fast. The blower fan seems to move soo much air, even on low, it cools the stove temp down so much that it takes quite a bit more wood to acquire the heat I want. I'm not sure I can get a secondary burn with consistency. I havent filled the firebox completely yet and tried running it that way, I hate to overfire the unit, especially since its not real cold out just yet. The temp here is running in the low 20's at night and 30's daytime. Mayby I just miss my old wood stove that got hot fast, and heated the house fast with just a bit of firewood. It makes me kind of frustrated to see how much wood this thing can eat compared to old faithful. I just miss throwing a few pieces of wood in he old stove to take the chill out. With my new furnace, those days are gone. Dont get me wrong, my new unit is heating more house, 1300sq ft, upstaire+basement,same size. And I know had I choosen a wood stove upstairs, it wouldnt have heated the basement, with ease. So I'm sure I made the correct decision, now I have to learn the secrets of using my new furnace. The furnace I bought is a firechief 100,000btu, their smallest unit. The heating guy didnt think I needed a larger unit for my home. Actually the only difference is the size of the fire chamber. Mayby one of you guys with a similar set-up can tell me how your unit is functioning for your home. I appreciate the input. Thanks

 

[pistonslap]

This is my second year burning with a wood furnace connected to my ductwork. I am heating a 1700 sq. ft. 2 1/2 story house with it. My house is an older house with no cold air returns in the 2nd and 3rd floors. If I heat my basement to 80, my first floor will be 75, 2nd 68 in the bedroom with the first register and 64 in the 2 bedrooms on the end of the system. My attic is finished but just used for storage, so I don't keep track of the temp up there. As you have said it takes a lot of wood to keep these temps when the weather gets cold. My neighbor heats his house with a fireplace insert. He tells me that it keeps his whole house warm. All I know is my woodpile goes down a lot faster than his. Also the radiant heat in the basement and on the first floor where it comes up my basement stairwell is so much nicer than the heat from the ducts. On our next cold snap I'm going to my neighbor's and check out to see if it is as warm on his 2nd floor as he says. If so, I will probably go with an insert next year or the year after, whichever fits my finances. I really hate burning all this wood to get the best heat in my basement since we don't spend much time there.

 

[johnsopi]

This will be my 2nd year heating with a wood furnace It's Yukon BigJack. The house is 2 story 2000sp ft. Energy effisent .My experice is much differant the basement stays cool @ 70 while I keep the rest of the house @ 75-78. The upstairs is about the same as downstairs. The real differant between using the oil furnace and wood one is how fast the house cools down.

 

[pistonslap]

I don't even know the make and model of my furnace. It was given to me by a friend. It's a big cast iron beast that says ORC La Crosse on the front. It has an air chamber above the firebox with a thermostatically controlled blower, 6" stainless steel chimney and I put a cast iron damper in the stovepipe. I can get it to burn overnight, but I have to really cut the air down. Even though my coals are glowing hot my chimney temps are lower than I would like them to be (275-290) on the long burns, even with the cast iron damper open.

 

[Eric Johnson]

Comparing a wood stove to a furnace or a boiler is like comparing a motorcycle to a car. A bike will go 70 on the highway and get you to your destination in the same amount of time, but not with the same level of comfort. The trade-off is that you use more fuel with the car. If you want to centrally-heat your house to a uniform temp, in other words, get a central heating appliance. If you want a source of radiant heat that's not (can't be) uniform, then get a wood stove. Then factor in the advantages and disadvantages of wood handling, mess, wood availability and cost, etc.

The bottom line with a 1,500-3,000 square foot house, in other words, is that you'll burn more fuel with central heat, but it's probably worth it.

A furnace or boiler is not a wood stove, and there's no reason to expect it to act like one.

 

[pistonslap]

I agree with you on that. PlusI want to enjoy the fire too, not just have a money saver. But the price on the furnace was right and when I remove the wood furnace, I'll be able to use the same chimney.

 

[laynes69]

This house is 2300+ square feet, 10 foot ceilings, 5 bedrooms, 150+ years old. We have a wood furnace in our basement and we keep it running 24/7 in the wintertime. 20 years ago my dad installed it and he installed it in paraelle. Which for him it worked and he used about a tank of propane a year. He burnt alot of wood and sometimes had problems heating the house when it was very cold. 2 years ago I bought the house from my father and I ripped out all ductwork, reducted the whole house and installed the wood furnace in series with the LP furnace. Its set to kick on at about 140 degrees and off at about 80. When the woodburner gets up to temp the main LP Furnace blower only kicks on and distributes the heat through the home. Now we heat 10 times easier and at least a 1/4 or more less wood than my father. Once the fires lit I can put 4 or 5 small splits on the fire and easily raise the house temp 5 to 10 degrees in a matter of a few minutes. With good hardwood we easily carry over a fire all night and we used 30% propane from NOV 14 05 to present. The air is not as hot with the LP Furnace unless we open the dampers a little, but ours runs almost all of the time. This way the house stays even with heat. We keep our house around 76 all winter long with our wood furnace. And with it in the basement, it stays warm down there so we have no chance of the pipes freezing. So i'll ask you whats your temp settings on the furnace, and how did you install it. Like I said the installation pushed so much more heat from the furnace while burning much less wood. As far as overheating it, its possible but with having the jacket around the firebox it helps keep the furnace fairly cool. We acheieve secondary combustion all the time with ours, even with the blowers running almost all of the time. One downfall is if you feed it some wood the heat has nowhere but the home to go, So theres no controlling it until you get a feel for it. We will use from 4 to 6 cords of wood this winter.

 

[Eric Johnson]

Where do you live, laynes?

reaperman: I know what you mean about the lack of a source of radiant heat. If you're used to a wood stove, it's nice to have a place to warm your hands, butt, whatever. Our house has cast iron radiators, so it's kind of the best of both worlds: wood heat delivered through radiators all through the house. It's kind of like having little wood stoves in each room.

 

[laynes69]

I live in north central Ohio. About an hour from Cleveland.

 

[reaperman]

Laynes

My furnace ducting is hooked to the ducting just above my LP furnace in my mech room. Initally the heating guy who did my home said he would wire the wood furnace to my LP unit so the LP furnace blower fan would run on low speed when the wood furnace fan kicked in. But he is young and didnt wire it correctly. I noticed this when I moved into my new place in mid august. Because the air conditioner wasnt working and the wood furnace relay kept clicking on and off. So he came and fixed the air cond and disconnected the wood furnace and LP furnace from running together. I recently talked to another heating guy who said he could wire the two together correctly. This is suppose to be a bit more efficient for the return air, a topic on which I am ignorant about. But I am able to manually turn of the LP furnace blower fan from the wall thermostat which I do on occasion. This really helps on getting the heat moving around. The factory settings are kick on 150, off 100. Which I lowered to 95, on advise of the heating guy. Who claims I wont get the fan kicking on and off so much.

Again, I havent done much burning yet this year. Just light a fire at night and its out by morning, but the new home is insulated very well and the heat lasts until the next night without aid of the LP furnace. I'm thinking ahead to when the temps really start to drop into the sub-zero numbers. I'd like to think my furnace will keep up, which I think it will. I burn almost all hardwood, including oak, elm, ash. The only part of the home that feels cool is the basement floor, which is all concrete. But until I put carpet in thats the way it will feel.

I hope to eliminate as much LP as possible in the winter. I kind of got spoiled in my mobile home. I have a 100 gallon LP tank which I usually had filled once in the spring and again in the fall. Thanks for the input guys. Happy burning!

 

[laynes69]

Sounds like its installed paraelle. Mine is installed in series where I dont have blowers on the wood furnace I just have the single blower on the LP Furnace. The problem with the paraelle install is when the wood furnace kicks on, the blower on the gas furnace kicks on. The gas furnace is blowing cold air due to the returns while the wood furnace is blowing hot air. Whats left when they are mixed is cool air only. My woodfurnace is ran to my circuit board on the LP furnace by 2 little wires. The wood furnace will kick the furnace on when ever it needs to. If the LP furnace kicks on and the Woodfurnace is running, the blower will stop and the LP furnace will cycle then kick back on. When the LP furnace is done heating, if the woodfurnace still needs the blower, the blower just stays running. I have 3 8" ducts going into the woodfurnace and 3 8" ducts going to the main heat trunk of the home. Its kinda complicated but easy when you understand. I guess its the only legal way to install a woodfurnace in canada with another furnace.
With the control on the woodfurnace for me set at 140 on and about 80 off I get the most heat I can from the wood furnace. Our woodfurnace keeps up just fine for us.