Filling the wine rack and keeping the fire

  • Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.

    We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.

    We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
Status
Not open for further replies.
Battenkiller said:
Soupy, one cord of good dense wood like (oak, ash, maple, hickory etc.) weighs about 3600 pounds. Burning only one cord since Oct.1 means you used 3600 pounds of wood in 120 days, or only 30 pounds per day. The low heating value of seasoned wood (20%) MC is 7800 BTU/pound. If you can realistically achieve a day-in, day-out average of 75% overall efficiency (pretty difficult, but I'll assume you can), that's 7300 BTU/hr for 24 hours. At 30º outside temp, the average home will need twice that amount of BTUs to maintain a 70º inside temp (40º temperature difference). All of this tells me that one would have to have burned at least two cord to heat one's home entirely with wood from Oct. 1 until Feb. 1. YMMV depending on home and layout, but there are no free rides in the world of physics and heat. 30 pounds a day is nothing. I have put two splits in my stove before whose combined weight exceeded 30 pounds.
Electric would be almost that much a month.

Soupy doesn't 24/7, in fact he lets the stove go out during snow storms.. and at least where we live, 2 weeks of vacation in January would mean near 1/3 a cord "saved".. I figure we have about 16 weeks of heating season, with about 4 of them being shoulder(ish) few random cold spells or ambience fires outside of that.

If averaged.. we probably burn 24/6..lol

But we are through about 2 cords so far, have about 2/3 of a cord of 2yo cherry ready to move to the porch.. should get us through. My estimate after talking with full time burners around here was 2 1/2 cord.. stacked +3.. should have some left over..
 
a little over 4 cord thus far, the last 6 weeks I have been running at about 1/3 cord per week - lucky I have a good supply. These FPX units are hungry machines, work great but they have a big appetite.
 
soupy1957 said:
Shawn: The Australians HAVE been doing a nice job with wine in the last few years, I agree!

Question: Who's staying up all night, keeping the fire going?! Is this a case of, "you have sleep apnea like a buddy of mine, so you end up sleeping in the recliner, and waking up every couple of hours anyway, so you throw a log on the fire" kinda thing???? (Sound familiar to anyone in here????)

-Soupy1957

I very rarely wake up in middle of the night to reload the stove . . . most nights are typical of last night . . . loaded up around 10 p.m. (I usually try to time things to get the fire down to coals by 9:30 p.m.), got the temps set and went to bed and woke up at 5:15 a.m. to find a decent bed of coals . . . threw in some kindling and larger splits and I was back up to temp in 15 minutes . . . one of the reasons I bought a new EPA stove was to avoid waking up in middle of the night to reload the stove . . . truth be told the only time I do load in middle of the night is if it's wicked cold out and I'm up to go to the bathroom . . . or my wife is "switching" over from being awake during the day to working nights at her job as a nurse and then she loads during the night.
 
Backwoods Savage said:
Gamma Ray, you are right in that new burners will use more wood their fist year. Lots of fiddling with the stove. Learning to do. Wood not as dry as it should be, etc., etc.


I don't think we are at 2 cord burned yet. I'll wait until the end of the season before knowing exactly how much we burned. I do not think we've burned any more wood this year than in the past either.

Down the road a piece, we have one fellow who has burned 10 cord so far!!!

+1 on the comment about not burning as much wood in the second year of burning with some experience under the proverbial belt.

. . . I've never really got hung up on exactly how much wood I burn . . . but I know it's far less than what my dad burned when I was a kid -- 10-12 cords (real cords) with a wood furnace . . . and I have no idea of how many cords he went through with his outdoor wood boiler . . . which is perhaps the second reason I opted to go with an EPA woodstove vs. exempt woodstove or OWB -- I saw how much time he was spending processing wood and decided that as much as I love working with wood I didn't want to devote most of my free time to being a slave to wood heat.
 
firefighterjake said:
I very rarely wake up in middle of the night to reload the stove . . . most nights are typical of last night . . . loaded up around 10 p.m. (I usually try to time things to get the fire down to coals by 9:30 p.m.), got the temps set and went to bed and woke up at 5:15 a.m. to find a decent bed of coals . . . threw in some kindling and larger splits and I was back up to temp in 15 minutes . . .

LOL, getting up at 5:15 is the middle of the night here. I am often "up" about that time and load the stove.. then take my lazy butt back to bed 'till 8:00am.

I should point out I rarely am asleep before midnight, and she works in central time, so my 8am is her 7am... but mostly we don't use EST or CST.. we use GRST. (Golden Retriever Standard Time) and since they are both pretty old, they like to "sleep in"..
 
I don't have an exact number but I'm sitting at about 4 - 4.5 cord so far.
 
Dakotas Dad said:
Soupy doesn't 24/7, in fact he lets the stove go out during snow storms.

Well, that will all change when he sees my new firewood condoms - the Last Wordâ„¢ in firewood protection. He won't get get a single snowflake on his precious firewood with these babies. Complete with reservoir tip to catch all those nasty bugs as well.

Last Wordâ„¢ Shields - they're good for your wood.
 
Battenkiller said:
Dakotas Dad said:
Soupy doesn't 24/7, in fact he lets the stove go out during snow storms.

Well, that will all change when he sees my new firewood condoms - the Last Wordâ„¢ in firewood protection. He won't get get a single snowflake on his precious firewood with these babies. Complete with reservoir tip to catch all those nasty bugs as well.

Last Wordâ„¢ Shields - they're good for your wood.

Will there be "double bag" option?

I only ask because when I recommended putting some wood in a rack on his covered porch, he countered that it was a good idea, but he didn't have a spare tarp to cover it with.. :bug:
 
Dakotas Dad said:
I only ask because when I recommended putting some wood in a rack on his covered porch, he countered that it was a good idea, but he didn't have a spare tarp to cover it with.. :bug:

Well, what with the ongoing tarp shortage and the skyrocketing costs involved with procuring a genuine Chinese-made covering, I can see his reluctance to part with his coin for mere firewood protection.

Maybe he can get a little firewood poncho and shuttle his wood back and forth in style?

Don't get all riled up now, Soupy... just bustin' yer stones is all. ;-)
 
2 cords isn't much at all. That is about what I have burned, though my place is well insulated and I have a good stove. I know people that burn 10-12 cords a year. I have a feeling this thread is going to be like fuel mileage threads where there is always though couple guys that can tow a 40ft camper with their duallie and get 35mpg going uphill the whole way... yeah... sure....
 
Definiltly over the 2 cord mark, i have about 1/2 a cord sitting in the shed with 2 cords seasoned sitting on my back lot, not looking foward to moving them to the shed through the snow. wine racks not in bad shape wife found an argintina syrah-cab she likes and bought a case
 
north of 60 said:

:exclaim: Damn that's cold. I moved from Minnesota to North Carolina about 15 years ago, and sometimes get romantic notions about "missing the winter." Thanks for the wake-up call. A good thing about real winters was the feeling of pride -- come spring -- for having survived another one.
 
Primary heat in a 4000 sf house (not all of it actively heated though).

Burned just over 2 cords, probably close to 2 1/2 cords. It's hard to estimate because my wood lengths were pretty random on my first 2 cord stack that I'm nearly through now.
 
3 cords since Oct. 13, burning 24/7. Still have coals after 10+ hours. Only had to restart the stove twice so far this season.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.