Help: My Shoulders Are Uneven!

[turbocruiser]

My shoulders (shoulder heating seasons that is) are uneven and I need help to make them more even. I always anxiously await temperatures below 50 degrees as Summer yields to Fall so I am able to start the stove and even if I have to start small fires and open large windows I can't wait to start the stove every year.

If the Winter is typical the two shoulder seasons are pretty even (I even start small fires and open large windows in late Spring!) however with the mild weather we're having here I find I am leaving the stove off for a few days at a time, and lazily allowing the furnace to kick on for a few minutes here and there just to warm the place slightly.

This just truly doesn't feel right and yet as wrong as it is that I'm not using the stove the way I want to, it also seems equally wrong that for the first time I'm trying to really remind myself to use the stove instead of being overly happy to use the stove! So any suggestions, thoughts, etc that would help me here would be much appreciated. Thanks.

 

[tfdchief]

Just shut the furnace off. Then you will burn your stove when it cools off in the house. You will be surprised how often, even when it is just chilly outside, that you will start a fire. Then you will love your stove again

 

[pen]

If I have to open the window in this place, I burnt something when cooking or I overloaded the stove.

If I have long sleeves on, and feel a chill, I didn't do my job with the stove.

Keeping in between those two is the goal.

To help, I keep the thermostat at 60, just in case on the low end. However, if we get under 68, someone is nudging me to get to the stove. On occasion I'll come home to a 62 degree house, but that's only when it's warm enough that the evening load will bring things back up to comfortable in a short amount of time. When it's dead of winter, I don't let things get that low generally, and if they do, I'll give the back-up heat some exercise.

At the end of the day, the worst case scenario is you waste some wood. If you can live with that, then do whatever keeps those under the same roof happy.

pen

 

[BrotherBart]

What's a furnace?

 

[corey21]

At my house the family likes it warm always my electric heat stays on 68 and when the temps falls to 70 i fire the stove up. But in mild weather it is a challenge cause the stove will overheat the house with ease so i do a lot of cold starts.

Now when winter is in full force i have trouble keeping the back end of the home warm. So when it is like it is tonight through tomorrow night the stove will not go cold.

 

[embers aplenty]

Keep so much firewood ahead, that you feel like if you don't burn it, it will go to waste!! Turn furnace off as previously mentioned. Keep fire starters and small splits handy at all times to make it more inviting for you to start a fire.

Look at it like, do I really want to give the neighbors a break from the smoke?? Nah!!

 

[Dustin]

I'm having the same problem in my neck of the woods lately, it's just not as cold as I'm used to.

During the day, it's warming up to 50 outside, I just can't justify running the stove when no one is home all day. I have no furnace and a poorly insulated house. So I usually come from work to a 60 to 65 degree house. I fire up and it's up to 70 by dinner time. With super cedars I don't mind the cold starts. I run the stove overnight and don't re load in the morning. Seems to work okay so far

 

[Mitch Newton]

I'm having the same problem in my neck of the woods lately, it's just not as cold as I'm used to.

During the day, it's warming up to 50 outside, I just can't justify running the stove when no one is home all day. I have no furnace and a poorly insulated house. So I usually come from work to a 60 to 65 degree house. I fire up and it's up to 70 by dinner time. With super cedars I don't mind the cold starts. I run the stove overnight and don't re load in the morning. Seems to work okay so far

Nothing wrong with that set up

 

[BobUrban]

To warm out to justify firing up the stove in Mid February is a high class problem

Equivelent to having to much firewood CSS'd, To many saws, etc...

 

[Highbeam]

I am in nearly a perpetual shoulder season where I live near the puget sound. Once you commit to heating with wood then you understand that there will be some temperature swings in the house when it is relatively warm outside. Even if it is 60 degrees outside, if the house is uncomfortable we light a fire. Small fire, maybe, but there is no shortage of firewood.

 

[nate379]

I generally don't bother with the stove if it's staying over 35-40ish outside.... usually between late October to April it doesn't get that warm. After that it's easier to let the boiler run vs trying to get a decent burn in the stove but not overheat the house.

 

[begreen]

Wood heats the house pretty well with temps below 50F, though often I don't burn wood until it gets below 45F outside. In milder weather we just burn shorter, hot fires and let them go out. SuperCedars are a godsend for shoulder season burning.

 

[Lumber-Jack]

I'm having the same problem in my neck of the woods lately, it's just not as cold as I'm used to.
During the day, it's warming up to 50 outside, I just can't justify running the stove when no one is home all day. I have no furnace and a poorly insulated house. So I usually come from work to a 60 to 65 degree house. I fire up and it's up to 70 by dinner time. With super cedars I don't mind the cold starts. I run the stove overnight and don't re load in the morning. Seems to work okay so far

We've been running the stove like that all winter, start a fire at night, let it go out during the day. Don't see it as a problem, in fact it saves us wood over trying to keep a fire going 24/7. The heat pump thermostat is set at 62 F (17 C), it seldom comes on between burns, but the house does cool down a bit sometimes, but you know, when the house is a little cool, that's when you really enjoy the wood stove fire the most.
I've lived in old un-insulated shacks who's only heat was an old kitchen wood stove, at night the temps inside would drop to near freezing. First thing you'd do in the morning was get your freezing butt out of bed, light a fire in the stove and throw a pot of coffee on the stove while the place started to thaw out. I feel spoiled when I get chilled and want to start a fire in the stove and the house is still above 68 F (20 C).

 

[corey21]

Another thing that would help is to leave a good bed of ash in the stove so the coals will last longer.

 

[rdust]

When I had a non cat I would run it like others, smaller hot fires and let it go out. This is where a cat stove shines, fill it up, dial it down and not overheat the place. My stove on low is probably close to an electric space heater.

In all honesty if I had natural gas I would probably let the furnace pick up a lot of the shoulder season. Since we're on propain I have a lot of trouble letting that happen. I'm at the point in the season where I'm done with the winter. I can't wait for 70* evenings and having a cold drink on the deck.

 

[Highbeam]

There is a difference between those of us that burn wood for 100% of our heat and those that have a good and cheap running furnace system. Shoulder seasons are much different between these two groups. I heat with wood and only wood. If I get cold I think of starting a fire and getting very warm where a guy with an efficient boiler/furance might instead consider spending a dollar to heat the home just a little bit to the point of comfort. Neither of us are wrong.

 

[ArsenalDon]

allowing the furnace to kick on for a few minutes

Blasphemer! To Quote the great philosopher Homer Simpson (although I don't think he was talking about my propane provider) They can kiss my hairy yellow butt. They ripped me off for too much before my stove!

 

[soupy1957]

Everyone in here would (should) readily admit that there are times (particularly near the end of winter) when the "chore" feeling strikes. Kinda like those times when an ex-smoker really WOULD like to have "just one."

Welcome to the human race!

-soupy1957

 

[pen]

Everyone in here would (should) readily admit that there are times (particularly near the end of winter) when the "chore" feeling strikes. Kinda like those times when an ex-smoker really WOULD like to have "just one."

Welcome to the human race!

-soupy1957

Nope

 

[Highbeam]

Nope. I have never gotten tired of it. Not yet. I do get tired of making coffee every night before bed, going to work, even shaving my whiskers, but the fire is different.

 

[ScotO]

I generally don't bother with the stove if it's staying over 35-40ish outside.... usually between late October to April it doesn't get that warm. After that it's easier to let the boiler run vs trying to get a decent burn in the stove but not overheat the house.

Holy chit, I'd never have to build a fire if that was the case ........It seems rare that it gets much colder than that here in the winters anymore!

 

[ScotO]

We have 19 thermostats in the house to help regulate the heat on those 'milder' days here....

They are the old fashioned thermostats, and once you learn how far to adjust them, you'll never have to worry about overheating the house again.....

These aren't the actual thermostats in my house (just a pic off of the internet), but you get the point....


(broken image removed)

 

[tfdchief]

Everyone in here would (should) readily admit that there are times (particularly near the end of winter) when the "chore" feeling strikes. Kinda like those times when an ex-smoker really WOULD like to have "just one."

Welcome to the human race!

-soupy1957

Nope, but I sure would like to have that cigarette.

 

[ScotO]

Everyone in here would (should) readily admit that there are times (particularly near the end of winter) when the "chore" feeling strikes. Kinda like those times when an ex-smoker really WOULD like to have "just one."

Welcome to the human race!

-soupy1957

Soup, I actually like to do it, I'll be kinda sad to see winter go. But I am a winter and snow lover, so I guess I must be a little nuts right from the get-go!!

 

[soupy1957]

Ok, so they're all going to lie to you and not admit that wood burning "at times" (not often) can be a pain. That's fine. The whole point is, the value is worth the hassle.

-soup1957