How many of you guys/gals rely on your stove 100%?

[Bassmantweed]

For the past 2 years I have been trying to use my wood stove to heat my house 100%. Today i looked around my house with all of my fans and humidifiers and I had a bit of an epiphany.

Why don't I use my wood stove to supplement my heating system?

1. I can run my stove in it's most efficient operating zone rather than pushing it as a blast furnace 100% of the time wasting wood.
2. My furnace returns are in the room where my stove is so when my furnace does kick in it would mostly be redistributing the existing heat.
3. My hvac has a built in humidifier.

I don't look at this as a failure, just a better use of resources.......

Thoughts!

 

[fatjay]

I have an oil furnace with baseboard hot water, I don't even have air ducts. I have a good layout to heat most of my house with my wood stove, and it's cheaper by far. I burn 24/7 and my inefficient furnace only kicks on when it hits the coldest of cold, or neglects causes the stove to burn out.

That being said, a friend has an LP furnace with forced air, and has a pellet stove. He turns off the furnace and just uses the forced air ducts to circulate the air that his pellet stove heats. Maybe something like that would work for you?

 

[JTRock]

I guess it depends on how vested you are. Is it a necessity that you burn wood exclusively? For some it's a necessity, also for others it's a passion, culture and lifestyle.

This is my 1st year with wood and my first winter in this home. This young season I am finding success and taking pressure off myself using wood by making my primary pellet and supplementing with wood.

 

[wenger7446]

In am about 80% wood and 20% heat pump. I would be 100% wood but am out of he house doe 11hrs of the day.

 

[Thislilfishy]

That was my plan all along. We are currently using the wood stove for 99% of our heating. Come the depths of winter I am hoping it will at least cover 50% of our heating. We have a forced air LP furnace as well, with a digital thermostat that cycles the fan for 5 minutes every 15 minutes. It does a decent job of equalizing the temp through the house from the woodstove. If I get the stove really cranking out heat I turn the furnace fan on full time for an hour or two which will bring the entire house to the same temp.

I have the thermostat set at a very cool temp to prevent the house from getting too cold through the night or when I am at work. So far this winter we've used 10% of our propane tank, and we'd be closer to using 40%. That includes two weeks of heating before the wood stove was installed. Due to the age and draftiness of this house I am assuming when we get down to the -20 temps (Celsius) we will be using the furnace to supplement the wood stove a lot more to keep the bedrooms warmish. A tighter house would likely be more easily heated on the wood stove alone though.

Ian

 

[Bassmantweed]

That was my plan all along. We are currently using the wood stove for 99% of our heating. Come the depths of winter I am hoping it will at least cover 50% of our heating. We have a forced air LP furnace as well, with a digital thermostat that cycles the fan for 5 minutes every 15 minutes. It does a decent job of equalizing the temp through the house from the woodstove. If I get the stove really cranking out heat I turn the furnace fan on full time for an hour or two which will bring the entire house to the same temp.

I have the thermostat set at a very cool temp to prevent the house from getting too cold through the night or when I am at work. So far this winter we've used 10% of our propane tank, and we'd be closer to using 40%. That includes two weeks of heating before the wood stove was installed. Due to the age and draftiness of this house I am assuming when we get down to the -20 temps (Celsius) we will be using the furnace to supplement the wood stove a lot more to keep the bedrooms warmish. A tighter house would likely be more easily heated on the wood stove alone though.

Ian

What thermostat are you using that just turns on the fan?

 

[Thislilfishy]

It's a Noma unit, I have had Honeywell units in the past, and everyone I had was a total pile of crap with wild temperature variances. This Noma one has been very good with no surprises.


http://www.upm-marketing.com/manuals/THM501_E.pdf

 

[bens_igloo]

Nothing wrong with that. We use our wood insert to supplement the heat from our 95% efficiency nat gas furnace. If I had to pay for my firewood if wouldn't make much sense but it's all from scrounging.

For us, the supplemental heats allows the house to be very toasty without concern for heating costs and is plain and simple just a great hobby.

 

[NYCPrincess]

We work mon-fri. We only run the stove at night/overnight and all weekend long. Any other time we simply put the furnace on (oil heat) in the mid 60s so it's not so cold when we get home. If the kids come home before us, they can turn up the heat to 72 until we get home, at which time the stove comes on.

We purchased it with the understanding it could never be run 24/7.

 

[DougA]

I can run my stove in it's most efficient operating zone rather than pushing it as a blast furnace 100% of the time wasting wood.

I'm not sure that is correct at all. I find running the stove 'hot' (650 range) is actually better. Less ash, less coaling, no more wood use than corresponding lower temps, more comfortable in the house.
Just my thought, since you asked.
We're running nearly 100% wood 24/7 in the living/dining/kitchen and baseboards in the bedrooms. No easy way to move the heat into the bedrooms and honestly, we prefer bedrooms to be much cooler anyway.

 

[Bigg_Redd]

For the past 2 years I have been trying to use my wood stove to heat my house 100%. Today i looked around my house with all of my fans and humidifiers and I had a bit of an epiphany.

Why don't I use my wood stove to supplement my heating system?

1. I can run my stove in it's most efficient operating zone rather than pushing it as a blast furnace 100% of the time wasting wood.
2. My furnace returns are in the room where my stove is so when my furnace does kick in it would mostly be redistributing the existing heat.
3. My hvac has a built in humidifier.

I don't look at this as a failure, just a better use of resources.......

Thoughts!

As I am not rich and I don't live in a fancy house with HVAC like you I do not really understand your epiphany.

My poor white trash house has baseboard heaters and a wood stove. The baseboard heaters have bee on once since I moved in almost 9 years ago.

Eh?

 

[Cory S]

95% primary heat. 92.7% LP (Propane) gas furnace as backup.

Total propane cost per 12 months without wood. $2300.00

Total propane cost with wood as primary heat. $350.00 (we have an LP gas dryer and water heater)

Total cost of wood. $540.00. We win.....

 

[Thislilfishy]

95% primary heat. 92.7% LP (Propane) gas furnace as backup.

Total propane cost per 12 months without wood. $2300.00

Total propane cost with wood as primary heat. $350.00 (we have an LP gas dryer and water heater)

Total cost of wood. $540.00. We win.....

I hope to be the same, last year we also used about $2300 in propane. I managed to get enough wood for the winter for about $300 total cost for this year I think. The last load of cedar should get us through the last bit of spring. Hope to get lucky for wood next year too, at which point the wood stove install cost will have been paid for! Most likely a 3 year ROI though....oh yeah, and this years propane rate was increased by 20% from the rate we had last year.

Edit: holy crap, I just now realized it was a 20% increase over last year. That puts me closer to $3000 projected for this year...geezuz....time to become a hermit!

Ian

 

[Cory S]

Ian, sounds like your on your way to a large savings though!! The more free wood the better. If it burns.... It will throw heat!

 

[TomatoLover]

We're hoping to get 100% of our heat from our wood stove(s). We bought the house earlier in the year, so this will be our first winter. Our backup is electric baseboard, and with National Grid announcing a 37% increase in electric rates Nov. 1, that puts us at about $.30 per kwh. I'll burn furniture before I turn on those electric baseboards! We're also installing solar panels and hope to go off grid. Fortunately, the house is in the middle of a forest and we have lots and lots of trees. For us, it was a major lifestyle change. It was time to leave the city and explore life in the woods. Tonight we used the wood stove to make dinner (potatoes and squash in foil packs in the coals, flounder on cedar planks and parchment paper). My new mission is to pay as little as possible to the utility company!

 

[Bassmantweed]

As I am not rich and I don't live in a fancy house with HVAC like you I do not really understand your epiphany.

My poor white trash house has baseboard heaters and a wood stove. The baseboard heaters have bee on once since I moved in almost 9 years ago.

Eh?

Yes I live in a mansion.

 

[jimdrea]

I have a Napoleon 1402 we have been tinkering with it for a year. My wife and I work my daughter is in high school and son away at college. We have programable thermostats in the house. 60 degrees from 8 am to 2pm up to 65 from 2pm to 4pm then we light the insert. The whole downstairs gets to a comfy 72 degrees in an hour. We run all weekend with the stove. Nothing beats the comfort of the heat from the stove.

 

[BobUrban]

95% + if I go out of town or it gets polar vortex cold I run the LP furnace to keep from spending my savings on new copper pipes. Also have gas stove, Hot water and dryer(water heater and dryer will be converted to electric when they die)

As much as a savings - which I certainly enjoy - it is also my attempt to "beat the man!!" Propane 24/7 cost between 25-3500 per yr prior to the stove. Now I top off the pig in the fall for around 4-600 clams. Wood is free sans labor which I still enjoy so at this point I feel I am winning.

 

[stephiedoll]

I would guess 60-70% wood the rest NG. Raised ranch with the undersized stove at the bottom of the stairs. Myself and a partner (he heats 100% wood) also sell so that nets around $1,500-$2,000 each per year. Thinking of a larger stove but with NG not sure if it would ever pay for itself. Still love the looks of the new Woodstock IS though. Could put a second stove upstairs and go 100% but then have to take care of 2 stoves and ROI would still be poor.
I guess it is more of a nice little hobby with a little extra cash for some toys.

 

[SteveKG]

We only have wood stoves. So except for some warm air from the solar greenhouse [attached] when there is a sunny day, we are 100% wood and have been since 1974. We actually don't have anything else, no back-up.

 

[Hawkeye]

We heat about 75% with wood. The rest NG and a forced air furnace (with humidifier). My wife and both work and chase two small kids around so during the day often nobody is home. That said, the stove has burned non-stop the last 7 days with the recent cool down.

Our house is only a few years old, and built with the wood stove in mind. Some of the things we did that have really paid off are: 1 - zone heating and AC. Its not a big house but its 2 story, and we also use the basement a lot. So on each floor we put in a thermostat and dampers on the furnace/AC so that when it does run, it only puts the heat or cooling where you want it (i.e. heat in the basement or AC on the second floor).

But my favorite is: 2 - we put in a small duct and duct fan (separate from the furnace/AC) that is controlled by a variable speed switch behind the wood stove. This duct pulls cool air from two floor vents (they look just like the furnace/AC floor vents) from the far side of the house and blows this air behind the wood stove. We run this duct whenever the wood stove is burning, most of the time at its lowesst speed. It draws very little electricity and is quiet enough you can not hear it on low. On high, you can hear it, but very little. This duct has really worked well to keep the heat distributed throughout the house. And if I'm trying to warm the house up quickly, just turn the duct fan up and it moves enough air by the wood stove you can heat the place up quickly.

 

[NJ_Burner08002]

I wish my house was laid out to be able to only use my insert. My insert heats the family room, kitchen and dining room. Living room and upstairs barely gets heated. So I put the heat on a little at night time to warm the upstairs. So I would say I am a 70/30 guy.

 

[not on the rug]

i'm like 98% with give or take. the only other heat I use besides the woodstove is the electric baseboard in my upstairs bathroom when I shower in the wintertime. I turn it on at 5am to get the bathroom hot, my wife and I eat breakfast, shower and get ready for work. by 6:30 we've shut it off and we leave for work at 6:45

 

[Andy S.]

I'm limited by firebox size due to the small prefab fireplace I started with and work schedule that has most evenings as a cold start. All I can ever hope for is supplemental heat and it bugs me no end. On nights in the teens (like last night) It'll take a while to warm everything up enough to stop the heat pump (set at 67*). Then on the overnight it will keep the thing off for a while and hopefully prevent the emergency heat from coming on. The savings are real but I'd LOVE to have a bigger unit.

 

[Woody Stover]

The higher you crank the tweed amp, the more heat it will give off...