Outdoor Wood Boiler

[gabe31]

Good evening all,

This will be my first post so I'm hoping this is even in the right thread. I'm in the market for an outdoor wood burning furnace. My home is 1,400 square feet with a crawl space. The house is well insulated and has an indoor fireplace which provides 0 heat because it has no blowers. I'm tired of feeding the electric company all of my money and I'm ready to take control of our heating situation. I know a wood furnace is the way that I want to go because I have endless access to wood. My father-in-law has a 40 acre farm with enough trees to last us our lifetime. Not including the Amish saw mill that is down the road. I was hoping to get everyone's thoughts on the best brands of furnace. I've done a lot of research and am starting to lean towards a furnace by Central Boiler.

Thoughts?

Gabe

 

[hobbyheater]

Good evening allThoughts?
Gabe

Welcome to Hearth .
I won't be of much help I'm one of those indoor guys .

 

[hobbyheater]

The E classic looks like it has the potential to be efficient and clean burning if it has a load or a demand for a lot of heat.

Your house is small well insulated making for a very small load likely under 25,000 BTU'S per hour . The smallest Classsic has the potential for 200,000 BTU'S per hour , so the boiler will idle much of the time ,and the times it will burn all out will have difficulty get up to the temperatures to burn cleanly and efficiently .
I would suggest looking at making a small out building and putting a smaller indoor gasification boiler with two used 500 gallon propane tanks for storage . The cost is likely not going to be much more than the E classic .

(broken link removed to http://www.newhorizonstore.com/Category/54-gasification-boilers.aspx)

Just a different approach

Specs for the smallest E Classic
$9,130


Door
Firebox
Weight
Water Capacity


18.5"x18.5"
32"x32.5"x24"
2,085 lbs.
195 Gallons

(broken image removed)


8-Hr Output Rating
12-Hr Output Rating

Manufacturer’s Rated
Heat Output Capacity


107,000 Btu/hr †
72,000 Btu/hr


209,000 Btu/hr †












- See more at: http://www.centralboiler.com/e-classic.html#1400

 

[rombi]

My only advise is to do it right the first time, I am on 7 years with a OWB smoke dragon and wish I would have went a different route like all these gasser guys did.

 

[flyingcow]

Welcome. You'll find most of us gassification snobs. CB is better than burning oil or propane but a true gasser will use less wood and not smoke. For about the same money. And storage isn't a must with a gasser.

 

[RobC]

I have had both indoor and outdoor. By the time your done with the underground piping etc outdoor is not inexpensive. Read about underground piping because this is not a place to skimp. However the real cost is the amount of wood you will burn year after year. A gassifier of any sort will burn substantially less wood. Like 1/2.
My dream set up would be a gassifier with storage, in an attached ( to home ) shed with enough wood storage for 1 cord or so. The shed would be to keep any ash, smoke dirt out of home. Storage could be located anywhere....

 

[maple1]

We don't know anything about your house layout, or your existing heat distribution system.

Going by what you have said, I think I would put a good wood stove in. That sounds like a very small heat load, which would be a bad match for an OWB.

 

[BoilerMan]

We don't know anything about your house layout, or your existing heat distribution system.

Going by what you have said, I think I would put a good wood stove in. That sounds like a very small heat load, which would be a bad match for an OWB.

This is true especially if you have forced hot air stuffed in a crawlspace.

As has been said, the majority of us on here have tried the OWB and "smoke dragon" route and have not been happy with the wood consumption/work involved. We have graduated to gasifiers andhave seen the benefits first-hand.

TS

 

[Vizsla]

So what have you come up with ? Any layout ideas? What is your budget for total project?