Wood furnace add on with heat pump

[marceleb19]

Hello , I am purchasing a home which currently has a heat pump as the main heat source and AC for milder weather and has an oil furnace as auxiliary heat in the winter time . I live in New Brunswick Canada where winter temperatures can reach -40 so I need an auxiliary heat source for about 3-4 months ( december through march ) . I will need to replace my oil furnace and oil tank this year so after consideration I thought about getting a wood furnace instead as I am able to get free wood from lands I own . My question is , can I swap out my oil furnace an get a wood furnace installed in it's place ? I read some people using heat pumps with wood furnaces and other people don't recommend it . Any imput would be greatly appreciated

 

[flyingcow]

You can switch out the boilers but you probably shouldn't? Should leave a heat source of someknd that is a typical unit? But I wouldn't think it'd be a problem switching to all wood just that banks and realtor frown on all wood. No problem running a HP and wood boiler..I have both. They also make HP water heaters also.

Welcome there are other "over homers" here also. I'm just 40 miles south of HOULTON.

 

[flyingcow]

At least this will bump u to the top and others should chime in.

 

[rkusek]

If the oil furnace need replacing the wood furnace sounds like a reasonable replacement. The HP should have electric resistance backup and should satify the insurance company/bank requirements for a primary heat source. One thing to consider is if you don't plan to stay there long as mentioned above is that the market value could be hurt if oil is a lot cheaper than the electric HP portion since not everyone wants to burn wood.

 

[DBoon]

If you are using a heat pump as your back up, I would make sure that the one you have today either has an electric resistance backup or I would install a mini-split type rated for operation down to -15 degrees F or so (Fujitsu and Mitsubishi make these).

I went the mini-split route and even at well be 0 degrees F it put out rated heat (15 kBTU) and more than rated heat above this. My application is just to keep a vacant (and being renovated) house at 50-55 degrees F through the winter, and it did that with a little help (about 100 gallons) from the oil furnace. Normally, the oil furnace would have used 500 gallons. It was a cold winter, and a good test of capability for the mini-split. We had many nights well below zero degrees F here in Central NY this year.

 

[marceleb19]

If you are using a heat pump as your back up, I would make sure that the one you have today either has an electric resistance backup or I would install a mini-split type rated for operation down to -15 degrees F or so (Fujitsu and Mitsubishi make these).

I went the mini-split route and even at well be 0 degrees F it put out rated heat (15 kBTU) and more than rated heat above this. My application is just to keep a vacant (and being renovated) house at 50-55 degrees F through the winter, and it did that with a little help (about 100 gallons) from the oil furnace. Normally, the oil furnace would have used 500 gallons. It was a cold winter, and a good test of capability for the mini-split. We had many nights well below zero degrees F
here in Central NY this year.

thanks every one for the imput . The heat pump right now is set to run down to -18 C then the oil furnace wood kick in . I believe the Heat Pump is whats called a single stage heat pump as it was meant to be used with the assistance of the oil furnace . If I am correct I think this means there are no electric resistance in the air handler . I think these can be installed pretty cheap the heat strips can be purchased for around 200$ for 10 Kwh but what worries me is the cost or electricity for when these heat strips will come on , I have read online a lot that people are getting huge bills when the start using the heat strips with the heat pump