Wood Journal

[CageMaster]

Does anyone out there keep a journal, I've started recording the date of the first fire, date we switch from shoulder season one a day fires to continuous burns, when the first serious wood ( burr oak in our case ) needs to be used, last day burning etc.

This is all merely done for my amusement to compare from year to year but I do find it interesting to see patterns starting to develop, it will be even more interesting to look back after 20 or 30 years and really see if and how the winters go in "cycles"

 

[Goater32]

Blades of Steal.....Ching---Flip the Pass....Started one this year.

 

[NateB]

So do you use pencil and paper, or are you going high tech with excel for charts and graphs (to impress the family at Thanksgiving)

 

[Jags]

My journal consists of:
Fall - had to start the first fire today - damn.
Spring - no more fires - Yay!

 

[tsquini]

I have a set amount of wood for each year. That is my journal. If I'm under for the year I smile. If I go over I frown.

 

[PapaDave]

I've attempted to begin doing similar, but lose interest. I know how much wood I need every winter, put up about a cord more than that for peace of mind, and watch it burn away.
Its been pretty steady year after year.
I burn whatever is needed to keep warm, and it still works out about the same.
Weird.
The transitions are very vague...too hard to pinpoint. I'll sometimes throw a couple splits of Oak in with the pine or Maple....sometimes the opposite, even though I segregate the wood according to when it'll be used. I suppose I could record when I run out of each type of wood and move to the next, but I sort of have that figured out fairly well.
That helps determine next years amounts.
I've done the journal thing in my head.
You could look back in future years to "The year we burned so much wood" kind of thing. That might be interesting.

 

[PDXpyro]

My journal consists of:
Fall - had to start the first fire today - damn.
Spring - no more fires - Yay!

So wait: you're saying that the first fire is regrettable and the last one calls for celebration? That's kind of tragic, considering all the effort and attention we give to fiery subjects. I'll admit that by the time spring finally arrives for real it's kind of nice to slack off, but all in all, as long as we're living in cool temperate zones cozy fires are mostly cause for celebration -- and isn't that the whole point of this forum? (just kiddin' ya here)

 

[Jags]

So wait: you're saying that the first fire is regrettable and the last one calls for celebration? That's kind of tragic, considering all the effort and attention we give to fiery subjects. I'll admit that by the time spring finally arrives for real it's kind of nice to slack off, but all in all, as long as we're living in cool temperate zones cozy fires are mostly cause for celebration -- and isn't that the whole point of this forum? (just kiddin' ya here)

I actually look forward to the first fires. Then around Nov. I realize what those fires signal is coming in shortly. Then it is all out burn baby burn, then I get tired of fetching wood. Spring signals that I don't need to do that anymore. Make no mistake that I love the heat from my stove, but it is a 3 times a day chore. I might as well have dairy cows.

And I have been doing this for a while (the honeymoon is over). And I will continue....

I am an advocate of wood heat. It has many, many upsides to it. Fetching 3 loads of wood per day ain't one of them in my eyes. Just a chore (like doing dishes or laundry).

 

[Bigg_Redd]

Does anyone out there keep a journal, I've started recording the date of the first fire, date we switch from shoulder season one a day fires to continuous burns, when the first serious wood ( burr oak in our case ) needs to be used, last day burning etc.

This is all merely done for my amusement to compare from year to year but I do find it interesting to see patterns starting to develop, it will be even more interesting to look back after 20 or 30 years and really see if and how the winters go in "cycles"

Nope.

 

[Stax]

Well said Jags.

 

[Slow1]

Hmm... well.. umm... yeah I guess if a spreadsheet with record of the date/time of every split ever put in my stove counts as a "journal" But this is a bit more than that keep in mind, I also import the daily degree days and that way it calculates my average usage and I can compare to prior years normalized for the average head load...

Ok, yes MAYBE a bit anal, but I'm sure I'll find a respectable use for it sometime, heh.

 

[BIGDADDY]

I can't get into journaling anything.
It may be of some benefit due to lack of memory or possibly if you ever get another stove to compare usage.
Best wishes

 

[Coal Reaper]

Hmm... well.. umm... yeah I guess if a spreadsheet with record of the date/time of every split ever put in my stove counts as a "journal" But this is a bit more than that keep in mind, I also import the daily degree days and that way it calculates my average usage and I can compare to prior years normalized for the average head load...

Ok, yes MAYBE a bit anal, but I'm sure I'll find a respectable use for it sometime, heh.

Where do yu import daily degree days from? Can this provide a forecast as well?

 

[Slow1]

Where do yu import daily degree days from? Can this provide a forecast as well?

I pull them in from degreedays.net - I don't think they do forecasts, but you never know.. .their data comes from wunderground which does do forecasts...

 

[lml999]

I am an advocate of wood heat. It has many, many upsides to it. Fetching 3 loads of wood per day ain't one of them in my eyes. Just a chore (like doing dishes or laundry).

Right. But if I am fetching the wood and tending the fire, I can dodge doing the dishes. Sometimes.

 

[fossil]

Anything I write down today I'm not going to be reading 20 years from now.

 

[Slow1]

Anything I write down today I'm not going to be reading 20 years from now.

But it might be carved in stone somewhere

 

[CaddyUser]

Hmm... well.. umm... yeah I guess if a spreadsheet with record of the date/time of every split ever put in my stove counts as a "journal" But this is a bit more than that keep in mind, I also import the daily degree days and that way it calculates my average usage and I can compare to prior years normalized for the average head load...

Ok, yes MAYBE a bit anal, but I'm sure I'll find a respectable use for it sometime, heh.

I'm glad to know that others have a degree day spreadsheet too. I have another table that links into the degree days to estimate the number of cords per year, and then a comparison to what it would cost if we were using heating oil. For instance, it took about 2.5 years to pay for the new furnace, chimney, etc. We are now starting year five, and it makes it easier to now justify the other tools (splitter, additional saws, etc)....

 

[Sinngetreu]

So wait: you're saying that the first fire is regrettable and the last one calls for celebration? That's kind of tragic, considering all the effort and attention we give to fiery subjects. I'll admit that by the time spring finally arrives for real it's kind of nice to slack off, but all in all, as long as we're living in cool temperate zones cozy fires are mostly cause for celebration -- and isn't that the whole point of this forum? (just kiddin' ya here)

I was kinda thinking the same thing, then I read Jags response, now I'm not sure how to feel! JK, its great to be able to save a few bucks and provide heat for the family (along with the interest of different woods and their BTU values making it interesting), but in the end it is work and that can have its pros and cons.

 

[Soundchasm]

I'm glad to know that others have a degree day spreadsheet too. I have another table that links into the degree days to estimate the number of cords per year, and then a comparison to what it would cost if we were using heating oil. For instance, it took about 2.5 years to pay for the new furnace, chimney, etc. We are now starting year five, and it makes it easier to now justify the other tools (splitter, additional saws, etc)....

We moved into an all electric house in 2002. I was floored by the first winter bills ($300-500/mo), and started working on how to save energy and ended up here, amongst other projects. I created a spreadsheet to track KWH/mo and the avg monthly temp, and noted accomplishments like insulation, light color shingles, wood stoves, new heat pumps and such.

The good news is that I've gone from 31,000 KWH to 18,000 KWH per year from 2002 to 2012. The bad part is that it's pretty hard to attribute savings to any one strategy. Too many variables. Even flushing a toilet here is electricity. If a month is high electric per other months of the same temp, I'll try to think if the oven ran a lot, or if yard/plants got a lot of water, etc.

Without the notes, I'd only suspect I was doing better, and the bill amount doesn't matter much since rates only go up. But I think it's cheaper to air condition than to heat.

I hate hanging on to stuff, but every now and then I find an email or document that really takes me back, and it's nice to have confirmation that there really was a past, and it wasn't my imagination!

 

[firefighterjake]

Dear Diary,

Today I started a fire in my woodstove using pine. Surprisingly, I did not burn down my house. Later on, I switched to black locust which was the cat's meow.

In other news I think Johnny likes Sarah and not me. Now I hate Sarah.

 

[JustWood]

I have a 12 month poster calendar ( all 12 months visble at the same time) on the wall in the mud room. 1st fire in the stove ,1st in furnace, last fire are marked as well as when different garden stuff was planted, first frost, bad snow events and other trivial stuff. It's helpful to be able to look back on.

 

[BillLion]

In a related way I keep a wood journal. I use Evernote to capture a lot of details regarding types of wood I've gathered, dates logs were split, and lots of tips I've found here and on other sites. Super useful because on Evernote because I can type it on my phone or computer and it all synchs together and I have the info available whenever I want it.

 

[My Oslo heats my home]

My journal consists of:
Fall - had to start the first fire today - damn.
Spring - no more fires - Yay!

+1, thats me too....although I'm happy when both times of the year come around.