Posted on 01/31/2005 2:42:57 PM PST by Willie Green
The best fuel for auger fed type stoves is cherry pits. I buy all I can get when I discover a load. Extremely hot and no ash whatsoever. A little tough on the auger when one gets bound, but ours has a reversing clutch to free itself.
I'm installing an outside wood burning boiler this summer and plumbing our hot water heater and inside boiler into it. I have enough wood just from our own woods for a zillion cords of fuel. I'd love to use the excuse to cut out all the trash basswood trees that are choking out the hardwoods and rare trees.
Smells like a corn-liquor still to boot!
I heat my house by burning corn
by Judith W. Monroe
http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles/monroe42.html
These systems take advantage of the fact that the earth is a huge heat/cold sink; a thermal buffer, if you will. Equipment(heat pumps)designed to exhaust cold/heat at the prevailing local temperature of the earth has the advantage of greater temperature differences; i.e., not having to push heat out of the house into hot air outside in the summer, and not having to push cold out into cold air in the winter. Downside is greater up-front costs.
Hi Viking,
I just read your post about wanting a log home and heating with an alternative heat source. You should check into these...
http://enertia.com/science.htm
My cousin has one, and says it works really well. If you go to the site, click photo tour, then "Jurassic Park", that's his house.
Downside is greater up-front costs.
It's worth it in the long run. I'm big on $tability
:D
I'm looking into getting a wood burning stove for my home. My fireplaces do heat but not efficiently. The Corn or wood pellet stoves require electric and a manufactured product that you have to remember to purchase. In a pinch there is always a source of firewood. I'm also looking at wood stove inserts. Any brand suggestions?
Mine is an old one - 'parlor' stove - love it. It has loading from front, top and side - can have front door closed and see flame thru micah 'window' or open for fireplace effect. It has the hand and the toe rails, great for warming toes! The Vermont Castings Stoves are good - the stoves with soapstone sides are great, giving out heat long time after fire has gone down...but it depends on your taste. I'd recommend going to an outfit that sells only stoves - or look online for ideas. Myself, I like the antique stoves - remind me of my childhood years growing up on the farm with my grandparents in the north Maine woods.. A wood stove is so 'friendly' - given constant heat, unlike the fluctuation of furnace heat.
I use a wood pellet stove for most of the heating in my home. Definitely a lot easier than cutting wood but of course there is some expense. Although this year wood pellets are much more economical than the propane that is my primary heat source. I have been told that I can mix corn with my pellets, but the corn has to be very dry to burn completely, somewhere in the range of under 12%. Wood pellets average around 5%.
I know wood fuel has an average btu output of 8600 BTU's of heat per pound but the higher the moisture content of the fuel, the less usable BTU's of heat are available. I don't know what the BTU per pound of corn is in comparison, however I doubt it is as much as wood. Moisture content of corn being 12% or more reduces the BTU output. Also the sugars in corn make "clunkers" as the wood pellets burn completely to a fine ash. I can burn about 200 lbs of wood pellets before I empty my ash pan, which is about 10" long, 5" wide, and 5" deep. Pretty amazing compared to cleaning out the old wood stove ash pan every day! And the wood pellets are made from sawdust.
The Buck Stove Insert is a very good choice. Installation is a little tricky though. A codified installation requires a direct vent from the top of the insert to the minimum of the first flue tile liner in the chimney. In many cases the installation requires a full stainless steel flue liner. Installing an insert changes the flow dynamics of a chimney and a much smaller flue vent is necessary to compensate for the reduced volume. I installed many stoves and inserts as a professional installer and chimney sweep.
Keep in mind that anything that needs a blower is susceptible to power outages. But a good free standing wood stove has a lot more convective heat than an insert.
Vermont Castings is an excellent stove. Somewhat pricier but worth it. Adds a nice touch to the decor as well. I used to have one of the parlor stoves. Burnt a lot of wood really fast since it wasnt very tight. But the ambience of a wood stove with a window is very comforting. :)
For those of you who do a lot of hiking and backpacking, check this out:
http://www.trailstove.com/
Seriously, I sold off my other stoves.
When my first wife & I bought a house in Seattle with her brother, he had an aversion to central heat, so we installed a wood stove in our bedroom, and once you got accustomed to the idea of "feeding the stove," it was a perfectly satisfactory source of heat.
I'd get up at dawn, set and light the fire, and jump back into bed until the room warmed up- other than not being "instant on," it worked fine.
I got a Whitfield, had it since 91, the free standing floor model.
About a bag a day during the winter, if the temp gets down to the teens, maybe a bag and a half, 18 hundred sf house.
I love that stove. Totally dependable. Clean it about once every 5 days or so.
I am very concerned that food is being turned into fuel.
What happens when we have to make choices between eating, heating homes or fueling vehicles?
If byproducts of the food processing industry can be used for fuel, fine. But, if the food itself is used for fuel, the farmer will have to make decisions about which market he will sell to and the one with the highest price (fuel) will win.
>>>>I am very concerned that food is being turned into fuel.
Don't be. There's a long, long way to go before we'd get anywhere near the scenario you paint.
BTTT!!!!!
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