Reducing my dependence on fossil fuel

[chiefchicken]

Thanks for the clarification. I thought your issue was with the masonry chimney as a result of the heat generated by the wood burning insert. I have heard that the welds can open up over time due to the repeated heating and cooling cycles.

Started our initial search for a wood burning insert yesterday with hopes to have something in place by next fall. We only have two acres, but I've been giving wood away the past few years for lack of use of it. How many pretty but inefficient fires can you have in an open fireplace? With oil going to $3.50/gal (+/-) last winter, it would only take a few years to payback on a wood burning insert, depending on how much of the wood fuel I can harvest from my property. At some point, I will have to buy wood to burn, but my guess is it will be lower per BTU for wood vs oil, especially if I buy log lengths and buck it and split it myself.

CHD, depending on the chimney/fireplace in your home and your budget, I would suggest you take a look at a traditional wood stove. Both my last and current house have had a traditional wood stove that is set in front of a standard masonry fireplace. The flue is connected to an adapter that allows the gasses to go up the masonry chimney. I've had very good luck with this setup. More than enough heat, and you can take it with you if you ever move. If you are close enough to Preston, CT, take a look at the Preston Trading Post. That is where I have purchased all my wood burning appliances for the past 17 years.

 

[CHDinCT]

CHD, depending on the chimney/fireplace in your home and your budget, I would suggest you take a look at a traditional wood stove. Both my last and current house have had a traditional wood stove that is set in front of a standard masonry fireplace. The flue is connected to an adapter that allows the gasses to go up the masonry chimney. I've had very good luck with this setup. More than enough heat, and you can take it with you if you ever move. If you are close enough to Preston, CT, take a look at the Preston Trading Post. That is where I have purchased all my wood burning appliances for the past 17 years.

C.C. - Been to Preston Trading Post several times. We shopped for a free standing wood stove for our Kitchen / Family room area but couldn't find a suitable spot in either roon due to all the set back requirements. I even considered taking windows out to make it work but no solution we came up with was acceptable to us. I ended up buying a used propane stove off of CL (close to PTP). That has worked out OK - doesn't put out the heat a wood stove would, but it's very convenient. Bought the propane tank so our cost per gal for propane was running about a $1+/gal less than oil. The propane stove really can't keep up when the temps really drop, so I'm still using oil to bring the house up to a minimum level (e.g., first thing in the morning), then let the propane stove maintain the temp.

Now we're looking, as stated, at putting a wood insert in the living room fireplace. It's kind of a formal room we only use on holiday's etc. but a good size stove should heat the whole downstairs and more, I'm hoping.

 

[jbrody44]

C.C. - Been to Preston Trading Post several times. We shopped for a free standing wood stove for our Kitchen / Family room area but couldn't find a suitable spot in either roon due to all the set back requirements. I even considered taking windows out to make it work but no solution we came up with was acceptable to us. I ended up buying a used propane stove off of CL (close to PTP). That has worked out OK - doesn't put out the heat a wood stove would, but it's very convenient. Bought the propane tank so our cost per gal for propane was running about a $1+/gal less than oil. The propane stove really can't keep up when the temps really drop, so I'm still using oil to bring the house up to a minimum level (e.g., first thing in the morning), then let the propane stove maintain the temp.

Now we're looking, as stated, at putting a wood insert in the living room fireplace. It's kind of a formal room we only use on holiday's etc. but a good size stove should heat the whole downstairs and more, I'm hoping.

We bought a Pacific Energy brand insert from "more than stoves" in Colchester CT about 6 years ago. This is a Canadian built stove. It has been flawless. We heat about 1500 sq. feet with it, they make a smaller and a larger size than the one we got. I burn about 4-5 cord of hardwood a season in it, and about 200 gallons of oil for hot water and to pick up the slack in the extreme cold. If we were able to keep it "fed" all day we would use much less oil, I generally have to re-stoke it in the afternoon, and first thing in the morning. Ideally I would feed it every 3 hours or so to keep it putting out at max level. It is a fantastic unit if you need an insert style wood burner. As pointed out earlier, you will get a bit more heat from a free standing stove

Like many others I would not enjoy my firewood harvesting without the help of my Bota:thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[CHDinCT]

We bought a Pacific Energy brand insert from "more than stoves" in Colchester CT about 6 years ago. This is a Canadian built stove. It has been flawless. We heat about 1500 sq. feet with it, they make a smaller and a larger size than the one we got. I burn about 4-5 cord of hardwood a season in it, and about 200 gallons of oil for hot water and to pick up the slack in the extreme cold. If we were able to keep it "fed" all day we would use much less oil, I generally have to re-stoke it in the afternoon, and first thing in the morning. Ideally I would feed it every 3 hours or so to keep it putting out at max level. It is a fantastic unit if you need an insert style wood burner. As pointed out earlier, you will get a bit more heat from a free standing stove

Like many others I would not enjoy my firewood harvesting without the help of my Bota:thumbsup::thumbsup:

jbrody, thanks for the recommendation. Will check them out as we are not too far from Cholchester. Our 1st floor is about 1,350 SF so a 1,500 SF unit is about what I think we need assuming some of the heat will make its way upstairs. On the other hand, might be better to go a bit bigger so we don't need to max it out to heat the 1st floor. Since March, I am around the house most days (sort of a good news/bad news story, but that's a different issue), so I could keep it stoked as needed. Getting it to burn all night might be an issue. From what I've seen, the smaller the unit the less total burn time it has on a single load.