What's everyone use as supplemental or main heat?

[Pete Judd]

Heat pump central heat, and a pellet stove. Cost still to high, but if I installed a wood stove my insurance bill would cost more than the savings in the heating bill.

 

[LJH]

Main heat is wood, burned in a masonry heater. Toe-kick heaters in the two bathrooms and for backup an electric wall unit w/thermostat that was required by the stooopid insurance company before they'd cover us. We never turn it on, I suppose it still works. Fugly thing defaces one of the living room walls. Oh, and a 100 yr. old Wedgewood range in the kitchen. That's good for quick heat in the immediate area.

One day when we're really old & decrepit I suppose we'll have to hire out the wood cutting & hauling or at last resort, install an HVAC system. Got plenty of room for it but so far, no need.

 

[71bronco]

How much is the initial cost of installing geothermal in an existing home?

About $21K. But I got 30% back from the government. It replaced a 15 yr old heatpump that was shot that we used for air conditioning and backup heat.It also included 2 80 gal hot water tanks hooked in to the geothermal. The wife has allergy problems and is much happier now whitch is priceless.
The company we went with used a line boring machine so the outside mess was minimal. I'm very happy that we changed to geothermal.

Jeff

 

[Ken45101]

Primarily wood (Pacific Energy Summit), we love it. We tried a pellet stove and that was a total disappointment (Harman Advance). We do have a heat pump that we use when it gets above 55 or so.

 

[Gunny]

When I bought this house it had an oil furnace, but fuel oil got so expensive I installed an LP furnace, then LP skyrocketed in cost! This old house doesn't have any ducts in the living room, it's too close to the ground to install any, so I put in a PTAC unit with heat pump to keep the living room heated and cooled. When it's in use, it keeps the room with the furnace thermostat warm enough that the furnace doesn't run, which means the back rooms in the house get kind of cold, but not cold enough to worry about freezing anything. I've got a pretty good fireplace insert downstairs but I don't trust my old chimney. Hopefully I can get a liner installed this year to I can burn wood in the real cold months.
We've got pretty cheap electricity here so I guess electric heat would probably run the same as LP

 

[sam5570]

we have a wood stove in the living room that burns from oct till april. we have a brand new heat pump that we had installed last summer for the ac in the summer and some heat in spring and early fall. got to have a heat sorce here that don't plug in or you going to get cold. we have lost our power 3 times so far in january. wife and i love our wood heat.it' cost about $200 a winter saves us alot of money.

 

[mehig]

How much is the initial cost of installing geothermal in an existing home?

My wife and I built our retirement home with about 1500 sq ft and installed a 2 ton Geo-thermal Water Furnace(brand) the cost was right at $12000. Last month we spent $50-$60 to run the furnace. In July or Aug we spend around $70 per month to run the AC and it's the best air conditioning ever, blowing cold air in the neighborhood of 50 degrees from the floor vent. It's our second Geo-thermal unit as we had one in our previous home. Our 1st system had the ground loop installed in vertical wells and the second system was installed in a trench around 6' deep and 300' long. Trenching is a little cheaper

 

[dex3361]

I installed a 14SEER split system heat pump that's used till it gets cold enough to fire up the Harman coal/wood stove that's in the downstairs family room. My house is well insulated but not super insulated. If I fire up the wood burner on above 40 degree nights it gets too hot.

 

[IgroRockwell]

I live in a large barn-style house with a garage on the first floor in the land of ice and snow. Heated with wood, oil backup for years. Always burned 10 to 12 full cords per year along with 300 gallons of fuel oil (big place, leaky garage doors). Then I found a lightly used Madawaska brand gassifier boiler (circa 1980). I bought it, brought it home and rebuilt it, made a storage tank to store lots of water and fired it up. Wood consumption dropped to 7 full cords, with no oil usage at all. Paid for itself the first year. I must clean the boiler thoroughly every two weeks because it needs to breathe. Never have had to clean the chimney, even burning off-the-stump green wood, since I started gassifying 4 years ago. After it gets up to temperature (2000 degrees) it burns all of the secondary wood gasses and gets heat from them. Mostly water vapor and co2 left to go up the chimney. Definitely not for everyone, and probably not even for me when I get older, but for now it works.

 

[cobb71]

We have a hitzer amish made anthracite upright stove, runs 24-7 and keeps the house cozy and warm. I like the fact that it will run for 12 to24 hrs on one tending.There no soot, smoke or creasote. This winter has cost 360.00 bucks to heat. It is also ultra clean.

 

[sweettractors]

Pelpro Pellet Stove 50,000 BTU, Model# HHPP2BDD-M | Corn, Pellet Multi-Fuel| Northern Tool + Equipment

I don't know what the guy in the review is complaining about. I put 3 bags of pellets in my stove the moment I started it up. He claims his only holds 50lbs, well mine holds 3 40lb bags(120lbs) without a problem. The one thing I did notice was Northern advertised it as heating up to 2500sq ft but the owners manual that came with the stove says 2000sq ft.

Do you have any possibility of creosote build up in the chimney with a pellet stove? Burning wood pellets or corn make a difference? Ken Sweet

 

[jymbee]

Our oil fired furnace never comes on, even on the coldest days as long as I'm around to keep our Biasi boiler fired up. Of course if we're out for an extended time the oil kicks in.

Also have more wood around our property than I have the time to cut it which makes the economics of it all a no-brainer. That and the fact that I really enjoy cutting firewood.

 

[techman]

I have two zones of geothermal for heating/cooling. 18 months ago I added 9.2 kw of solar PV, and I have a 10 KW kubota powered diesel genset for outages. The gen can run the geo units along with the rest of the house. All electric and I average $ 80/month electric over the year.

paul

 

[D7E]

95% wood . About 12 full cords but there are 2 electric baseboards which are rareley on .

 

[kiotiken]

Wood fireplace, ducted to the furnace & master bedroom is primary, geo thermal ground source closed loop heat pump with water coil for additional heat as a back up, passive solar room, ducted to the upstairs, for sunny days and radiant floor heating. Heat for water is propane which also supplies fuel for the stand by generator.

My wife doesn't think it would be possible to sell our house because of the mess I've made in the furnace room, but she'll never be cold!

 

[jerrybob]

Electric heat pump for the house with propane inserts in the fireplace (for the wife in the evenings). Wood stove in the shop for me. Works for us.

 

[mjarrels]

Heat pump... sucks in bitter cold weather. Harmon MKII coal stove in the basement, haven't fired it up in two years. I like to winter over in the Philippines when I can affort airfare. Never below 90 degrees in Nov/Dec/Jan/Feb. South China sea temp is like bath water.

"In God we trust... All others we monitor" VQ-1

mark

 

[jerrybob]

Heat pump... sucks in bitter cold weather. Harmon MKII coal stove in the basement, haven't fired it up in two years. I like to winter over in the Philippines when I can affort airfare. Never below 90 degrees in Nov/Dec/Jan/Feb. South China sea temp is like bath water.

"In God we trust... All others we monitor" VQ-1

mark

We don't see much bitter cold so the heat pump does just fine. Used to live in So. Calif......you can have that 90 degree stuff.....give me clear skies....55 to 60 degrees.....it don't get much better.:thumbsup:

 

[Greg H]

I have a TARM Excel 2000 gassifier oil/wood furnace. Heats 3000 sq ft, domestic hot water and a hot tub. With 1200 gallon thermal storage I go through about 8 cords a year. Will be hooking up 6 HW solar panels this spring to cover DHW in the summer. I burn about 5 gallon of oil per year mostly if I go away for a 3 day weekend in the winter and the wife doesn’t want to load the furnace.

 

[vabiker23518]

Mines a different situation 'cause its a (nearly) new log cabin thats used for weekends and hunting season. I have electric heat pump (14 seer) for heat and a/c. We use this heat, set at 47 when we're not there. When there, I have a propane heat stove that looks like a Ben Franklin stove. It easily keeps the temp around 70. And here in southside VA, the a/c is wonderful in the summer months!