[Last minute changes]
So I've run into an issue with converting my less than efficient fireplace with an exterior-wall chimney into a super-heating machine. My new wood stove with included blower, being as small as it is... is still too big. Just small enough to be inserted, but after that you'd never get your hands in there to attach a lined chimney to it. So... back to plan B!
Back a couple months I got myself a barely used wood stove and now I think I'll be using it this season and in the room I originally wanted to utilize one in. Instead of heating my den at the far end of the house I'll be heating my living room, which is more central to where we spend most of our time in the homestead. Not only that, the floor above it is where our bedrooms are located so with enough heat it should transfer upstairs a bit as well - especially if we cut registers into the floors for the heat to travel up.
Luckily a local vendor is going to assist with the process and make sure the outside double-walled chimney will be up to code when being run up the side of our house. More on this soon...
Showing posts with label wood fireplace insert. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wood fireplace insert. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 8, 2014
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Alternate Heat - Winter Months Part II
[Options]
[Part I]
With a heavy reliance of heating oil in large areas of New England many are looking elsewhere for heat sources. Wood and pellet stoves are often the first to come to mind or even the ability to switch to natural gas and be hooked up to the grid. Originally when we bought our house in southern New Hampshire we thought that may be a choice, but soon found out that natural gas lines didn't even run under our street. Scratch that idea. I grew up in a small, coastal town a couple states away that was almost entirely heated by natural gas lines and I didn't have much experience with oil heating. The only exception to that was visiting relatives far out in the boonies in Cape Cod, MA.
You have to get deliveries of fuel?
It isn't just in your house from a gas line?
Preposterous!
Well I soon learned how that worked. Last winter we had filled our old tank three times and once before that after we initially bought the house. After moving in I had a brand new boiler installed and mid winter at the beginning of 2014 we also replaced our oil tank with a brand new one. So at least going into this winter everything is new and as efficient as it can be - for oil, that is. I believe the oil boiler is in the high 80's for percentage of efficiency - whatever that really means in the grand scheme of things. The new tank is a Roth double-walled 275 gallon unit that has a proper line running along the basement ceiling to the new boiler as well.
But with the house being over 150 years old it isn't like we can keep all that heat in. Sure we can tear apart the walls of the original horsehair plaster and try re-insulating the entire house, but I'm no masochist. Instead we are looking towards alternatives to heating. Granted we are doing insulation bits here and there to help keep heat in, but mostly we're shying away from a reliance on that deliverable fuel everybody requires to survive in the winter and keep their pipes from freezing.
In August I talked about picking up the wood stove to heat the main living room, but I know considering all the projects I'm trying to complete I will not be able to utilize it until next year at the earliest. As it will require cutting a hole through an exterior wall and installing a rather expensive chimney system up the side of the house. But what I can do is install a wood stove insert in our den's fireplace and re-line the existing brick chimney for it. With an included electric blower I can heat at least two (maybe even three) rooms quite well with just wood.
On top of the addition of a wood stove fireplace insert I have bought an efficient electric infrared stove for the bedroom as well. For my attached home office, which is just shy of 200 sq. feet, I will be utilizing a portable kerosene heater.
Not only do I have alternatives, but I have different types of options. If we lose power at any point this winter we can still use the wood stove insert and take the kerosene heater to whatever room we need it in.
Review of the above KeroHeat Kerosene Heater by TacticalIntelligence
[Part I]
With a heavy reliance of heating oil in large areas of New England many are looking elsewhere for heat sources. Wood and pellet stoves are often the first to come to mind or even the ability to switch to natural gas and be hooked up to the grid. Originally when we bought our house in southern New Hampshire we thought that may be a choice, but soon found out that natural gas lines didn't even run under our street. Scratch that idea. I grew up in a small, coastal town a couple states away that was almost entirely heated by natural gas lines and I didn't have much experience with oil heating. The only exception to that was visiting relatives far out in the boonies in Cape Cod, MA.
You have to get deliveries of fuel?
It isn't just in your house from a gas line?
Preposterous!
 |
| Original 50-year old boiler in our home |
But with the house being over 150 years old it isn't like we can keep all that heat in. Sure we can tear apart the walls of the original horsehair plaster and try re-insulating the entire house, but I'm no masochist. Instead we are looking towards alternatives to heating. Granted we are doing insulation bits here and there to help keep heat in, but mostly we're shying away from a reliance on that deliverable fuel everybody requires to survive in the winter and keep their pipes from freezing.
 |
| New oil boiler and water heater system |
On top of the addition of a wood stove fireplace insert I have bought an efficient electric infrared stove for the bedroom as well. For my attached home office, which is just shy of 200 sq. feet, I will be utilizing a portable kerosene heater.
Not only do I have alternatives, but I have different types of options. If we lose power at any point this winter we can still use the wood stove insert and take the kerosene heater to whatever room we need it in.
Review of the above KeroHeat Kerosene Heater by TacticalIntelligence
Friday, August 1, 2014
Wood Stoves - Self Sufficiency
[Challenges of Heating an old New Englander ]
Long have I wished for owning a wood stove (or multiple wood stoves) and now that I have one I'm worried it isn't quite right for our house. In an oblong and quite frankly uniquely laid-out house heating is a big challenge. The original 1858 house, was much smaller and simpler, but since then multiple add-ons (including the addition of a second floor about a hundred years ago) have made this house quite odd. The front room is a long, slightly narrow living room with 4 windows where we spend most of our time either relaxing, reading or watching TV. Quite frankly it's the perfect room to plop down a hearth and wood stove to cut oil usage during the winter, but... there lies a number of challenges.
First and foremost the positioning of the wood stove would be a challenge due to the placement of the windows and existing baseboard heating AND on top of that (or rather, below that) the oil tank sits under this room. Second, there's two entrances to the living room - one on either end and I don't want to block or obstruct an exit. Third, the floor would need major reinforcing in order to support a 300+ lb. wood stove as well as a brick or stone hearth. Fourth, just the pure cost of the chimney that would have to be ported through the exterior wall.
Other than that it should be easy? Right? Ugh...
Besides the wood stove placement in our living we do have an existing fireplace on the opposite end of the house in a den-like room that is on a slab, rather than the house's original stone foundation. It's a small fireplace and hearth and it's cozy, but the chimney itself is built on the outside of the house, which is inherently inefficient due to the loss of heat outside of exterior walls. What would help mitigate this? A wood fireplace insert and the internal chimney that comes with it. What it comes down to these days is just pure cost effectiveness versus efficiency of the end product. Will a wood stove and wood fireplace insert eventually be worth the initial costs in the long run? Hard to say. More on this very soon...
Long have I wished for owning a wood stove (or multiple wood stoves) and now that I have one I'm worried it isn't quite right for our house. In an oblong and quite frankly uniquely laid-out house heating is a big challenge. The original 1858 house, was much smaller and simpler, but since then multiple add-ons (including the addition of a second floor about a hundred years ago) have made this house quite odd. The front room is a long, slightly narrow living room with 4 windows where we spend most of our time either relaxing, reading or watching TV. Quite frankly it's the perfect room to plop down a hearth and wood stove to cut oil usage during the winter, but... there lies a number of challenges. First and foremost the positioning of the wood stove would be a challenge due to the placement of the windows and existing baseboard heating AND on top of that (or rather, below that) the oil tank sits under this room. Second, there's two entrances to the living room - one on either end and I don't want to block or obstruct an exit. Third, the floor would need major reinforcing in order to support a 300+ lb. wood stove as well as a brick or stone hearth. Fourth, just the pure cost of the chimney that would have to be ported through the exterior wall.
Other than that it should be easy? Right? Ugh...
Besides the wood stove placement in our living we do have an existing fireplace on the opposite end of the house in a den-like room that is on a slab, rather than the house's original stone foundation. It's a small fireplace and hearth and it's cozy, but the chimney itself is built on the outside of the house, which is inherently inefficient due to the loss of heat outside of exterior walls. What would help mitigate this? A wood fireplace insert and the internal chimney that comes with it. What it comes down to these days is just pure cost effectiveness versus efficiency of the end product. Will a wood stove and wood fireplace insert eventually be worth the initial costs in the long run? Hard to say. More on this very soon...
 |
| Cozy, but sadly inefficient fireplace |
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