Heating with wood, how much???

Corkie Monster · 10-05-2007, 09:04 PM

We are building a house outside of Cottage Grove, since electric heat is the only option besides wood, I would like to use wood as much as possible. I would like to know how much wood it would take to heat the house for the winter. Our home is a 2 level home with 2,700 square ft. We plan to install an efficient wood stove (any help on choice of wood stoves would help too).

Thanks
CM

roadsend · 10-05-2007, 09:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corkie Monster

We are building a house outside of Cottage Grove, since electric heat is the only option besides wood, I would like to use wood as much as possible. I would like to know how much wood it would take to heat the house for the winter. Our home is a 2 level home with 2,700 square ft.

Thanks
CM

Our (formerly) 1700 sq.ft. house south of Astoria, insulated ceilings, floors, and 2x4 walls could be comfortably heated for the year with four cords of wood, hemlock, alder, and spruce mix.

Joe Schwab · 10-05-2007, 09:14 PM

We had a 2400 square foot older house in The Dalles. I installed a stove in the basement and heated it probably 80% of the time with wood. I don't recall ever using more than three cords of dry wood.

Cold winters too!

duckboy · 10-05-2007, 10:40 PM

4 cords should be plenty, and a new woodstove with good air circulating fans by the stove.

2 cords Maple and 2 CORDS fir.

Or 1 cord oak or Madrona and 2 cords maple.

Corkie Monster · 10-06-2007, 06:21 AM

Thanks for the replies, it's been yrs since I heated with a wood stove. We are going to have an unlimited supply of wood, mostly Fir & Oak. I just needed to know how much was need to put in dry storage for the winter. I will probably build a wood shed that will hold 5 or so cords.

Thanks
CM

roadsend · 10-06-2007, 07:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corkie Monster

Thanks for the replies, it's been yrs since I heated with a wood stove. We are going to have an unlimited supply of wood, mostly Fir & Oak. I just needed to know how much was need to put in dry storage for the winter. I will probably build a wood shed that will hold 5 or so cords.

Thanks
CM

Fir and oak have a lot more BTUs than the wood I burn. Five cords should be more than enough for even the coldest or wettest winter, given a well insulated house.
I neglected to say in my earlier post that my woodstove is setup to pre-heat my hot water tank.

Don Becker · 10-06-2007, 08:27 AM

'Sorry if this is obvious - - - since you're building and if it's not already in the plans and/or too late - - put a return-air vent in the vicinity of the woodstove and a "summer fan" switch on the electric furnace so you can circulate the heat from the woodstove. We had that set-up in the house we built in Hillsboro in the late 70's and we used it to supplement the gas furnace. We used one cord of oak per year. 'Worked great. Don

Corkie Monster · 10-06-2007, 09:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Don Becker

'Sorry if this is obvious - - - since you're building and if it's not already in the plans and/or too late - - put a return-air vent in the vicinity of the woodstove and a "summer fan" switch on the electric furnace so you can circulate the heat from the woodstove. We had that set-up in the house we built in Hillsboro in the late 70's and we used it to supplement the gas furnace. We used one cord of oak per year. 'Worked great. Don

Thank you for the excellent tip, but the floor plan of the house will not permit this.
our return air is acually placed at the top of the stairs.

CM

Twitchs_Tackle · 10-06-2007, 10:49 AM

Cut as much as you think you'll need... then cut more! Its a whole lot easier to hold wood over til the next year than to try to cut more in a pinch...

As for brands... expect to PAY for a quality, efficient stove. My house has a cheapie $600 steel thing that is about a step up from my 55 gal. oil drum burn barrel..

Try these... cast iron, super efficient, gets hot, stays hot!
Vermont Castings

Don Becker · 10-06-2007, 11:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corkie Monster

Thank you for the excellent tip, but the floor plan of the house will not permit this.
our return air is acually placed at the top of the stairs.

CM

That's where the heat will want to go anyway - - still consider the "summer fan" to circulate it back around the system . . .

retaliate · 10-06-2007, 02:05 PM

4 to 6 cords. Good Air flow with a vent to each room if possible would help greatly, Wood stoves create alot of dust, so a Air filtration system is recommended also.

Corkie Monster · 10-06-2007, 08:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by retaliate

4 to 6 cords. Good Air flow with a vent to each room if possible would help greatly, Wood stoves create alot of dust, so a Air filtration system is recommended also.

We are having a pretty high end Train Heat Pump system put in. I think air circulation will be pretty good. As far as insulation. we are going with the best we can get, all our windows are rated pretty high too. When we found out that there are no Natural Gas lines near by we decided to make this house as efficient as possible. I hate using electric for heat. I grew up with wood stoves, have always loved them and I look forward to using them again.

Here is the latest picture I have of our creation. Don't worry, this picture was take about a week before the rains hit, it has a roof now!

Chrome Bumper · 10-06-2007, 09:12 PM

I was going to say have 6 cord in the shed, a heat pump is a great idea. With the pump half a cord will get you through power outages. Looks like some fire wood on the right side of the garage right now...

Extra wood this year will be extra dry next year.

baltz526 · 10-06-2007, 09:56 PM

i burn 3 1/2 to 5 cords to heat a 1400sqft house in lapine. burning good jackpine/lodgepole. ease of cleaning your pipe and stove is a very important feature. some stoves are a serious problem to clean, buy one with a removable deflector so when you run your brush down you can actually clean the buildup you knock off out of the stove, without disasembly of pipe. like the one that came with my house

Corkie Monster · 10-07-2007, 06:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chrome Bumper

I was going to say have 6 cord in the shed, a heat pump is a great idea. With the pump half a cord will get you through power outages. Looks like some fire wood on the right side of the garage right now...

Extra wood this year will be extra dry next year.

Yea, those tree's won't be going anywhere! There are three huge Black Walnut tree's down there. Unless your refering to the scrap pile.

CM

SILVERSINK · 10-07-2007, 07:43 AM

1700 ft house in Tigard and we heat 100% wood. Use 3to4 cords a year and my wife starts the fire the first week in Oct. and put it out the first week of June.

fishkisser · 10-07-2007, 09:13 PM

Wood for heating your home is like money you can't have enough...
5-6 cords will take you through most anything mother nature can put out...
But you should always have a reserve to use just in case the unexpected occurs...

Chrome Bumper · 10-07-2007, 11:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corkie Monster

Yea, those tree's won't be going anywhere! There are three huge Black Walnut tree's down there. Unless your refering to the scrap pile.

CM

I was eyeballing the scraps.

gottafish · 10-07-2007, 11:51 PM

We live in troutdale and take a ton of heat robbing wind. I have A country t top.

Ive had several stoves and I gotta say this one is the best ive used. It has a blower which is a must if your heating anything over 1000sqft. our house is 2400 and I have it in our great room. Im toying with the idea of placeing a smaller one in the front room as my house is in a shape that dosent allow the heat to get to that room. As for wood. get a big saw like 32 in bar and some cables and a log splitter. and spend next summer building your wood stock then its easy to replace it. also every wind storm that blows get your saw in the truck and hit every fallen tree around .

PapaHog · 10-08-2007, 01:41 AM

Quote:

also every wind storm that blows get your saw in the truck and hit every fallen tree around .

I know a family that heat all the time with wood as they help the road department clean up. It is a family affair, when a big wind is coming they sharpen the saws, hook up the trailer and are ready to go at first light. They bring it to the to the wood shed in 8 foot logs and then work it into firewood as time permits.

They have a three year supply all the time. One green, one half dry and one ready to burn.

Seefood Man · 10-08-2007, 06:55 AM

How long does it take to get good seasoned wood?

CGRFish · 10-08-2007, 08:56 AM

We live in a 90 year old, 2200 square foot home -needless to say insulation is not great. We purchased a Quadra Fire stove a few years ago (coastal farm in Eugene) , and the improvement was huge over a older wood stove. We use about 5 cords per year, but it provides probably 85%+ of our heating. With the new stove, we use much less wood (were at 9-10 cord - ouch!). One thing with the new high efficiency stoves is they HAVE to have dry, seasoned wood to function well. I split my wood storage area, and try to keep two seasons put in at once. That way I have extra if the winter is extra cold, but I also have well seasoned wood. Good luck!

retaliate · 10-08-2007, 09:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seefood Man

How long does it take to get good seasoned wood?

About a Year if cut Wet & stored in a Dry area.

Dave G · 10-08-2007, 12:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Don Becker

'Sorry if this is obvious - - - since you're building and if it's not already in the plans and/or too late - - put a return-air vent in the vicinity of the woodstove and a "summer fan" switch on the electric furnace so you can circulate the heat from the woodstove. We had that set-up in the house we built in Hillsboro in the late 70's and we used it to supplement the gas furnace. We used one cord of oak per year. 'Worked great. Don

The prior owner of our home has a vent that goes upstairs with an eletric motor blowing hot air up. We use one cord of that for a 2000 sq ft home.