Wonderful information you posted up Oliver.
One of the way’s I’ve had to learn to needs-must be able to handle been-a-bad-drying-year 30%+ too wet, stove wood is to in-house crisscross stack as you say in two stacks on each side of the wood stove. NOT TOO CLOSE! 24 hours worth. Get down to half moisture loss by the time it goes into the stove. That excessive moisture sucked up and out with the stoves air-in, chimney out flows.
I can humidity pump as much as a pound of moisture an hour when in full heating needed time of year.
Ha! My whole house moisture’s-out pumping has to be split up between two gone outside wet dogs, me, my boots, outer wear AND the wood drying down. No capacity left for inside open air cloths wash drying without steaming up the house.
Here too internal humid house makes for a sickness house.
Regards
tree-farmer Steve unruh
Tks for the attaboy, Steve…well the name of the thread is ‘optimization’ so I just threw in a few tips. I’m working yet again this fall… attic ventilation, underfloor insulation, always trying to keep things in check, oh yeah gotta get those 2 long axles out from under the doublewide, been there 30 yrs. or more, cobwebs everywhere.
I guess I’m lucky, but I have wood storage area right by the house, so, the firewood stays outside of my place till it gets thrown in the fire. LOL…it can get pretty buggy sometimes if I let that stuff warm up by the stove, so for me, the firewood goes in— bugs, fungus, and all. Naturally I wish all my firewood was hard & dry and therefore bug free…but I burn the cheap wood with the good stuff.
As for those wet dogs, you might try thrashing them with some wild mint or something before they get in the house…lol, well I guess it beats the smell of polyurethane curing.
Actually for personal use I (we) have grown accustom to burning the worst, roughest, “dirty” wood portions. The clean, clean white-wood split out for many years was the for-sale wood. Wifie does make me responsible for the keep debris/shed-offs sweeping up’s.
Just not possible here to next to house wood store. Carpenter ants would eat up your wooden house. We large covered wood shed store FAR from the houses. Wheelbarrow to the porches daily, other other day, in the rain-muds or frozen down snow.
Woodshed I actually encourage the habitat and reproduction of local spiders. They eat the wood-eating bugs.
Yep. Everyone here been cold-sleeping warmed up spider bit at least once over the years. Just part of the price of wood heating here in the bugs-active rainforest.
If you home hived honey bees, 'aught to expect an occasional sting. Good for the arthritis. Keep a home milk cow and you are go to get head butted, stepped on, whipped tails swatted every once and while. Kicked? for no caused reason? - sell off, butcher, eat that cow!
I know I posted a picture on DOW with my wood stacked in the greenhouse I think it was the beginning of September. At that time I cut a growing Birch tree, blocked and split it. The moisture meter read 40%. Today I took a split log and cut it in half and tested the moisture again. My reading is at 19%. This after only 2 months in the greenhouse. I call that a success.
I’ve been burning our stove everyday since the beginning of October, once per day. I used 3 split logs in the morning. Since October 27th, I haven’t let the stove go out and only went through 1/3 of a row.
As you can see, the greenhouse is shedding snow well. We’ve had over 15" in the last 2 weeks. Once it gets built up enough, the snow breaks loose and slides off the greenhouse. I am very happy with this design.
Wow, that is beautiful! I gave my pumpkin cattle panels to Dad, in the spring I’ll get more, photos later of Dad’s rig.
Woke up to -27F this AM. 60 F in the house. This is a big improvement from last year with the similar temps. Last year in these temps, it would be 40-45 F inside the house. This year there is still enough coals in the stove, I don’t need to build a fire, I just add wood. Smaller split wood is sitting in front of the stove at night so it’s ready right when I wake up. The left over coffee from the day before is quickly heated up with Propane. The coffee pot will find it’s reserved spot on the top surface of the wood stove shortly after.
Having a controllable wood stove and dry wood has made things much easier this year.
The propane guys would really like too hook you up. I envy all that extra coyntry side around your home, good way too thrive. My stove is in my garodge, when it gets below zero -8 f this morning its a little warmer in the shop than my trailer house,Next project might be the cement floor around the wood burner? God Bless. Stay Warm.My next project might be grean house for fire wood.
We were away most of yesterday and Christmas day just popping in at night to sleep so the temps dropped down in the house. Bloody cold this morning. It will get worst this winter at some point but I don’t plan on being gone that long again…
Bill glad to hear it is working out for you. Mine was almost out this morning too when I got up but it was only -6 last night headed to -15 F tonight if the weather man is right. Too cold for this time of year here this is Feb weather. I just hope we don’t see it getting colder.
That still isn’t my favorite stove but it does get the job done. Mine is binding up when it gets hot now so I can’t open the bypass on the cat. I am not sure I want to know what is causing that it is really hard to get in there without taking the entire top off the stove. I just replaces the glass and frames in my doors this year. Hoping to get a few more seasons out of it before I replace it. If you have any issues I have done a fair amount of repairs to mine so I might have seen any problems you run into.
Wow !! You northern guys really make us southern folks fill like a bunch of sissies !!! Today and through the Christmas holidays the low temps have been between the 30s and 40s and just too cold to get out in it but to feed the cows . So to stay comfortable we have been doing a lot of riding DOW, the ole trucks all have good heaters . Also I think it takes less wood out cruising around DOW than it takes to heat a 2,200 sq foot house with 25 windows . ( the wife likes the house temp 70-75 )
Long story short when yall talk about minus temps we can’t comprehend what yall are talking about .
Hope everyone had as good of Christmas as I.
Dan, I can see how your problems with the stove can be troublesome. I do believe your stove and many more seasons working than this one has. I know the guy well I bought this from and it was only used for one season. For the money I paid for it, I couldn’t go wrong. After selling my potbelly and buying this one, it only was $100 out of my pocket. Plus at the time, I didn’t have enough money to throw at a new stove. If I can get a few seasons out of this one, I will be very happy.
It will last a long time mine has about 20 years of hard use. It was bought about 35 years ago or so but there was a long spell where the house wasn’t heated in the winter. But if you come across an Englander stove with the two knobs in the front door and a offset shelf with a blower and cat it is way nicer. For what you have invested your right you can’t go wrong.
Wayne just open up your chest freezer and jump in in shorts for about 20 minutes it will be close enough… on second thought don’t do that we wouldn’t want to see you freeze. The funny part about your comment is there is research which shows people on colder climates actually have thicker blood to deal with the cold and that is part of why you guys can take more hear then we can. I read about it when I was in Taiwan. Weird how out bodies addapt.
Wayne, If it were that warm here, my skid steer and sawmill would start with no fiddling around. Now it takes a couple of hours to warm them up enough to start. Last weekend it was in the single digits when I was putting tin on the garage. They are only 13’ sheets, so it wasn’t too bad. I would put up a sheet in an hour and come in the house for 20 minutes to warm up my fingers and put another log in the wood stove. I have no time clock to punch to get things done, so it’s all good. I have figured out that temps between 35-60 are ideal for working outside and not work up sweat. My only worry right now is how the chickens are doing. I heard the roosters crowing, so I know they’re alive. Right now I will go out and make sure their water heater is winning over the cold temps. They get a lot of cracked corn when it gets cold to keep their energy up. Unfortunately when I go and get the eggs, most of them are froze and cracked. I have to get the eggs right when they’re laid.
We lost one of our chickens to a old Wiley Coyote, that chicken was the one that will sit on the nest of eggs the longest. We have several nesting boxes but they all lay the eggs in the same nest. Now we are having the same problem.
Had to put a heat lamp in the coupe. But we are no where at the temps you are experiencing ,we are in the teens and higher.
If you notice one of the chickens being the mother hen, keep her and let her have a long life, doing what she does best , sitting on the nest keeping the eggs from freezing in cold weather.
Bob
You will need a egg cam so you know when to go get them…
Live stock in the cold is never fun. I have some cows that are due any time and I keep hoping it will be during a warm spell that the calve. But all we can do is keep an eye on things and hope for the best. As long as the eggs are all that is frozen you can call it a good day I guess.
Just want to put in a word about rocket mass heaters. They’re good. I have a friend that heats his shop with one. We just scraped up some dirt in his back yard, mixed it with water to make mud that we used as mortar. The land is bentonite clay around here. On one of the early builds we did outside we had the heat exchanger up to 845F. Like crazy, I know. It doesn’t get near as cold here in Denver, but I’m pretty sure you could do a two hour burn once a day and keep a small house warm up there. I estimate we have about three tons of thermal mass. Materials to build these can be very low cost: an old 55 gal drum, used brickes, mud…
I do believe rocket mass heaters work in some climates. I don’t think these are applicable when fighting subzero weather for 2+ months on a daily frequency. One would be a slave to it at -20 to -30. I think a masonry stove would be a great option. I think I did a good job putting up poly inside this house. Once it gets colder than -10F you can feel the cold air fighting it’s way into the house.
With all that said, I would love to implement a rocket mass heater in a greenhouse build. Something that would need heat in April, May and September through November.
It was minus 32C here this morning, that’s getting cold, takes all the enthusiasm out of doing outdoor projects. Warmest day of the week tomorrow, minus 21, then colder yet on the weekend. Coldest Christmas period in 20 years here.
Bill I am assuming your talking about a masonry heater also called Russian fireplaces. Basically a large thermal mass. You fill the fire box once or twice a day and fire it up the wood burns with no restriction at temps upwards of 1800 F but the smoke is passed through a long passage of brick which cools it to about 300 F before leaving the heater. The slow nature of the stone to warm up and release heat forces it to store the heat for hours. These work well in all climates you size them based on the thermal load of the building and learn how much of a fire to build in them based on how cold it is. I had a Tarm wood gasification boiler in my last house which is based on the same theory but uses 700 gallons of hot water for the thermal mass. It was amazing how effecent that system was but the wood boiler starts very hard when it is cold basically only in the fall when you haven’t run it all summer. I don’t think the mansonay heater would have the same problem. The water pulls too much heat out of the fire box.
My soapstone stove works on a similar theory of thermal mass but it doesn’t burn as efficiently it takes higher temps and secondary air to actually get complete combustion of wood. The cat in your stove is I think 85% efficient and secondary air systems are about 95% effecent. Something a long those lines. A wood stove without either is only around 60 to 70% I think if I remember right. I have cement blocks sitting around my Dutch western stove to increase the thermal mass. It helps A lot on stabilizing the temp in this old farm house which is just standard 2x4 construction which was never insulated and has windows and doors from 1901 when it was built. When it gets down below zero the cold rushes right through these walls. I really want to strip this house and insulate it. But for now wood is work insulation and new windows is money… not to mention what rebuilding it would do to my taxes.
But I digress. The point I was getting at is the high thermal mass heaters come out of northern Europe and Russia to deal with exream cold.
Masonry Heaters desiring building and living with a piece of the sun by Ken Matesz is a good book on these heating systems.
I would love to heat this house with a couple of them. In my old house I would burn about 6 cord of wood in my Englander wood stove with a cat and about 200 gallons of oil a winter. When I switched to the Tarm gasification boiler I could heat the house at 70F all winter day and night on 4.5 cord of wood with no oil. I would fill that boiler 2 or 3 times a day and it would always relight off the heat left in the fire brick. I also got all my hot water out of the storage tank . That boiler really was amazing a modern version of a thermal mass system where you gain the ease of use because the water storage allows you to just heat the mass independent of the the thermal load in the house the base board heater will only cycle the heat you need out of the hot water storage tank. I had that tank insulated at r60 so it basicly didn’t loose heat. I debate building something like that here but I want to keep the ability to close down this farm house there are two houses on the farm and the old farm house has been closed down a lot of winters in the past.
Anyway those are my thoughts on heating. I would also like to use a radiant floor heating system as it works with much lower temp water then baseboard heaters which opens up other options for heating the water. I would love the more efficient masonry heater mostly because I want to get the most heat I can for the work I put into cutting wood. Burning it inefficiently means I have to work harder for no good reason. My kind of lazy is to work harder building a better heating system so I can work less later cutting wood. Another project on my long list of projects. The issue I see with a rocket stove is there is no storage so adjusting the fire to the changing demand over the course of the winter seems like it would be hard to me.