diy solar

diy solar

who is still burning wood in april?

Checkthisout said:
So the guys on Hearth.com hate me.

I got that stove for free and cut about 1/3rd of the back off and made the chimney exit the top so I could use it in my puny cabin.

There is a book about Bob Fisher and Fisher Stoves.

The door on mine is hinged on the left side (rare) and is a 3 piece top (the earliest models) has pipe caps for draft control (how Bob did it on his first stoves) and if you look closely, the door says "Patended" instead of patented.

Apparently the foundry misspelled the word on the first run of doors Bob had made to license to outside manufacturers.


So it's basically pinnacle Fisher stove collector masterpiece....and I took a grinder to it and chopped it down.😒

Before I knew of course......
Click to expand...
But now it's one of a kind.
 
I had the pellet stove on one night last week. Can’t remember which day, but I hope we’re done for the season. It was a mild winter here in south central Pennsylvania, only used about a ton of pellets. Been trying to use the heat pump more and the pellet stove less since I can make my own electricity for free, while pellets are up to $300 a ton.

The beagle however, prefers the pellet stove.



7521D9DF-54FF-423D-8E2B-36A13B4FDDD1.jpeg
 
Brett V said:
I had the pellet stove on one night last week. Can’t remember which day, but I hope we’re done for the season. It was a mild winter here in south central Pennsylvania, only used about a ton of pellets. Been trying to use the heat pump more and the pellet stove less since I can make my own electricity for free, while pellets are up to $300 a ton.

The beagle however, prefers the pellet stove.



View attachment 209259
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Yep our cat loves the wood stove last month that furry asshole was so close his fur was starting to curl
 
We are some days, mainly in the morning weather dependant. If it is below 50 f or so when we get up and it looks like it won't warm up quickly(cloudy day we'll start the fireplace and turn on the fan insert for a few hours). But the last day of that may have past now.

I grew up with wood stoves and other than looks don't understand why anybody would install a fireplace over a stove. We have to run the fan(electricity) to get the majority of the heat benefit. When we build off grid one of these days we'll be looking for the most efficient woodstove.
 
Daddy Tanuki said:
2030 hours on April 12th, its 37°f or about 3°c here at Fujigane at the cabin. just curious who else might be running their woodstove besides myself.
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Haaaaa… you ain’t the Lone Ranger……it rained , snowed and hailed with terrible wind yesterday afternoon for several hours ….it was about 35F tonite … will be warm Monday and will be back below freezing by next weekend…
But the trees are starting to put out buds…that’s always cool..
 
I have ancient Burham wood boiler with 500 gallons of thermal storage. I had it running 10 days ago when I got 18 " of snow. I may run it again if there is cold snap but the minisplit is carrying the house so might as well burn up my surplus power.

BTW with respect the most efficient woodstove, it is called a pellet stove ;) Or go looking on the web for the Professor Richard Hill "stove" actually a wood boiler with thermal storage. http://www.hotandcold.tv/stick_wood_furnace.html The commercial versions were made by Dumont and Jetstream and possibly a third firm.
 
peakbagger said:
I have ancient Burham wood boiler with 500 gallons of thermal storage. I had it running 10 days ago when I got 18 " of snow. I may run it again if there is cold snap but the minisplit is carrying the house so might as well burn up my surplus power.

BTW with respect the most efficient woodstove, it is called a pellet stove ;) Or go looking on the web for the Professor Richard Hill "stove" actually a wood boiler with thermal storage. http://www.hotandcold.tv/stick_wood_furnace.html The commercial versions were made by Dumont and Jetstream and possibly a third firm.
Click to expand...
@peakbagger

how many sqft is your house and how long does that wood boiler with 500 gallon tank last if the fire goes out? 8 hours? 24 hours?

the reason i am asking is I just got an insulated 450 gallon tank and am preparing to build a water heater system with excess solar and a waste oil burner to bump up the BTU's during the coldest months.

I know the tank is large enough to provide me with hot water just with the solar, i was planning on experimenting with it to see how much heat I could put into the house without it dropping below 135°f or so.

cheers
 
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My old Better N Bens leftover from the 70's fuel crisis is finally getting some rest. Now I just fire it up to to the spring rain dampness out.
 
Daddy Tanuki said:
that cold in Tennessee? wow must be colder int he US than i thought for this time of year.
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The past two weekends have seen snow in the higher elevations in TN and NC. Not unheard of but definitely infrequent, thankfully our blossoming fruit escaped damage so far.
 
Daddy Tanuki said:
@peakbagger

how many sqft is your house and how long does that wood boiler with 500 gallon tank last if the fire goes out? 8 hours? 24 hours?

the reason i am asking is I just got an insulated 450 gallon tank and am preparing to build a water heater system with excess solar and a waste oil burner to bump up the BTU's during the coldest months.

I know the tank is large enough to provide me with hot water just with the solar, i was planning on experimenting with it to see how much heat I could put into the house without it dropping below 135°f or so.

cheers
Click to expand...
Heated area is about 1500 square feet in Northern NH (if gets down to -20 F on occasion). 2x6 walls, double pane windows with double cellular blinds with side tracks on windows (an extra R 5). The tank usually gives me 24 hours, so I fire it once a day, but in cold conditions its twice a day. Total wood consumption is around 4 cords over a season. I use 1 ton mini split for shoulder seasons when overnight temps are over 25F. The house was built in 1987 as a modular and they definitely did not do advanced framing so lots of cold spots in the walls due to framing bridges. I did have an energy audit 10 years ago and with air sealing got the house down to point where I should have an air to air heat exchanger but do not so its tighter than most homes but nowhere near modern energy efficient buildings. To appreciably decrease the heat load I would need to strip the siding, build out the window casings and add 2 inches of foam on the outside, that would mitigate the cold spots, on the top and bottom header, window headers, corners and framing.

The big driver of storage tank thermal capacity is the type of heating emitters in the house. My house was setup for oil fired heat and has Slant FIn style hydronic radiators. Oil fired furnaces are usually set up to maintain a range of 160F to 180F and the radiator sizing is based on the same. The thermal performance of slant fin style radiators really drops off as the supply temps drop so if the tank drops below 140F, the amount of radiator surface area (length) is inadequate to heat the house on a cold day. My tank is vented American Solartechnics (great design but the owner has shut down the business and is selling it) with a PVC liner and its rated for 180F max. So I only have a differential of 40F of useful storage. At 8 pounds for a gallon multiplied by 40F delta that is 160K Btus storage. If I had radiant in the walls and ceilings, the supply temp using an injection mixer would be around 90F. 180F -90F = 90 delta so the same tank would have a capacity of 360 K. Note: due to stratification in the storage tank I actually have less capacity as 180F at the top of the tank may be 150F at the bottom. My tank is rough square. Horizontal cylindrical tanks will have even more impact due to stratification. Rectangular tanks take up far less room than cylindrical tanks but they still eat up some space. Folks with steel tanks may be able to tweak up to 200 F but they are flirting with boiling. I fire in the evening and the boiler is in the basement so I get a pretty good boost for several hours off the mass of the boiler and heat loss to the basement. The basement walls have 1" of foam outside but nothing in the floor so its is extracting some heat.

Most folks who have storage wish they had more with 1000 gallons being the sweet spot. Keep in mind that the storage needs to be matched to the boiler. My ancient Burham is rated at 100K btus/hr. For me to charge it up from 140F its going to take a couple of hours. My next system will probably use stainless steel IBC totes available on the surplus market, They can get up to 600 gallons and are rectangular with top manhole which would be good for installing a coil. I would buy two. I would just foam the exterior of the tank for insulation.
 
peakbagger said:
Heated area is about 1500 square feet in Northern NH (if gets down to -20 F on occasion). 2x6 walls, double pane windows with double cellular blinds with side tracks on windows (an extra R 5). The tank usually gives me 24 hours, so I fire it once a day, but in cold conditions its twice a day. Total wood consumption is around 4 cords over a season. I use 1 ton mini split for shoulder seasons when overnight temps are over 25F. The house was built in 1987 as a modular and they definitely did not do advanced framing so lots of cold spots in the walls due to framing bridges. I did have an energy audit 10 years ago and with air sealing got the house down to point where I should have an air to air heat exchanger but do not so its tighter than most homes but nowhere near modern energy efficient buildings. To appreciably decrease the heat load I would need to strip the siding, build out the window casings and add 2 inches of foam on the outside, that would mitigate the cold spots, on the top and bottom header, window headers, corners and framing.

The big driver of storage tank thermal capacity is the type of heating emitters in the house. My house was setup for oil fired heat and has Slant FIn style hydronic radiators. Oil fired furnaces are usually set up to maintain a range of 160F to 180F and the radiator sizing is based on the same. The thermal performance of slant fin style radiators really drops off as the supply temps drop so if the tank drops below 140F, the amount of radiator surface area (length) is inadequate to heat the house on a cold day. My tank is vented American Solartechnics (great design but the owner has shut down the business and is selling it) with a PVC liner and its rated for 180F max. So I only have a differential of 40F of useful storage. At 8 pounds for a gallon multiplied by 40F delta that is 160K Btus storage. If I had radiant in the walls and ceilings, the supply temp using an injection mixer would be around 90F. 180F -90F = 90 delta so the same tank would have a capacity of 360 K. Note: due to stratification in the storage tank I actually have less capacity as 180F at the top of the tank may be 150F at the bottom. My tank is rough square. Horizontal cylindrical tanks will have even more impact due to stratification. Rectangular tanks take up far less room than cylindrical tanks but they still eat up some space. Folks with steel tanks may be able to tweak up to 200 F but they are flirting with boiling. I fire in the evening and the boiler is in the basement so I get a pretty good boost for several hours off the mass of the boiler and heat loss to the basement. The basement walls have 1" of foam outside but nothing in the floor so its is extracting some heat.

Most folks who have storage wish they had more with 1000 gallons being the sweet spot. Keep in mind that the storage needs to be matched to the boiler. My ancient Burham is rated at 100K btus/hr. For me to charge it up from 140F its going to take a couple of hours. My next system will probably use stainless steel IBC totes available on the surplus market, They can get up to 600 gallons and are rectangular with top manhole which would be good for installing a coil. I would buy two. I would just foam the exterior of the tank for insulation.
Click to expand...
I have a few questions and do not want to clutter a thread that was supposed to be more a social thread then a technical thread, do you mind if we go to PM?
 
rhino said:
Snow for Northern MN as well later this week :rolleyes: What I can't get over is why in the USA triple pane windows are a niche product and in Europe you can get them at big box stores.
Click to expand...
My friend's dad is building a house here in SE TN, and he went with triple-pane windows. Around here, double pane is the standard. I need to replace windows at my place in the mountains at 3,200ft. I haven't decided yet what brand/specs to go with. I probably should consider triple pane since it's regularly below Zero F in the wintertime.
 
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