Anybody else heat their home ONLY with wood?

If so, what kind of stove do you have? How big a house? and how many cords a year do you use. And what kind of wood you burn.

It seems to me one of the guys on this board lives in the hills and does wood harvesting or something. was it spencer?

I'll ask my cousin's dad (I guess that would make him my uncle, I just met him for the first time in my life) how much he goes through. I know he has a wood stove in his garage with the pipes that run under his concrete floor. He also has some stove inside his home that he says can heat the whole house using some fans. He also said the inside stove is EPA rated or something in such a way that he can burn it on Red days. Something like that.

Anyway, he has a hydraulic splitter and a bunch of wood in the back yard. I'll ask next time I see him.

Is this coming from that thread about wood on Arfcom?

i didnt see a thread about wood. I just spent a few hours splitting wood, for the winter. I have a large homebuilt, towable, horizontal, verticle splitter. We only heat with wood. our furnace has not even been turned on in 3 years. in the mornings it can be chilly, if we didnt get up and stoke it. but since we allways have a baby, we never sleep allnight. We heat 2400+ sqft. Yes, it is a chore sometimes. And we cant leave for more than 8 or so hours before the stove is winding down. We have 5 kids and livestock, so we rarely go for that long anyway. Of course the inside air temperature would still have to then drop the temperature for quite a while before it was cold.. We have a soapstone stove, so it stays warm quite a while after its out. We also try to cook on it as much as possible in the winter.

I also was thinking about it, because I was checking out the new stoves online. The one hearthstone soapstone stove heats 3500 sqft at 120,000 btus, and is over 75percent efficient. But, it costs alot of money. Our stove is 28 years old.

I don't think you could ask better stove than what you have, I have a hearthstone soapstone stove also and they retain heat better than anything else out there. Make it really nice for overnight burns.

I was told that in the garage set up with the water pipes running through the floor, that even when the stove winds down for the night, that the hot concrete maintains the heat in the garage until you start the stove up again the next day. I guess the temperature almost never gets "cold" in the garage all winter. Sounds like a sweet set up, but was told that it is a lot more expense to set up with all the plumbing and stuff.

Here is the thread:

http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=10&f=1&t=639334

My dad heated his place in Oregon on wood. 2-1/2-3 cords a year and the Oregon winters are milder than here.

I grew up on sawdust heat and my main heat is a pellet stove. I do have the 36 year old gas furnace but it gets little use.

Old
Not very
3 cords
beetle kill pine


[Fire]

Friend has 3-4 cords built up through the summer/fall. (A lot of work!) and will heat his home most of the winter with 3 cords. ~800 sqft house, poorly insulated. Wood stove type, unsure of model or size, but it's not very big.

Interesting thing is how he setup Ceramic Tiles on the wall behind it, that are about 1 inch away from the drywall, this gives the heat somewhere to collect and rise from the heated tiles. Hopefully that makes sense.

That is a good idea. How does he mount the tile if they are 1 inch away from the wall?

this is how i did mine. i have 2 inch square tube, layed on the floor for bracing. then i have 16 guage sheet steel over that, then i have my brick. the walls are similar. keeps the combustibles away from the home, plus allows air to circulate. i am sure there is a better way. but, this was cheap and works.

i burn cottonwood because its free. the company my wife works for charges landscape companies to dump all the 100 year old cottonwood trees that are being cut down or falling down all over. then i pay for the truck to bring me the free wood. basically i have paid about $200 for the 2 end dumps and 1 dump truck to bring me 20-25 cords. i dont know exactly, because it is put on the truck untill it is full and then it is dumped in a big pile. next year we will probably have a semi load of pine. it comes in 12-16 foot lengths. and the trucks average about 20 cords of pine stacked like that.