Woodburners, how many cords do you use?

sugarbush · #41 08/25/08, 05:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rider

we dont bother to measure our wood in cords we haul by the 4 horse trailer load an open stock trailer and the back of the pickup full to counter balance the trailer weight usually 4 of these loads each fall a mixture of cotton wood and pine hoping to get started soon but right now its 95-100 degrees and its not much fun to cut wood in the heat so will wait a couple of weeks till it cools off

That sounds like a lot of wood... if you burned hardwood instead of cottonwood and pine you wold use a lot less....probably about half of that.

Cottonwood has a BTU of 13.5 and pine is between 14-17 btu depending on which type. Oak, hickory, cherry etc is up around 27 BTUs.

goatsareus · #42 08/25/08, 08:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sugarbush

I own a sawmill, buy the logs, sell the lumber, burn the sabs and butt ends, write off the gas, oil, chains, files, etc..... yup, firewood is free and it has nothing to do with location....it was free when we lived in Vermont, and Maine as well

It appears we operate from different Schools of Economics.

We too, used to own a sawmill. Even having that endeavor, our firewood was not free.

rider · #43 08/25/08, 12:48 PM

sugarbush we dont have the choice of woods here we have cotton wood and or pine the elms here are not plentyfull enough to cut and cedars are the same we do burn old cedar fence posts but you have to be very careful with them as they go hot in seconds and if you run your stove correctly the standing dead white cotton wood we cut will burn for 8 hours per chunk of wood its enough to keep chill off the house and keep furnace from running the only time we let the furnace run is if it has been -20 for more tahn 24 hours then we have to let it run to keeep pipes thawed even with water running a bit it will still freeze up at certain temps

djberg · #44 08/25/08, 02:20 PM

To answer a few questions:

The passive solar home builder lives in Lassen County, California. That's at about 4,200 feet elevation. Winter temperatures go down into the twenties. The area actually has a climate that's almost exactly average for the continantal US.

Acording to him, "Our wood burning stove is an airtight unit (Sweet Home), made in Sweet Home Oregon, I believe. The air intake can be controlled manually to reduce the heat output. Completely closed the fire will go out. We use a combination of cedar, ponderosa pine and oak for our wood. It is seasoned. We use the cedar in the early season, the pine during the colder months and the oak to stoke up the fireplace before going to bed. Some years we have only used the pine".

The family has lived off-grid for more than twenty years. During that time, the builder has experimented with, tinkered with and invented a number of active solar-powered devices. He shares information on his most successful experiments on his web site.

You can see the home and web site here:
http://countryhomejournal.com/passiv...ientation/273/

Thanks again, everyone, for your posts.
Don

raymilosh · #45 08/25/08, 04:06 PM

I live in a 900 sq ft house in central NC. It is retrofitted to be passive solar, is well insulated, has low infiltration and good curtains used daily. I burn between 1/2 to 1 1/2 cords per winter. I often close off extra rooms and let the house get cold sometimes, too. The wood stove cooks the food and heats the water in addition to heating the house.
Before it the curtains were installed and before I let it get cold in there sometimes, I burned over 2 cords or more in a winter.