Admittedly in years past I was not burning fully seasoned wood. Often I was burning high BTU wood like Oak, Rock Maple, and Shagbark Hickory that was only 6-12 months seasoned at best. Could never seem to get ahead. That is until I joined here and was told over and over to get on the three year plan. I buckled down, and got ahead finally. Now I’m really excited to see if my consumption of wood changes at all with drier wood. Currently I’m going through 7-8 full cords a year. I’m hoping drier wood might reduce that to 5-6 cords. Maybe I’m being optimistic. Curious as to others opinion/experiences with this topic. What percent difference would you expect?
This will be my 2nd year, burning 3yr wood. Consumption is difficult for me to offer. The heating season changes from year to year. This past spring, it was an extended shoulder season, for example. Due to that, I still offer 3-4 cord each heating season, for me.
It has been a long, long time since I could compare but I do not think your estimate will be far off. I'd say it could easily be 33% less or maybe greater because of what you burn. And of course the stove has to fit into this equation as does how warm you keep the house.
In the past I had to burn some 10-month seasoned oak, and I didn't like it much. This year I've got some good, fully seasoned oak, and the difference in the amount of heat given off is amazing. So I am thinking I'll for sure use less wood.
i got a ussc 1557 hotblast furnace and i usually end up using the same amount but i have noticed that when i put seasoned wood in it it usually makes my house hotter than satans keister
I don't have personal experience here but I'll offer my humble opinion. ANY improvement in consumption is worth the effort it took to get there. Even if you "only" save a cord per season burning better wood, that's still a cord less you have to labor over. My best thumb in the wind guess is you're not too far off the mark in your wood savings estimation. Plus you'll have the peace of mind not worrying so much about creosote buildup, your chimney emissions will go down, you won't have to reload as often. There's all sorts of perks you'll be privy to since you did the hard work up front. Now that you reached your goal it'll be relatively easy to maintain your inventory too. Being ahead rather than working to get ahead equates to less stress, less lost weekends, more time doing the things you could be doing otherwise. So good for you man, I'm looking forward to an update about this in the future.
I agree with JotulYokel, hard to say how much less you will burn but the amount of heat given off by dry wood is very noticeable.
It’s real simple water doesn’t burn well! So the dry wood doesn’t have to push the water out and you’ll get more heat. That should cause you to use less the variables being the stove and then the weather temperature outside and temps inside. You will burn cleaner with less creosote. I am guessing 20 to 30% less usage.
7-8 cord of wood! What are you heating with and how many sqft are you heating? If you don’t mind me asking.
I’m heating with a 1980’s ThermoControl. It’s a large older stove. My house is a 24x36 cape. Stove is in basement
Boiler? Do you use it for domestic hot water as well? im curious because my home is pretty similar in size and pretty much the same climate. I’m thinking of going the boiler route.
Mine is a hot water stove. It has a pipe coil in the stove that you can hook to your domestic water. The stoves with actual water jackets are better imo. I had it hooked up for awhile but it was hard to control. Even with a heat dump zone it got too hot and blew the tc valve of the storage tank all over the floor
I read this earlier and had to think on it, we ran out of wood our first winter up here, record setting cold (-37*F no including wind chill) and we ran out of wood and ordered more early spring. That wood was wet, I used much less of it because I had a hard time keeping it lit! And I FROZE! Hat's off to you that you could get wet wood to burn, but I think you will be amazed of the heat seasoned wood puts out in comparison.
I agree it would be best to burn seasoned wood but thats not the way it has been working out for myself. On winters when I have had steady work I burn 7 to 8 cord in my Hotblast. I bet it would also be 6 to 7 with dry wood also along with I wouldnt need to babysit my stove so much. I have cutting and splitting this years wood smaller and that seems to make drying quicker and burning a little better. I dont no how any one could burn green with a EPA stove
