If you have a hundred cord stacked out back (I wish) and a guy offered you 10 free cord of 3 year old dried oak... would you really need it? Don't ask an FHC member!
Shed is 32 feet long by 8 feet wide, and I stack about 7 feet high on average. It is built as part of my pole barn, and I ran two sheets of 3/4 treated plywood to offer the metal some protection. Other side of barn exactly the same where I store splitter and 4 wheeler. Does a pretty good job drying out the wood with three open sides. Holds approximately 13.7 cords.
I think you could pick up about a 1/4 cord by switching to 4' florescent lights mounted between the rafters
This may be a stupid question. How do you owb guys have hot water in the summer when not running owb? I live in an area where they are an uncommon item, and i have zero exp with them. I guess there may be multiple answers, but this being a wood hoarders club i would guess that your like me and hate utility bills.
I have a friend that uses an OWB for heat and DHW during the winter. During the summer he turnes on his electric water heater when he shuts his OWB down.
During the months that the OWB is shut down, I simply start up the gas water heater once again. There is a valve on the heat exchanger that I installed to shut off the flow from the water heater to the OWB heat exchanger during this shut down period...that way, the water heater only heats what is in it's own tank.
Thanks for the info, it sounds like there are different ways to go about it. Does the owb heat your water and provide heat for the house also? Are there great differences from one model of owb to the next? Like i said i dont know anyone in my area who has one, and i believe they are much more common in the eastern united states.
Yes, the OWB heats not only the house through a heat exchanger in the forced air furnace, but also the domestic water through the use of a side arm heat exchanger. Yes, there are differences between manufacturers of OWBs. The one I have is an vented system meaning there is no pressure built up by the OWB when it is in use. Oregon probably doesn't allow the use of OWB's as it seems the state is quite restrictive/regulating in regards to the use of any type of wood burner....inside or outside. Better watch out for campfires!
Thanks for the info i find it good to learn about new to me wood burning equipment. As for ore'gone i live east of the cascade mtns and alot of us here dont claim or like the fu€£ing sobs that make the laws in our state. I live in a fairly rural area and if i wanted an owb i would have one, and their tree hugging worthless azz would not tell what to do. For the most part i doubt anyone would notice. Ya oregon has alot of stupid laws alot like california, but ive met some super backwoods down home freedom loving people from north cali.
Question already answered but yes, i have an electric hot water heater. The way mine is set up, I have a large, I think 65 gallon tank. It has a hot water coil of sorts in it, meaning it takes hot water from the OWB, and uses it to heat domestic hot water. Then sitting right beside it, i have a regular electric hot water heater. It pulls its supply from the first tank. When running the OWB, the electric hot water heater is pulling already hot water, so it has to do little or nothing to the water to get it to temperature. When i turn off the OWB, then the water in that first tank is of course cold, and the hot water heater just works like normal. Advantages are that 6 months out of the year I get a large hot water supply (both tanks), and when i shut down the OWB, I don't need to do anything further. For my first ten years using an OWB, I actually burned year round as we were a family of 6, plus an exchange student, and there was enough hot water demand to make it worth it i thought. But now that the nest is empty, i felt like just taking the six months off to stockpile wood and let what water my wife and i use come through the electric hot water heater. Running an OWB for only limited domestic hot water is not efficient and burns way more firewood than is worth it in my opinion, and I also thought maybe reduces the life expectancy of the OWB and some of its parts. Hope this helps answer your question. Lots of sharp folks on this forum and always happy to share info.
Ok so i understand an owb is a large quanity type of heat supply, and not really worth it if its just 1 or 2 people living in the home. Its my guess that an owb could burn large amounts of firewood when its goen 24/7. Thanks for the info greg.
The amount of people who live in the house doesn't matter; the size of the house matters. I think this place is around 1200 sq ft or so. Not at all large by any means. There are also different size OWBs to consider. I think that Greg has a storage tank set up that he is referring to. My system does not have that, the only tank is on the OWB itself. That hot water is circulated to the house...water heater and then the forced air furnace and then back out to the OWB. Google OWB and some different brands should come up with the particular info you're looking for.
I don't know about the rest of you folks out there, but personally after mid April, I want to be done burning. I have struggled after joining the FHC to get to the 3 year plan and I'm there. Every piece I burn at that time of year is a piece I'm taking from the following winter in my eyes. I'm lucky in that my wife likes it cool and up here, 50's and 60's in the spring is a throw open the windows heat wave. Just saying, I know when we had had babies we kept it a little warmer by burning later. But I'm beyond that now. The downside is the wife does have a lot of clothes on in the spring. Maybe I'm not so smart after all?
