# Woodburners, how many cords do you use?



## djberg (Mar 14, 2007)

In researching passive solar homes, I came across a nice, simple 1,600 square foot design. The owner, in northern California, said that he burned three cords in a woodstove, each winter as "back-up" heat. That seemed like a lot to me.

It made me wonder how much wood it takes to heat a conventional house.

If you heat with wood, please let me know where you are, how big your home is and how many cords you go through each year. 

Thanks for your help.

Don


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## Skykomish (May 28, 2008)

I live in Laramie WY where it gets down to -30 a few times each winter. We completely used up 2 cords and got a third one which we used a bit from. My house is 3 stories... I don't know the square footage. It has 2 bath and 4 bedrooms. We also used it to heat our garage which has an attached "shed" area. We only used it in the garage for 2 weeks. The wood stove itself makes a HUGE difference. If you have a well sealed nice one it won't use as much wood to heat for a longer time.


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## WisJim (Jan 14, 2004)

We have a 1900sf early 1900s 2 story farmhouse with a sunroom addition, and we heat with wood using a wood forced air furnace in the basement. We use about 4 full cords of wood each winter, less when it is a mild winter. We burn another 1/2 cord or less in our wood cookstove, occassionaly during the winter. We get a reasonable amount of heat on sunny winter days, no matter how cold outside, from the sunroom as long as it is sunny. 

We are in western Wisconsin, east of St Paul, MN. I know of other people in our area with newer, tighter, better insulated houses who heat primarily with passive solar and internal heat gain from people and appliances, who burn a cord or less of firewood in a Wisconsin winter.


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## wdchuck (Jun 24, 2007)

3,000sqft, 1800's, two story farm house with some additions. Drafts, old windows, doors, the works. 
Using a forced air wood furnace connected to the ductwork as an add-on, and used as primary heat and the LP furnace as backup, we have used up to 8cords, that being the previous winter due to length of cold season. 

Properly designed supply/return air ducts, insulation, housewrap, doors, windows, new exterior, would improve heat retention considerably, and will happen when feasible. 

Looking forward to 5 cords or less someday.


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## Shawna (Jul 10, 2007)

I will be interested to see how much we use this year. Last year was our first year with the woodstove. We have an old stove that was given to us. About halfway through the winter, dh installed a damper in the pipe, which helped out immensely. Also, we couldn't seemt o get the heat into the living room and two bedrooms, so we tended to burn hotter to get more heat. However, now we have the fan situation figured out and we can get heat moved into those rooms without heating the rest of the house to 900-thousand degrees!

So, that being said, we burned about 9 cords of wood last year. We should go through alot less this year since we have things figured out. We live in Ohio, and our house (about 1800 sq ft)is over 100 years old. Although we have new windows, insulation, we still get alot of heat loss (something we will be working on in the future!). Our house gets ALOT of wind. We always seem to have a breeze here, which is fantastic in the summer, not so great in the winter. There are no homes around us, just farmland, so our house really gets hit with the wind.

We are splitting and stacking this weekend, and we are planning on having about 12 cords ready to go (dh is getting deployed again next year, so he's kind of getting a jump start on next year's wood supply). We are both very curious to see how much we go through this year. People think we are nuts when we tell them how much we went through last year, but we were going through wood like it was nothing. But I think we got it dialed in now!!!

Shawna


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## sugarbush (Jul 15, 2007)

Houses here are sure built less efficiant than those back home in Vermont. We burn 3 cord here in two stoves and 3 cord back in Vermont in one stove. Our house here is a whole story smaller as well.


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## djberg (Mar 14, 2007)

Thanks everyone!

The differences that you're reporting are amazing: 2 1/3 cords in WY (where it's really cold) to 9 cords in OH. I guess that there are too many variables to make any conclusions.

WisJim - You said "I know of other people in our area with newer, tighter, better insulated houses who heat primarily with passive solar and internal heat gain from people and appliances, who burn a cord or less of firewood in a Wisconsin winter."

That's what I would have expected and less than a cord is probably a good target for a passive solar home with all of the best features. 

The builder in northern CA, who uses three cords, has a fairly conventional ranch house with most of the windows on the south wall. That's probably the easiest and least expensive way of doing "passive solar," on a new house. I'm just trying to figure out how effective doing only that is. Based on your 2 1/3 cords in a colder climate, I'd guess not-so-great.

Shawna - It won't help right away, but you might consider planting an evergreen wind break on the north side of the home. White pines, planted at about 20' center to center, fill in fast. You have to plant as many as possible in a tight semi-circle around the house, then leave a 40' wide open semi-circle and then plant another, bigger semi-circle around that. 

You'll loose some of the breeze on the lower level, but not upstairs. To make up for it, plant some shade trees at the south west and south east corners of the house if you don't have them now. Norway maples grow fast.

I hate to suggest more work for dh. He seems like a good man, and probably deserves a break. But, little pines are cheap. After just a few years, a similar wind break made a world of difference on our house. It will save a lot of splitting and stacking in the long run.


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## RVcook (Mar 29, 2008)

We live in central Wisconsin in an 1100 sq. ft. home (not counting the finished, walkout basement.) Although our winters have been relatively mild for the last several years, we had a *BRUTAL* winter last year and we burned through 700+ gallons of propane in our *new* 93% efficient furnace.

While our home needs additional insulation and caulking, we have taken steps to get our wood furnace up and working for this heating season. If all things were to remain the same as last year..._heaven forbid_...I did some calculating and figured that we would use about 3 1/2 cords of medium heat output wood to heat the house (based on the total BTU's.)

If I were to build a home now, I would completely over-insulate to keep my heating and cooling costs in check. The amount you invest now will result in big buck savings over the years since heating and cooling prices are only going to continue to go UP.

RVcook


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## frazzlehead (Aug 23, 2005)

The problem in the cold weather is the windows - which are also the whole point of passive solar. All that glass is COLD at night!

We have a south wall that is just about all windows, for a storey and a half. In the winter, we put quilts over them at night - they do let in light and warmth in the daytime, but man, as soon as the sun goes down you have to close them off tight ... even walking near them you can feel the chill.

The high ones will probably get bubble wrapped this winter.


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## Wags (Jun 2, 2002)

"Northern California" doesn't really tell you much about the climate this house is in. It could mean cold snowy winters, wet damp winters or mild temperate winters. You need to know that before you judge whether or not three cords is excessive. And is the owner talking about three full cords or three face cords?


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## diane (May 4, 2002)

So many variables involved.
Some people call a face cord a cord.
Woodburners burn with various degrees of effieciency.
Some wood is way better than others.
Winter vary greatly from year to year.

For me, last winter was brutal. Very windy, very cold for a very long time.
I have 1500 square feet, a Kitchen Queen cookstove, and I used about 4 full cords last winter. Some winters it has been as low as 2 cords.


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## goatsareus (Jun 23, 2007)

3000 sq foot house, southern Ohio, it gets cold here, cold enough to go ice skating at least once a winter (zero F range). Depends on how cold the winter is, but we use between one and two cords of firewood a heating season, Oct/Nov to April. We built our house and it is superinsulated. That is why we use so little firewood. We have a wood burning furnance in the basement with duck work to every room. Yep, there are a lot of variables.


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## RiverPines (Dec 12, 2006)

The wood used matters a lot. Soft woods burn up real fast. Hard last a lot longer.
How well cured they are effects not only the burn but also the temperature of the burn.
Many. many variables involved.

Oh and the type and size and location of the wood burner will make a lot of difference two.

We had a brutal winter last year. Our sole heat is wood in and old style wood burner with a heat reclaimer.
We went through 5 full cords but a lot was soft wood.


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## cowboy joe (Sep 14, 2003)

1400 sq ft ranch...we keep the doors closed to the bedrooms so we're only heating about 1200. We burned ~1.5 cords last yr (Zone 5, western NY) + 400 gals of fuel oil. The house is also supplemented with passive solar from the attached greenhouse. Your milage may vary...


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## djberg (Mar 14, 2007)

Wags - Good questions. I'll have to find out. But, a photo of the house shows about 10" of snow on the roof. 

I only considered that he was burning hard wood and that a cord was a cord, like this:

http://www.backroadhome.com/how-to-measure-wood.html

Please, anyone, how big is a face cord?


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## Janis Sauncy (Apr 11, 2006)

I'm envious of those who can make it through the winter using only three cords.

I average about a cord a month. My wood stove, though, is a dinosaur and not at all efficient. It will, however, blast you out of the room at times with the heat it puts out. It is also my _only_ heat source (no electric, or other, back-up).

This year, I am going to make more of an effort to be conservative with the wood. Last year, I kept the stove going 24/7 and this winter I'm going to try and let it burn itself out for a few hours every night. And make sure I have plenty of kindling on hand to re-start it _quickly_ in the morning.

I know a few people that bank their stoves at night with a couple of pieces of coal. I think I'll try that.


Janis


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## cfabe (Feb 27, 2005)

A "face cord" is an indeterminite measure. It is a stack of wood 4 feet tall by 8 feet long by how ever long they cut the pieces. Usually 16-24", which would be about 1/3 to 1/2 of a cord depending. Some places they also call this a "rick".


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## RVcook (Mar 29, 2008)

frazzlehead said:


> The problem in the cold weather is the windows - which are also the whole point of passive solar. All that glass is COLD at night!
> 
> We have a south wall that is just about all windows, for a storey and a half. In the winter, we put quilts over them at night - they do let in light and warmth in the daytime, but man, as soon as the sun goes down you have to close them off tight ... even walking near them you can feel the chill.
> 
> The high ones will probably get bubble wrapped this winter.


This is exactly the problem with our home. We have two sets of two large windows, each individual window is 64 x 38 so they are very long. The only way to keep out the 'radiant' cold is by friction fitting large pieces of rigid foam, foil faced sheathing into each window. We leave them off during the day to get the benefit of sunlight and then pop them in as soon as the sun goes down. It cost me less than $100 to make one for every single window in the house, but it was easy, cheap and fast considering we moved into the house only two weeks before we got hit with the season's first massive snow storm and frigid temps.

Bubble wrap on the upper windows sounds like the best option for that area.

RVcook


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## Old Vet (Oct 15, 2006)

Your question has a lot of room for other questions. Where are you located, how big of a house, is it insulated how much, how many trips out the door, how tall of ceilings, and a few other. I live in Arkansas in a fairly new double wide and have used 3 to 4 cords per year for a couple of years. The weather has not been very cold. In the same time a friend of mine heats his store and he runs about 1/2 rick per day through his, 1 rick is probably what you would call a pickup load.


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## beowoulf90 (Jan 13, 2004)

Ok, Here we go...
When we burned wood we would go through about 7 cords a year. Now you must realize we were heating a old stone house built between 1750 and 1770, so it is very poorly insulated except where we managed to get some in the ceilings.. It is also 84' x24' and 2 full stories so it is roughly 4000 sq ft. No we didn't/couldn't heat it all with wood, we only heated about 2900 sq ft on cool days, less on cold days.... 
There is no furnace in the house and from my knowlege it never had one..

Now we heat with a coal stove and supplement it with kerosene heaters as needed.

But with the price of kero, that will continue to change.


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## stanb999 (Jan 30, 2005)

We use about 8 1/2 cords of hard wood. Only heat with wood too.
We have a house built in the 1830's 1450SF. But we insulated and put new windows and doors.

I think it has a lot to do with local conditions as well as the length of the heating season. For instance we had our last fire in late May for 07 and our first fire this last week. So we burn a very long time. So we use quite a bit of wood. Of course the room with the stove is warm but like has been noted above the farther you get from the stove the colder it gets. Sometimes the DW bakes bread to warm the kitchen. lol


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## akhomesteader (Jan 5, 2006)

We heat 2 buildings and do all of our cooking with wood. In a typical we'll go through 10 cords 70% beatle killed spruce and 30% birch that has dried for a year.


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## Itilley (Jul 29, 2008)

I think the amount of wood used a season is dependent on the stove used and the area being heated and the seasoning of the wood. We haven't heated by wood only for several years but hopefully we will use about 3 good with our newer stove. We have in the past burnt about 5 cords a winter here in Maine. If we have a lot of snow that tends to insulate the house a little more which should help a little. When we first started burning wood I never thought about wood having to be seasoned and we did not get the heat we should have and had a lot of creosote in the chimney. This wood is well dried.

RenieB


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## seedspreader (Oct 18, 2004)

North East Ohio last year and we used about 4 chords, 1800 ft. house. 123 years old. 


NW pa. this year, interested to see what we burn, much more open and compact house. I am sure it's not the tightest house, but I think we may do pretty well and only use 2 - 3 cords We'll see. I may need 10, who knows.


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## COSunflower (Dec 4, 2006)

I have a 3 bedroom mobile home that is well insulated with good tight windows. I use on average 3 cords of seasoned pine. Less if I can get Tamarack. It usually gets around -11 for a week or two in the winter but other than that is usually above zero. Last year was mild and I only used a couple cords with my heat pump as a backup will I was at work during the day.


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## djberg (Mar 14, 2007)

Going just by the math, it's an average of 4 3/4 full cords per home. But, with so many different locations, types of stoves and furnaces, varieties and condition of wood and sizes of homes, there are way too many variables to come to any conclusions. 

A lot of what you said is very interesting. 

With 1-2 cords for a 3,000 sf house in Ohio, goatsareus is the big winner! ( or just a very warm dresser : )

That post, and a few others, seem to tell that superinsulation, and a way of ducting heat or distributing heat so that it reaches all rooms, work best.

Woodburners are much more in touch with energy usage than most homeowners. Someone should do a survey of what you know works best. All homeowners could learn from it.

Thank you all.

Don


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## vicki in NW OH (May 10, 2002)

NW Ohio, no more than 4 cords of wood, 1800 sq. ft., approximately 100-year-old farmhouse, 2 story. This is our only source of heat other than an electric heater in the bathroom when it's really cold.


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## WindowOrMirror (Jan 10, 2005)

NorthCentral WI here. 2800 sq. ft. home built in a "square" with heat registers on each floor. The envelope is mostly windproof. We use a single -large- woodstove in the center of the home and *burn 5-6 cords in a rough winter*. It gets to -20 normally, and sometimes hits -30.


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## goatsareus (Jun 23, 2007)

djberg said:


> Going just by the math, it's an average of 4 3/4 full cords per home. But, with so many different locations, types of stoves and furnaces, varieties and condition of wood and sizes of homes, there are way too many variables to come to any conclusions.
> 
> A lot of what you said is very interesting.
> 
> ...


We have heated solely with wood for 33 years, cut our own wood, season it two years or more and designed and built this house for wood heat. Besides being superinsulated, it has air lock entries on both entrances. So we are never opening our living space to the outside air. One air lock entry is the garage and the other is the green house. The house is airtight with the draft draw right by the stove, so the draft air is not the inside air. Built this house in 1986 so have forgotten all the design elements for using little wood.


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## djberg (Mar 14, 2007)

goatsareus - Nice! Think of all the work that you saved yourself over the last 33 years.

So, it's superinsulation, air lock entrances and outside, combustion air delivered right at your stove. Anything else that you can think of? 

What is your site like? Is the house in an open field, or protected in a valley or by trees? Is it conventional stick-frame construction?

Thanks for the help.

Don


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## goatsareus (Jun 23, 2007)

djberg said:


> goatsareus - Nice! Think of all the work that you saved yourself over the last 33 years.
> 
> Don


LOL, I am trying to remember all the work we have saved cutting, hauling, splitting and stacking wood for 33 years...me thinks we have saved more money than work


yes, I have thought of something else.... the green house is passive solar, it has a 12 inch over hang on the roof so we get no summer sun but we get full sun in winter. We do get some solar gain from the greenhouse in winter, to the first floor only. We have a basement with two floors above. It is cheaper to build up than out. I believe the foot print is 30x40 but we do not have full use of the top floor because of knee walls. The wood burning wood stove does not keep a fire over a few hours. It is pert near impossible to keep a fire overnight. We only try that when it is -10*F or colder. Otherwise the fire goes out before midnight. The temp in the house drops to about 60 to 65*F overnight. The house will not freeze when left alone. That was one goal of ours in this design, to be able to leave the house unoccupied with no resulting damage. We actually capture heat from appliances, that is why the house can not freeze.

The house sits high on a hill, and is surrounded by trees. Dh felled 11 trees closest to the house 2 years ago, we were surprised how much they had grown since we built the house. We have been having terrible wind storms the past few years so he wanted those trees gone. So now there is a small buffer of no trees, but the house has a large buffer of trees on the east, north and west side. The house is oriented due south with no trees directly in front, except for two hugh blue spruces.

It is conventional stick framing, except for the balloon(?) framing. There are two 6 inch stud walls built right next to each other, studs off center so there is no wood conduction of heat through the walls, to house the insulation. First floor walls are 12 inches thick.

Any more questions? I'll be around a few more hours until I help get in the last cutting of hay today...


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## goatsareus (Jun 23, 2007)

opps, remembered the basement....poured concrete floor with concrete block walls. I believe there is rigid insulation under the floor and I am positive there is rigid insulation on the outside of the walls, covered with stucco.


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## sugarbush (Jul 15, 2007)

My issue with passive solar is that if it warms you in the winter, it warms you in the summer too. Firewood is free, AC is not.


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## goatsareus (Jun 23, 2007)

sugarbush said:


> My issue with passive solar is that if it warms you in the winter, it warms you in the summer too. Firewood is free, AC is not.



In our case, this is not true. We have blinds in the greenhouse over all the glass and two doors on both ends of the greenhouse for ventilation. And we keep the doors from the greenhouse into the house closed. So there is no effect of heating the house in the summer from the greenhouse.

And firewood is NOT free! We pay taxes on the land, buy and maintain chainsaws, buy oil and gas for the chainsaws and tractor to haul the wood, not to mention our time.


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## radiofish (Mar 30, 2007)

Northern California encompasses a large amount of territory, going from the beach to over 10,000 feet in elevation.. I am interested in what part of Norhtern California that is????

At the old place, I used about 2 and 1/2 cords per winter in a 2 story, 13 room, over 2000 sq.ft. victorian house built in 1891. That was at sea level, in a drafty house for over 17 years.

Here at the new place, an 1000 sq.ft. one story house at 1,800 feet in elevation. I burned around the same amount the last two winters - 2 and 1/2 cords of wood. It does snow here, I had up to 6 inches of snow, at four different times last wiinter.

Firewood is free?? Geeeez - I thought my chainsaw, extra chains, chain files, 2 cycle mix, gasoline, bar oil, splitting maul, sledgehammer and wedges, chimney brush and cresote destroyer, and leather gloves cost money. Not to mention using one of my trucks, and that fuel used for moving the wood.... Firewood is going for over $350 per full cord (or not quite - depends on who sells it), for hardwood in this area now!!!!

I was out cutting Doug Fir and Sitka Spruce this afternoon. A couple of 2 year old winter storm blow downed trees, each about 100 feet in lenght and over 3 feet in diameter near the base/ rootwad. Tomorrow I get to go split and haul it out. Maybe it might get stacked into the woodshed, if my leg pain levels don't go throught the roof!!! 

It is oh so much fun doing firewood by myself...... But I will be warm and toasty this winter, when it is raining sideways here.. I was working in the trees/ shady, with a temperature of almost 70 degrees here today..


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## Junkman (Dec 17, 2005)

Our little place in the Sun is about 1,600 sq ft and we use about 3 cords of wood a Winter. We also have propane as there is no gas available in our area. And, we sure can't afford electric heat in this old poorly insulated house. We insulated what we could but not the area under the foundation. It is very large cut stones. But, we don't complain. We love our life here. jklady


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## RVcook (Mar 29, 2008)

sugarbush said:


> My issue with passive solar is that if it warms you in the winter, it warms you in the summer too. Firewood is free, AC is not.


If the home owner and home builder are smart, this is definitely NOT the case. Proper orientation, deep overhangs (and/or porches), appropriate plantings, etc. make ALL the difference in a well-designed passive solar home.

I also have to agree with the others that firewood is definitely NOT free! Maybe things are different in KY, but here in Wisconsin, unless you have a managed woodlot (that you don't have to pay taxes on) and the strength to be able to use a decent chainsaw (that you had to buy), gasoline and oil (that you didn't have to purchase), not to mention all the maintenance and repair issues (that of course _*never*_ happen!) and lots and LOTS of time to cut, split and stack the wood, then firewood is NOT free. Oh...and did I mention trips to the Dr. in case of an accident (which also never happens!) Yep...firewood is sure free.

RVcook


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## cathleenc (Aug 16, 2007)

we easily went through 6 cords of wood last year plus over $2000 in propane and we froze our tushies off...... moved in in early november and had the joy of discovering how incredibly energy inefficient our house is. Draft city.

hoping to keep it to 5 cords this year and improve drastically next year.


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## sugarbush (Jul 15, 2007)

goatsareus said:


> And firewood is NOT free! We pay taxes on the land, buy and maintain chainsaws, buy oil and gas for the chainsaws and tractor to haul the wood, not to mention our time.


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


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## rider (Feb 11, 2003)

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


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## sugarbush (Jul 15, 2007)

rider said:


> 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.


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## goatsareus (Jun 23, 2007)

sugarbush said:


> 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.


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## rider (Feb 11, 2003)

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


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## djberg (Mar 14, 2007)

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/passive-solar-home-design-window-orientation/273/

Thanks again, everyone, for your posts.
Don


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## raymilosh (Jan 12, 2005)

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.


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