is when it freezes off on the coldest day we've had this year. Woowee, it was cold in here when we got back from town. It's warmed up to a toasty 58.3 degrees in the kitchen. I had been thinking about taking out the big woodstove, but now? No way in the hot place would I do that now.
We're waiting on Doug the Well Tender to show up. I love winter and I love snow. I'm not much of a fan of a house with no heat though. Even the word fan is making me cold.
Thank goodness for the wood stove and fireplace! We'll be fine, we'll just be working a little harder until the gas is back on. Country life--it's full of surprises.
Now to put that monster pot of chili on the wood stove to heat. My poor Tappan isn't much help today.
Showing posts with label wood heat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wood heat. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Woodstoves:The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Heating with Wood
I love my woodstove and fireplace--sort of. I love free heat and the beauty of the open fire. But it's a love tinged with resentment and sometimes downright fury.
Like tonight.
It's Thursday, and that's writing group night. The woodstove was loaded and the drafts carefully shut so the fire would hold and heat evenly until we returned home.
Writing group was great--several good stories and poems, and it was nice to reconnect after so many of us had to miss meetings the last two months due to kids' ball games and other commitments. The Chai tea was excellent, and it was one of those mellow evenings that leave you relaxed and smiling for no real reason. Larry and I even cruised down a street in town renowned for its holiday lights as we drove home.
The good mood evaporated when we opened the front door. What was that smell? There was no smoke, but the acrid smell of it filled the house. A quick check of the fireplace revealed no problems--the fire had burned itself out and everything seemed fine in that room.
Then we looked more closely at the wood stove. It's a Fisher and I've had it for 30 years (hard to believe). Every year it has provided so much heat that we often open doors in the dead of winter to cool things off. The temp is usually around 78 when we go to bed, and around 68 when we get up (this is a drafty house). It holds fire for hours, sometimes days, if properly filled.
But tonight we made two big mistakes. First mistake was that we put a pine log in the Fisher. We know better than that--pine is okay when the stove is burning wide open and is pretty hot. Second, we closed the drafts too tight. So the creosote from the pine and other wood leaked out the stovepipe joints and bubbled and smoked until it was completely charred. What a mess. And what a smell.
The stovepipe is as old as the stove. Because it runs directly up about 8 feet and then through the ceiling, it provides a lot of extra heat itself, and it's cool by the time it reaches the ceiling. So it's never burned out, and the only problems we've had with it is when we do something stupid like we did tonight. Thirty-year old stovepipe (ordered through the Sears catalog when it was still Sears Roebuck) is pretty amazing, come to think of it.
This weekend we'll have to find new pipe. It's past time. Stovepipe isn't as easy to find as it was in the past--even Lowe's doesn't carry it now. So it'll be a search, and probably we'll end up ordering it online. I got my money's worth (it was $7.00 a joint back in 1976 when we bought it) so I can't complain.
I love wood heat. I love the fireplace. I love being toasty warm in the evenings and knowing the fire will hold all night. I hate the smell of creosote, especially in my house. I don't like the dirt that seems to be an inevitable part of heating this way either. Or cleaning out the ashes. In the end it all balances out, I suppose. The heat is low-cost (we do have to consider the cost of gas and oil and the chainsaw and its upkeep, the tractor, wood splitter, etc) and it's WARM. No chilly house for us. The fireplace is beautiful; the open fire is a pleasure that I look forward to every wintry evening.
So it's a trade-off, and one we'll keep making until we decide when we want to hook up the free gas. After the cost of pipe and furnace, our heat will be truly free.
Then I'll probably reminisce fondly about the good ol' days when we heated with wood, and remember only the good things--and forget all melting creosote on a stovepipe stinking like 1000 pieces of burnt toast.
Like tonight.
It's Thursday, and that's writing group night. The woodstove was loaded and the drafts carefully shut so the fire would hold and heat evenly until we returned home.
Writing group was great--several good stories and poems, and it was nice to reconnect after so many of us had to miss meetings the last two months due to kids' ball games and other commitments. The Chai tea was excellent, and it was one of those mellow evenings that leave you relaxed and smiling for no real reason. Larry and I even cruised down a street in town renowned for its holiday lights as we drove home.
The good mood evaporated when we opened the front door. What was that smell? There was no smoke, but the acrid smell of it filled the house. A quick check of the fireplace revealed no problems--the fire had burned itself out and everything seemed fine in that room.
Then we looked more closely at the wood stove. It's a Fisher and I've had it for 30 years (hard to believe). Every year it has provided so much heat that we often open doors in the dead of winter to cool things off. The temp is usually around 78 when we go to bed, and around 68 when we get up (this is a drafty house). It holds fire for hours, sometimes days, if properly filled.
But tonight we made two big mistakes. First mistake was that we put a pine log in the Fisher. We know better than that--pine is okay when the stove is burning wide open and is pretty hot. Second, we closed the drafts too tight. So the creosote from the pine and other wood leaked out the stovepipe joints and bubbled and smoked until it was completely charred. What a mess. And what a smell.
The stovepipe is as old as the stove. Because it runs directly up about 8 feet and then through the ceiling, it provides a lot of extra heat itself, and it's cool by the time it reaches the ceiling. So it's never burned out, and the only problems we've had with it is when we do something stupid like we did tonight. Thirty-year old stovepipe (ordered through the Sears catalog when it was still Sears Roebuck) is pretty amazing, come to think of it.
This weekend we'll have to find new pipe. It's past time. Stovepipe isn't as easy to find as it was in the past--even Lowe's doesn't carry it now. So it'll be a search, and probably we'll end up ordering it online. I got my money's worth (it was $7.00 a joint back in 1976 when we bought it) so I can't complain.
I love wood heat. I love the fireplace. I love being toasty warm in the evenings and knowing the fire will hold all night. I hate the smell of creosote, especially in my house. I don't like the dirt that seems to be an inevitable part of heating this way either. Or cleaning out the ashes. In the end it all balances out, I suppose. The heat is low-cost (we do have to consider the cost of gas and oil and the chainsaw and its upkeep, the tractor, wood splitter, etc) and it's WARM. No chilly house for us. The fireplace is beautiful; the open fire is a pleasure that I look forward to every wintry evening.
So it's a trade-off, and one we'll keep making until we decide when we want to hook up the free gas. After the cost of pipe and furnace, our heat will be truly free.
Then I'll probably reminisce fondly about the good ol' days when we heated with wood, and remember only the good things--and forget all melting creosote on a stovepipe stinking like 1000 pieces of burnt toast.
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