How will you heat your home this winter?

[over9five]

I use oil. I have two 275 gallon tanks that I fill as late in the year as possible. I live up a large hill, and the oil truck can't make it up in the snow/ice.

This summer, I bought a pellet stove as oil prices are out of control. I put $1100 in my tanks last month. Filled one tank, and just a little of the second. Yuck!

Gas prices have gone down, but not oil. Gonna be a lot of cold people this winter.

 

[moreluck]

I have a gas forced air furnace. When it's just chilly, we use a gas log fireplace in the rec. room. When it's colder, we use the furnace. I turn it off basically during the night (I like covers). Of course, living in CA., we don't have the extreme cold. We do get down to 38 or 39 sometimes at night.

 

[browndevil]

I have a gas forced air furnace. When it's just chilly, we use a gas log fireplace in the rec. room. When it's colder, we use the furnace. I turn it off basically during the night (I like covers). Of course, living in CA., we don't have the extreme cold. We do get down to 38 or 39 sometimes at night.

Fortunately we don't have extreme tempatures here either in Northern California. I may be using the heater in the morning in December and January just to get the chill off before work and on the weekends I will burn in my fireplace(a least until it becomes illegal)

 

[Big Babooba]

I converted to gas years ago with no regrets. I had a 1000 gal tank and would fill it in the summer when the oil price was around .50 / gal. that would get me through most of the winter.(I've got a big house). I have two fireplaces I in the living room and the other in the basement.I am thinking about pellet inserts for them, but I don't know if the second floor would get warm enough.

 

[mattwtrs]

I converted to gas years ago with no regrets. I had a 1000 gal tank and would fill it in the summer when the oil price was around .50 / gal. that would get me through most of the winter.(I've got a big house). I have two fireplaces I in the living room and the other in the basement.I am thinking about pellet inserts for them, but I don't know if the second floor would get warm enough.

Heat rises in my house so the 2nd floor is always warm enough in winter with all the forced air registers closed. I really liked living on the 2nd or 3rd floor of the apartment building cause the heating bill was so affordable.

 

[scratch]

I use gas to heat my house, I am on a budget plan and am currently paying $91 a month. I have a small two story frame house that has separate heat/AC systems for each floor. My electric bill is about $60 in the winter, and this month it was $162. It actually went down a couple of dollars from last month, which surprised me. I replaced both units this past year going to a bigger size, from a 1.5 ton units to 2 ton units. I also had ridge vents installed when I replaced my roof a few months ago after hail storm damage. So that has apparently cut down on the summertime heat buildup in my attic.

 

[toonertoo]

I have a wood burner and my house is 725 glorious square feet. I did also have propane heat as a major source of heat, but when it died last November I put in baseboard electric. My home has been totally insulated now, so this winter should be interesting. My high bill was 370 for this house which is craziness. My kwh ph is 6.9, and my neighbors is 3.9, as they got a discount for going all electric which is no longer offered. I did get all my wood free, which really helps if someone is here to keep the burner stoked.
I heard in Ky the natural gas went up 65%!!!!!

 

[jds4lunch]

Over, are you able to burn used oil in your furnace? When I was on road construction our shop burned the used oil from the machines to heat it in the winter. Obviously, that's alot more oil than you would go through in your personal vehicle.

As for myself, I'll just continue to pay my rent. That usually keeps the apartment warm.

 

[dillweed]

I voted on both propane and wood. We used to have baseboard electric throughout this old farmhouse but it cost a fortune. Originally the place had those wonderful steam radiators which weren't so cool trying to move out of here!

We went several years usiing total wood but finally got tired of getting up, starting the woodburner again, getting home to cold house, restarting woodburner and so forth. Put in a propane wall-heater which keeps it warm enough while we're gone, then we fire up the woodburner when we're home.

The wood heat is very best, wish we had our own wood to cut. We considered pellets but they stoves had fans on them which wouldn't do us any good if the power went out.

 

[over9five]

Good site for NE residents to check area oil prices:

www.newenglandoil.com

 

[wyobill]

We have been in our new house for almost 6 years now. Propane or electric was about our only choice so we went with propane with forced air. Air conditioning
is nice on these hot summer days which is run off of electric but in the winter we suck the propane to run the furnace. Our first fill was OCT. of 2002 at the price of 69 cents a gallon now we pay 2.39 a gallon. We just filled to the toon of 1887.18 dollars and we will have to fill again in December. We have a 1,000 Gal tank.
Ouch!!!!! I thought filling up my Diesel was painful. To heat our house here in Wyoming it will run about 3,600. for the winter season.

 

[over9five]

There's an interesting video about how wood pellets are made:

http://www.pelletheat.com

The dealer they featured is where we bought our pellet stove.

 

[over9five]

My pellet stove.

 

[scratch]

I have a friend of mine that uses a pellet stove in the wintertime. He keeps it in his finished basement, it also helps warm the main floor of his house. Our winters are mild compared to you guys in other parts of the country, but he says he has noticed a considerable savings on his winter heating bill.

I also burn wood in a fireplace, but it doesn't warm hardly a bit. I just enjoy watching it. I went and got a free truck load of red oak yesterday, now I just have to take an ax and split it. Yes, I still do it that way.

 

[over9five]

Ouch! I can't do the splitting thing anymore. My shoulders are toast from the job!
Main reason I decided to go with pellets. I want nothing to do with splitting or even carrying wood.

 

[scratch]

Splitting firewood is just a type of therapy to me. I'm the outdoors type so its second nature. It would be easy to rent a hydraulic woodsplitter and do it. But I can drink a few cold beers and take out my frustrations on that piece of log with my ax.

 

[soberups]

Splitting firewood is just a type of therapy to me. I'm the outdoors type so its second nature. It would be easy to rent a hydraulic woodsplitter and do it. But I can drink a few cold beers and take out my frustrations on that piece of log with my ax.

I love splitting and cutting firewood. I have a 2000 sq. foot house with a high-efficiency gas furnace/ac system....and a woodstove. In the winter I use the woodstove almost exclusively. I have a rural route and when I see a diseased or fallen tree I ask the customer if I can cut it up and haul it away. I currently have about 5 cords of split and stacked wood on hand, enough for the coming winter and a good part of the following one. I also buy green unseasoned wood off of Craigslist for pennies on the dollar, and sit on it for a year or two until it is ready to burn. I can heat my home with wood for about $40 a month, a fraction of what my gas bill would be.

 

[soberups]

A real back-saving trick for splitting wood is to mount an old tire on top of your chopping block. You need a tire whose inside diameter is smaller than the block so that it will sit on top, and you can screw it into the top of the block with a couple of decking screws.

When you place your wood to be split on top of the block, the tire helps to hold it upright and it holds it and keeps it from falling off after it is split. If you have a round that needs to be quartered, you can literally walk a circle around it and split it up without having to constantly stop, bend over, pick up the wood and put it back up on the block.

The other benefit is that it will protect the wood handle of your axe or maul, if you swing and miss the handle will hit the tire instead of the edge of the chopping block. It shouldnt cost anything either, my local tire shop has a bin of used tires to be discarded and they told me I could hve whatever I wanted for free.

One other thing; once you mount the tire on the block, drill some holes on the bottom of the sidewall so that it doesnt fill up with rainwater or snowmelt.

 

[scratch]

Soberups,
Great tip on using the old tire to hold the wood in place on my chopping block. I haven't tried it yet. My brother-in-law just had a giant red oak taken down in his back yard, so I have a good, free supply. Its hard to split though, its still a little wet. I just came in from swinging the ax and maul, I have a stack that will last a couple of months. I have a little bit of seasoned wood left from last winter

 

[over9five]

Did I mention I have 40 bags of pellets?

Gawd, I sound like a whimp after reading Scratch and Soberups posts....





<You know I have to tear those bags open, right???>

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