Solar Heat-Gain - Page 5

 On Wed, 22 Apr 2009 18:11:39 +0100, Tim Jackson


Despite the Clean Air Act there is *nothing* to stop wood burning in a
restricted area if you use an appropriate specifically approved
stove/bolier, for instance those listed here (no connection etc)

http://www.stovesonline.co.uk/smoke-control-areas-clean-air-act.html


--

 

Mike wrote:


With a good stove, a good chimney and a decent air supply, a cast-iron stove can
be one of the most efficient room ( and possibly subsidiary water ) direct
heaters there is.

Graham

 Jim,


Do you want any TMY numbers for NH (HDD, CDD, Tmax, Tmin, wind speed,
...).

What about fuel type heat comparisons/conversions for #2 fuel oil,
Propane gas, Electricity, and Split & Dry Hardwood?

Curbie

 
I wondered if anyone else had measured the cooling rate of their
house, for comparison.

http://www.climate-charts.com/USA-Stations/NH/NH275712.php

Free firewood easily beats everything else on cost although it
required more attention than the others. I also can use the woodstove
for casting aluminum and heat-treating and blacksmithing steel, unlike
the other types. Some of my neighbors replaced their wood stoves with
natural gas heaters, these originally all-electric houses are
insulated well enough that they don't need forced circulation.

The weather conditions here don't match the official recordings taken
at airports all that closely, the biggest differences being that I
have considerably more shade and am shielded from most winds. The
temperatures on my Radio Shack remotes are within a degree of each
other and the official reading early in the morning but not too close
when the sun is out. The humidity readings differ by up to 10%.

I've used all those measurements to identify and fix specific
problems, like an area of thin attic insulation, a window insert that
popped loose behind a curtain and leaky stove joints. They shift after
every change and I haven't redone them since thoroughly sealing up the
stove, which improved it considerably.

Good temperature measurements really require a multipoint recorder, so
far the closest I have is a DVM that talks to a laptop which I used to
measure the 240V water heater's recovery time. I built an 8 channel 16
bit A/D converter on a Mac Nubus card once that I could modify for a
PC parallel port, some day.

I posted the measurements to show how complex even a simple system
such as a wood stove is to characterize. There really isn't much left
to do to change the house's efficiency without spending more than I'd
ever get back.

Jim Wilkins

 Jim,


I currently live in Florida although am planning a move soon
(hopefully my last) to Nebraska (wind, land cost, population). I don't
have any numbers (cooling or heating) for my current home because it
seems so un-related to anything I'll need for the move.


I agree with your cost analysis, just out of curiosity, do you know
the price per cord of hardwood in your area; I know your price is free
+ labor. I looked at a wood-stove for back-up heat, but am getting
older and think I could deal with material handling now, but as for
the future, I don't know?

Curbie