Brrrrrr It's Cold Out There

[JohnyMac]

As I sit here on Tuesday January 21, 2014 at 2100 hrs eastern; the temperature outside is -1F and 72F inside.

I know that Crudos, hj, Whiskeyjack, Wellie, Special-K and others live in the NE and are use to these cold snaps. I am just wondering what all forum members are using to keep warm this year; hence the poll.

Please place your vote and then elaborate on your source (s) of heat.

Thanks.

PS: All can play including you S.Cal and FL. boys!

[APX808]

Can Argentinian guys play?

I'm fooking hot, practically naked even considering today is being a cold day this summer, just 77°F.
Usually we are enduring 95°F, even more in the northern provinces

[JohnyMac]

Up at the cabin (AKA the BOL) we have a jotul Oslo wood stove. This stove is the sole heating source with the exception of a "milk barn" electric heater we use in the head when we take a shower.

When it gets into single digits, negative or positive, we use about twenty-two to twenty-five, 20" - 22" logs a day. I close off the second story bedroom & head plus the first floor bunk room. So in theory the only thing open is the first floor bedroom (ours), head, kitchen and great room. For the most part we stay at about 72F UNLESS MrsMac takes it upon herself to put in more logs because she is CHILLY!  At those times the cabin will go above 75F and we waste wood! Gee willikers you have a cedar chest full of sweaters!!

During these colder periods,when MrsMac and I go to bed, I set my alarm to wake me up every 4 hours or so, to get up to reload the wood stove. I have repeatedly tried to train the cats to do this but to no avail. If I do not I wake up to 55F or so temps in the main part of the cabin and 50F in our bed room in the AM - Brrrrrr!

When it is normal temps for this time of year (25F/20F) we only use 15 - 20 logs a day and I DO NOT set my alarm for every 4 hours.

We spend $120- a cord for 20-22" logs. We average a cord a month starting November. We typically buy 2-3 cords and cut from our own woods 2-3 cords a year.

This coming season, the farmer across the way and I are talking about buying a logging truck worth of wood from a logger. Cost will be $600- and we will get 8 cords out of a load. That's $75- a cord of ash/oak/& or cherry.

[JohnyMac]

APX wrote:
Can Argentinian guys play? (a)

I'm fooking hot, practically naked (b) even considering today is being a cold day this summer, just 77°F.
Usually we are enduring 95°F, even more in the northern provinces (c)

a) LOL, Absolutely you can play APX!
b) I just read your post and MrsMac asked if you had any pictures 
c) 77F  Oh my heavens! I think I am going to take the next plane south and do some...ahhhh...Argentinian dove hunting - Yeah that's it!

[APX808]

LOL, no pics as I'm to drunk to look good in them
Man you're using really shitty measure units... I had to Google what a cord is and the explanation I get is a picture of how big the  amount of wood should be! LOL
Argentina is a nice country, specially if you have many green bills

[JohnyMac]

  Oh heavens!

A cord is equal to: 4 feet deep (width) x 4 feet high by 8 feet long or 128 cubic feet or 3,000 - 5,200 pounds.

Of course weight is not used for a few reasons:
1) Wet or freshly cut wood will weigh more then dried wood, and
2) Different species of wood will weigh more/less, depending on the species.

Here is a great fuel comparison chart you can use to calculate the cost of your heat. ONLY plug prices to the "cost per unit" column! Sorry APX this is set up for Canadian & US dollars not Argentine Peso.

[APX808]

I just imagined against my walls how big is a cord LOL

When I was a child we had a wood stove at home, and we burned whatever we could find, the best wood you can buy around here is called "Quebracho" I can't find the translation to English, but it was expensive and we couldn't afford it.
Anyway we never suffered such hard colds as you, our worse temperatures were around 20°F (-7°C)

[JohnyMac]

It sounds like Quebracho must be like Ash or White oak. Both woods get a premium around where the cabin is.

Wood by the cord where the cabin is (as written earlier) is about $120- a cord. Back in Rhode Island it is about $225- a cord or equivalent to the cost of natural gas.

Here at the cabin, most people use outside wood boilers for heat. They operate buy heating water that then gets pumped through radiators in the house. The benefit of this type of heater is:
> Since the boiler is outside you can burn any kind of wood. Inside heaters you can only burn "hard" wood.
> Since the boiler is outside you get NO ASH/dust inside the house.
> You only have to load it twice a day. My wood stove in minus temps 5-6 times a day. Normal winter temps 3-4
    times a day.
> Hot Water - No need to pay for hot water in the winter as you have all that you need.

The drawback is - Electricity. You need electricity to pump the hot water into/ then out of the house (Recirculate) . This is why most folks who have one of these heaters also have a generator as a back-up. 

[thatGuy]

Some of those trees are cousins of Iron wood and that is some tough wood!

I heat with electric because it is cheap and easy but do have a wood burning stove with a coal grate in it if need be. Truth be told I live in a fuel poor country and would have to suffer if it came down to it.

[hjmoosejaw]

I use natural gas, but have electric, propane, and kerosene heaters for back-ups.

[special-k]

I start off with an electric oil filled radiator, and when that is not enough the natural gas furnace kicks in.  Since electricity is cheaper I get the most out of it before I start burning the gas.  I heat only the first floor so I close all upstairs doors & vents even though I sleep up there.  My tiny bedroom ranges between 50 - 60 this time of year so I supplement with an electric heated mattress pad (it's like an electric blanket but underneath me.)  It's very comfy until it's time to wake up and I have to throw off the covers.    *yikes*

[JohnyMac]

When we lived on the boat in Seattle Special-K, we used the oil filed electric heater. On the boat we also had a small diesel heater but only seldom used it as it got the boat to hot.

Current temp at this time -11F outside and 68F inside. Time to make coffee. 

[special-k]

It's a scorching 0 here this morning... 69 inside.

[Well-Prepared Witch]

3* here!  We have geothermal in the floors, so it saves some on heating & cooling, AND we have solar panels that sell power back to the electric company.  I shudder to think what our power bill would be without those.  It's already around $180/month this winter.  Normally, it's around $70/month. 

I may be used to colder winters than some, but THIS cold is unreal!  I'm used to the coldest nights being in the 20s and days in the 30s and 40s.  I'm not used to single digits and negative wind chills.  Brrrrrrr!

[JohnyMac]

Geothermal and solar panels...Toooooo cool (Pun intended  ) Wellie! You must have gotten some snow too.

My brother who lives in lower Bucks County, PA. got a foot or so. I just hung up from my mom who lives on Cape Cod (AKA, The Cape) and she has about a foot and it is still coming down. She told me that it being classified as a blizzard. The wind is a steady 25 mph with gusts up to 35 or so. The temp where she is was 22F.

No snow here at the cabin as the storm went south of us and then up the coast. 



 

[crudos]

Effin' cold out tonight in Wisconsin with the windchill. So cold, my power steering hose popped off again and lost all of my steering fluid on my way home from work. Not sure why since I was 98% of the way home and just stopped at the grocery store for a couple of things, and the vehicle was all warmed up and running fine. Could still drive it, just steering is a real workout that last mile or so. You know how a really cold vehicle sounds when you start it first thing? Well, those creaks and groans where starting as I was driving into a strong and very cold wind tonight. Hate that.

[JohnyMac]

I know it is cold here at the cabin however I can not even imagine the temps where you are Crudos.
My memory of WI. is it is rather flat and there seems to always be a breeze/wind.  Add to that breeze/wind negative numbers and nothing outside works well - Especially human flesh.

You take care Crudos!

This morning here at the cabin was -5F. So it is warming up from the -11F yesterday.  Got up at 0300 hrs to load the wood stove and it was 66F inside. Alarm went off at 0600 hrs and I didn't get up to feed the stove. I rationalized that things were fine and I would load the stove when I got up at 0700 hrs.

At 0700 hrs I got up and there were plenty of coals in the wood stove but the temperature in the cabin was 58F and our bedroom was 48F!

Well I reloaded the wood stove. I had to coax the wood to a flame so the temperature on the chimney would get to 300F. Once you hit that temperature things go on autopilot and you just have to adjust the draft occasionally and keep her full of wood.

Well it is now (0940 hrs) 63F in the cabin. Lesson learned: It takes more effort to raise the temperature then just get the heck out of bed and keep things going!

[hjmoosejaw]

It's ignorant cold here!

[JohnyMac]

Hey hj, I spent the first 24 years of my life in the Northeast along with the last 16 or so years: Can you remember as cold a winter as this one? Snowy yes...Cold no.

It must be that global warming huh? 

[Well-Prepared Witch]

Try "Climate Change", JM.  It's a better descriptor.  In fact, last year's data showed it was the hottest on average year in quite some time.  That's what global warming is - the gradual increase of average global temperatures, which increases the amount of energy in the atmosphere, which leads to large swings in temperature, more frequent, larger storms, and changing weather patterns that lead to droughts and drowning rains where there was a balanced rainfall previously.

[crudos]

Winter, your drunk, go the 'eff home.

Another couple of polar-vortexy-type days, then more normal winter temps later this week. Was able to fix my truck yesterday and hope it sticks. We have a little back-up car, a 1999 Mercury Tracer, that had been sitting unstartable for a few weeks due to the extreme cold. Neighbor helped charge the battery and we got it going again. Really need to get a new battery, or at least a car battery recharger. Anyone know a good brand or model without breaking the bank?

Needless to say, it's still only January, long way to go before winter breaks here I suspect.

 

[JohnyMac]

Wellie, I really do not want to get in a debate as to whether the correct term is Climate Change or Global Warming as both terms are interchangeable. A great example of how both terms are interchangeable was your response in correcting what I had written earlier. You knew exactly what I was referring too. 

Now on the subject of Climate Change and / or Global Warming: I do not worship at the alter of of the church that is called CC or GW. As a member of the proletariat class, it is pretty simple and I look at it this way. CC and / or G W is another made-up crisis to put blame on industrial nations of the world - Germany, Russia, China, USofA, to name a few. In order to restrict further progress of those nations in order to allow less industrial nations to "catch up" and /or to put more controls on you and I.

It is used as a means to an end by which the government can pass further restriction on business and private citizens. Hence 2013's new Federal regulations picture of which the majority of those regulations were posed by the EPA? 

Please notice in this picture the pile of papers on top right corner of the book case. Now compare those papers which were laws passed by the US Congress in 2013, to the regulations imposed by the Fed's in the case - All enacted in 2013! 

I do not hope nor do I want to convince you or other forum members that our environment is or is not changing (Check out El Nino & La Nina) as it is always in flux. The forum members here can make up their own minds. I just want to unequivocally state that "I do not worship at the alter" of this new found religion called Climate Change or Global Warming.

Crudos, I truly feel for you living where you do. You and many other folks north of of 43' lat, and in the Midwest are getting hit pretty hard this year. I am sure it is hitting you in both your pocket book and physically. Stay warm brother! 

[crudos]

JM, just wondering why you keep on inserting religious connotations/descriptors when you talk about cc/gw? I've heard others use the same sort of phrases, but don't see the connection. Thanks.

[JohnyMac]

  What religious contentions? You have totally lost me. 

[crudos]

Wellie, I really do not want to get in a debate as to whether the correct term is Climate Change or Global Warming as both terms are interchangeable. A great example of how both terms are interchangeable was your response in correcting what I had written earlier. You knew exactly what I was referring too. 

Now on the subject of Climate Change and / or Global Warming: I do not worship at the alter of of the church that is called CC or GW. As a member of the proletariat class, it is pretty simple and I look at it this way. CC and / or G W is another made-up crisis to put blame on industrial nations of the world - Germany, Russia, China, USofA, to name a few. In order to restrict further progress of those nations in order to allow less industrial nations to "catch up" and /or to put more controls on you and I.

It is used as a means to an end by which the government can pass further restriction on business and private citizens. Hence 2013's new Federal regulations picture of which the majority of those regulations were posed by the EPA? 

Please notice in this picture the pile of papers on top right corner of the book case. Now compare those papers which were laws passed by the US Congress in 2013, to the regulations imposed by the Fed's in the case - All enacted in 2013! 

I do not hope nor do I want to convince you or other forum members that our environment is or is not changing (Check out El Nino & La Nina) as it is always in flux. The forum members here can make up their own minds. I just want to unequivocally state that "I do not worship at the alter" of this new found religion called Climate Change or Global Warming.

JM, see bolded sections.