Woke up this morning with no heat or hot water (both run off the same oil furnace)... I assume at -3 degrees my oil tank heater just couldn't keep up! Wood stove fired up, tech called, waiting for a call back. I assume they had about a thousand of the same calls this morning. The joys of home ownership.
-
Jan. 24, 2011 8:22 a.m. littleturquoiseb HalfDork
-
Jan. 24, 2011 8:26 a.m. patgizz SuperDork
that sucks.
my house is 55 in the morning when i wake up, the fire never lasts through the whole night and i am not waking up at 3-4am to load the furnace back up.
i am about 4 days away from being out of firewood, i have some work to do before saturday, the only day the place i plan to buy it from is open for picking up wood. i have yet to buy any, except i tried some of those eco bricks yesterday that claim to burn 2.5 times longer than comparable hardwood. that is a load of BS.
-
Jan. 24, 2011 8:45 a.m. littleturquoiseb HalfDork
In reply to patgizz:
If I were to go 'more wood heat than oil' or just replace my stove ... I'd go automatic pellet feeder with a blower. My wood stove is in the downstairs great room and it doesn't heat the upstairs (where the bedrooms are).
-
Jan. 24, 2011 11:58 a.m. Rufledt HalfDork
That totally sucks! I have a friend back in WI who uses wood (not sure what his furnace is) constantly during the winter. He said it can't keep up below 0 either but then the furnace just kicks in. I think he said his upstairs bedrooms are the warmest, but his house is pretty open so the air can probobly get up there easier. Could you use fans to get the heat up there?
-
Jan. 24, 2011 1:11 p.m. littleturquoiseb HalfDork
The oil burner is all fixed .... 5 miniute blow out with a valve and a CO2 whippet can fixed it then a bottle of something creativily called HEET to put in the tank so it dosn't happen again.
I'm sure that'll cost a hundred bucks! ... I guess I'll shower and go to work.
-
Jan. 24, 2011 1:22 p.m. Lesley SuperDork
Yikes! The igniter went on mine over the Christmas holidays. Minus 20 out, glad there is emergency service on the holiday weekends.
-
Jan. 24, 2011 1:29 p.m. 1988RedT2 HalfDork
My last electric bill was about 360 clams. I'm not really looking forward to the next one. I bet it tops 400. We've got two heat pumps, and the electric "strip" heat has been on most nights, all night. Dang things never shut off.
-
Jan. 24, 2011 3:55 p.m. Strizzo SuperDork
In reply to 1988RedT2:
mine was around that last winter. i have a feeling the digital thermostat the PO installed wasn't working right. replaced with a programmable thats connected to the alarm so i can change it while i'm away, and its dropped the a/c bills from 120-140 in the summer to 75-95 and the heat bills from 300-400 to 120-140. BIG help on the ole wallet for sure
