Building a new house what wood burner is best

[NSMaple1]

I echo NSMaple1. Ground source heat pump for main heat/cooling, but if you go this route get a contractor that knows heat pumps. They typically need a smaller sized well pump to run longer when cycling, and multiple bladder tanks for increased water reserve to reduce cycling of the well pump (more mechanical room space). There are many kinds of heat pumps, air to air, ground source, etc., and different sub-groups in those. Air to air heat pumps are not efficient in colder climates. You probably do not want one. (If you have city water then no heat pump .) A supplement to that could be anything you choose, and as a supplement, you can heat with wood are not tied to it. Huge plus in a world of changing circumstance, job travel, injury, resale, kids with asthma, etc. Excessive creosote built up can be from several things, such as colder exterior chimneys, poor draft, and poorly seasoned wood, or choked down fires. Regardless, the chimney/roof line and access to it in winter, will be a consideration for cleaning/inspection. Your going to have to get up there with a chimney brush several times a year, unless you go the outdoor boiler route. Trukn2004 suggests flue stainless, which I second. There is triple wall stainless, in which is insulated between the inner and middle wall, and an air space between middle and outer wall. Another thing to consider, is an outside air supply for a wood stove for better flue draft in a tightly sealed house. Plan it in your home when building, and choosing a stove. Interior design and air flow will have a lot to do with your heating choices. If your plan is to save money by heating with wood, first check with your home owners insurance agent to see if you will be paying in some cases much higher rates, and if that is true with outdoor wood heat as well. Have fun picking and choosing from all the options.

I was speaking of air source heat pumps - mini-splits to be exact. Arkansas should be a good place for those, not exactly an arctic climate. I looked into geothermal for my place, wasn't worth it for me. $20k for the geo end, plus likely $10k more for system retrofits inside the house. (Existing is hot water baseboard). I also know some people around here that took the geo plunge & ended up with power bills that were higher than they were expecting. That might come down to expectations though.

I think an OWB would be down my list of choices pretty far if building new in Arkansas. Unless, perhaps, if heating multiple buildings at once. But even then I don't think the capital cost and amount of wood you'd need to put up year over year [vs. what a nice efficient (and much cheaper) wood stove would use while supplementing] would be worth it in that climate. To each their own though.

 

[MountainHigh]

Best tip I received prior to building my house some 30 years ago, was to put the thermal mass chimney in the centre of the home. You get less creosote buildup and use less wood, because you're not heating the outdoors with the main part of your chimney and flue gasses stay hotter and burn cleaner.

Most traditional homes in the artic circle are built around a central chimney. It becomes the gathering place for the family and if designed well, holds and radiates heat to the whole house.

A modern version could also integrate solar with underground storage and floor heat for rooms in outlying areas of the house.

 

[AR200]

Thanks for all the replies I was thinking about buying a used OWB (hearty heater). I would like to do a insert like the bigest buck stove or Lopi. But that will probably cost me as much a the new-aire insert that would have no problem keeping up the whole house. My contractor wants around 11k to do the new-aire mostly masonry work. I like the idea of the indoor furnace but not sure on the insurance. All the mess and smell would be outside the main house and wouldn't have the cost of the masonry work. I do like the look of the fireplace would probably put in a propane insert which is a lot cheaper. 2700 sq ft heat pump and ac. Single story not a chance of many neighbors. Don't have time or want to cut wood every weekend but enjoy doing some.

 

[NSMaple1]

Thanks for all the replies I was thinking about buying a used OWB (hearty heater). I would like to do a insert like the bigest buck stove or Lopi. But that will probably cost me as much a the new-aire insert that would have no problem keeping up the whole house. My contractor wants around 11k to do the new-aire mostly masonry work. I like the idea of the indoor furnace but not sure on the insurance. All the mess and smell would be outside the main house and wouldn't have the cost of the masonry work. I do like the look of the fireplace would probably put in a propane insert which is a lot cheaper. 2700 sq ft heat pump and ac. Single story not a chance of many neighbors. Don't have time or want to cut wood every weekend but enjoy doing some.

Even though it wouldn't actually be every weekend, your last sentence makes me think an OWB wouldn't be a good choice for you. You would be committing to a lot of years of putting up a fair amount of wood every year to keep it going.

 

[trukn2004]

Even though it wouldn't actually be every weekend, your last sentence makes me think an OWB wouldn't be a good choice for you. You would be committing to a lot of years of putting up a fair amount of wood every year to keep it going.

I have to agree. No matter how you do it, to successfully heat with wood in any real fashion is going to require time. Wood is a supplement to my heating and it still takes a lot of work. If you do not enjoy the work, the payback wont be there. Getting ahead on wood, having the right stashes, keeping the equipment clean, the stove fed, etc is a labor of love. If you cant find some enjoyment, you will cut corners or become easily annoyed by it. Your best bet is to sit down and figure out how much wood you will need, how easy is the wood to get, how much free time do you have to work and process it, and will you enjoy it. That will help determine how beneficial wood heating will be for you.

 

[67L36Driver]

No opinion on heat source here.

But, money spent on insulation now will pay for itself rather quickly.

We built with insulated 6" exterior walls, more than average blown in insulation in the attic and double pane windows. 1800 sq. ft. single story ranch style. Our natural gas and electric bills run about half of what our neighbor's pay out monthly.

 

[wise8706]

I'm also in the process of building a house, however, I'm in Michigan so my climate is a lot different than the op. We have 6" exterior walls with spray foam insulation upstairs. 2x4 walls downstairs in the basement with spray foam down there also on the exterior walls. And spray foam in my attached garage. 15" of blown in insulation in the attic. 67l36driver has a very great point about how important insulation is. You can have the best heat source but if the insulation is not up to par, u will be paying a lot in heating the house. I also have Infloor heat in the garage and Infloor heat in the basement. Our winters here can get pretty chilly. And the OWB will be burning 6-7 months out the year.


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[AR200]

I heated with nothing but wood for 11 years in my old house. I would say probably 2 to 3 cords a year, No big deal even sold some at times also keep my dad in wood he burns quite a bit also. I talked to a guy that got rid of his OWB and said he put in a high efficiency heat pump and more insulation and can't tell any difference in his electric bill.

 

[7sleeper]

I cannot understand how, if building new, one would even consider anything else but a wood gasifier with lambda control! You will need only about 1/3 of the wood compared to an owb and with lambda control you don't have to care for one second what type of wood you throw in as long as it is dry. With around a 500 gallon heat sink you only fill up twice a day when very cold.

7

 

[NSMaple1]

I cannot understand how, if building new, one would even consider anything else but a wood gasifier with lambda control! You will need only about 1/3 of the wood compared to an owb and with lambda control you don't have to care for one second what type of wood you throw in as long as it is dry. With around a 500 gallon heat sink you only fill up twice a day when very cold.

7

I would agree 100% - if one wanted to heat 100% with wood. I have a gasifier (non-lambda), and 660 gallons of storage. I have an actual fire burning only 6 hours a day, the rest of the day I am coasting on storage. I used to have a wood-oil combo boiler, that used about 8 cords of wood & 150 gallons of oil a year. Now it is 5 cords of wood & no oil (yanked everything oil out).

That's with a 20 year old 2 storey house though. If I had to do it all again, I would build a bit smaller and much more energy efficient, and use mini-splits and a supplemental wood stove. Way too much potential these days with modern building tech & materials to build well enough to not need much energy for heat period, whatever the source is. An OWB would be about my last choice.

Might be some older age kicking in there though - the idea of not having to handle any wood at all is becoming more appealing as more time goes by.

 

[StihlKicking]

I have an OWB and am very happy with it. Granted I live in the Deep South where it's only below freezing probably 3-4 weeks a year total and that is a day here and a day there not weeks on end. I have a newer really well insulated home. I burn 365 days a year to heat DHW and use a water to air heat exchanger in my central duct. It will take approximately 6-7 full cords in a year. I installed a dual heat pump system in my house when I built it and it cost on average $375 a month to heat with. It was very poor heat at that. I can't imagine them being worth installing further north. I don't have any neighbors within a mile and I have 100 lifetimes worth of fire wood on my property. The thing I like most about my OWB is that it will burn any kind of wood you throw at it. It takes more cords than a stove but all I have to do is cut and stack it. The only thing I split is stuff to big to fit through the door. I don't have to constantly worry about splitting and stacking to get "years ahead". All in all I spend about 8-10 hours a year fooling with fire wood. I have roughly $6500 in my boiler, heat exchanger, and underground. I did the install mostly my self. The pay back is pretty good. I hear people on forums talk about OWB using 20+ cords of wood a year, I don't know if this is due to poor quality boilers/piping or just climate related. Either way I wouldn't want to mess with that much wood a year. However I would rather deal with 6 cords of cut and burn wood than 3 of cut split and stacked wood two years ago just to ensure I have wood dry enough to burn today. Everybody's situation is different but for me I wouldn't be heating with wood if not with a OWB.


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[Dalmatian90]

Not that I anticipate ever building a "dream home"...but I'd either have a driveway accessible walk-in basement for ease of storing wood...or a "furnace room" on the ground level with a nice concrete block firewall isolating it from the main home. Either case something ultra high efficiency like a Kuuma so when I'm 80 I'm not trying to keep an OWB fed.

With a wood cook stove in the kitchen for decoration / heating during power outages.

At least I can dream about dream homes

 

[absrio]

I still don't understand why people think an owb is so much more worry free.

an owb cant burn your house down, like a fireplace, wood stove, insert, or add on furnace can. I'd call that a huge worry off my mind.

 

[cuinrearview]

an owb cant burn your house down, like a fireplace, wood stove, insert, or add on furnace can. I'd call that a huge worry off my mind.

Compared to the yearly worry of collecting/processing nearly twice the wood, plus the daily hassle/worry of making sure you can get outside to your boiler to feed it? Added to that the initial investment for purchase and installation of the boiler and the lifespan of it compared to a stove. I sleep just fine at night knowing that my properly installed insert is going to safely heat my home for decades.

 

[absrio]

Compared to the yearly worry of collecting/processing nearly twice the wood, plus the daily hassle/worry of making sure you can get outside to your boiler to feed it? Added to that the initial investment for purchase and installation of the boiler and the lifespan of it compared to a stove. I sleep just fine at night knowing that my properly installed insert is going to safely heat my home for decades.

to each their own. I burn the exact same amount of wood in my owb as in my old wood stove. I just spend half the time processing it cause I can throw in big chunks. but I'm as interested in arguing online as I am doing a swan dive onto a cactus. I think the wood stove vs owb debate has been discussed here once or twice. the conclusion is always= hey to each their own, what works for some doesn't work for others. (shrug)

 

[trukn2004]

to each their own. I burn the exact same amount of wood in my owb as in my old wood stove. I just spend half the time processing it cause I can throw in big chunks. but I'm as interested in arguing online as I am doing a swan dive onto a cactus. I think the wood stove vs owb debate has been discussed here once or twice. the conclusion is always= hey to each their own, what works for some doesn't work for others. (shrug)

i will tell you this though; its a lot easier to load a wood stove in your underwear then it is a OWB.

 

[AIM]

If you are ever thinking about heating 2 separate buildings with one fire your choice of heat TYPE will be made for you.

 

[absrio]

i will tell you this though; its a lot easier to load a wood stove in your underwear then it is a OWB.

I load my owb on my way to the truck, to go to work. and on my way from the truck to the house coming home. no need for middle of the night fills. also I don't walk around in my house in my underwear. thats just gross. I have shorts I wear in the shower. the shower shorts motto:

SHOWER SHORTS!!! for the man who has nothing to hide, but still wants to.

all shower shorts come with a complimentary, self retracting velcro wallet. for safe keeping of your valuable things. (which is obviously, on your person, AT ALL TIMES!!)

 

[cuinrearview]

Just to prove to yourself you can, next winter load the boiler in your shower shorts for a week and prove all us indoor snobs wrong. Heck, I've loaded my stove in the buff a time or two. Dare.....

 

[StihlKicking]

I have about $6500 in my OWB and it came with a twenty year warranty, most people I know with the same unit gets around 30 out of them before they need reworking. I don't really process wood I just cut about 6 cords a year and pile it up.

I get that OWB's aren't for everyone and that's cool but it seems that a lot of people just post outright false hoods about them compared to my experience. My boiler is durable, affordable, and safe. It will keep my whole house evenly heated as hot as I want it and heats my hot water for about $60 a month. If I get to old one day to cut wood I'll buy it. It will still be cheaper than burning gas. I figure if a person gets to feeble to load an OWB they will be to feeble to cut, split and stack 18 years worth of fire wood only to have to pick it up again 2 years down the road when it's dry and move it once again into the house, pick the wood up again and move it into the heater, clean up the mess the wood leaves behind, then build a new house after there wood stove burns their old one down......[emoji28]

Oh and I load my heater in the winter about every 15-16 hours, in the summer (DHW) about once every three days.


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