Heating options...

[wifi]

I love my coal stove, $270/ton at Clarks, I have a 1000 sq ft house, use between 2-5 tons/year (5 when it was -20 decades and decades ago!! ). My house is a barely insulated former summer cabin, taxed and regulated to death by the local authorities (and CSPA).... ooops, off the subject.

[fatlazyless]

Installing one of those small Toyo oil-fired heaters would add more in-house living space heat to what you get from the existing baseboard forced hot water heaters. Plus, it would be a source of warm, clean, dry, fast acting, heat. You may fall in love with a little Toyo oil heater. Excellent quality heat, plus a skinny appetite for oil..

Installation requires a 3/8" soft copper oil line tee'd off the existing line, a nearby 110v wall outlet, and cutting a small, maybe 3" diameter hole thru the exterior wall for the, air in-exhaust out, direct vent stainless steel tube.

The little Toyo's have their own built in thermostat and timer. Best of all, they delicately sip expensive #2 heating oil, and create clean-dry-fresh & very warm, hot air heat!

Suggest you try Laconia Oil for an installation quote, plus maybe they'll cut you a deal as your fuel-oil supplier if they do the Toyo install.
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Warning-Stay away from the Rinnai propane heaters which are vent free, or without a vent. While the Rinnai propane direct vent heaters are excellent, the ventless units make hot air heat that includes a very small but detectable-smelly odor of combusted propane. Rinnai instructs not to use them in a bed room, and to use them in a living room, kitchen, or sun room. However, while the Rinnai vented propane heaters make clean fresh hot air heat, the RINNAI VENTLESS heater operates good BUT makes heat with an ODOR.

I found this out, myself.
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Some good news here, my Amerigas August propane pre-buy cut my 2007-2008 propane bill from last year's 5.29/gal to this year's 2.39/gal. That's a huge difference!

In aprox 2005, Amerigas-Vermont refused to honor their Vermont pre-buy propane customer's contracts and raised prices anyway. Maybe one year later, they lost a lawsuit and had to pay refunds to a few hundred Vermont propane customers.

So, sometimes a real good pre-buy deal is too good to last.

[ApS]

Originally Posted by Argy's Wife

What secondary affordable heating options do you recommend?

Electric blankets only draw 75 watts.

By far, the most raved-about heater in this household is an antique radiant electric heater mounted near the ceiling. (Only 600 watts—and you'll overheat if you sit within 10-feet of it.)

Those hand-knitted woolen lap comforter-thingys you see in the catalogs can be bought at yard sales for a few bucks. After a few minutes of overheating, (because your dog insists on napping on your lap too), you may have to throw them off!

A good time to do baking is at the same time of maximum need for heat! Hobbies that require a kiln, like ceramics and cloisonné, would be welcomed I'd think.

An engineering neighbor ran his clothes-dryer's discharge through a nylon stocking, and ducted the moist heat into the house's interior! (Particulates may be a problem, however).

I use a 40,000 btu "Kero-Sun" kerosene heater to warm up the morning's living spaces, or a small radiant propane attachment that mounts atop one of those $50 tanks. The "Kero-Sun" is extremely efficient—at 99%—and was used in Japan for decades. The New Hampshire legislature banned them from new sales. Unless restrained from tipping over, neither are child-friendly, however.

If yours is an older home, it's most economical to conserve heat, rather than add additional heat. As previously stated, add insulation: if the upstairs can be closed off by a door or plastic tarp, I'd do it.

Infrared film can record your house's worst heat-loss features:



Spectrum in Wolfeboro might be able to help with infrared film—569-4747.

Try those temporary plastic films on the inside of the window frames. They can be stored and re-used. It can be gratifying to see the wind bowing the plastic in, knowing that the cold wind has been barred from entering there!

But even a woodstove isn't a cheap way to heat, unless you cut your own wood.

I got these ideas because I haven't gotten around to insulating my house!

[fatlazyless]

Let me remind everyone that Acres lives in FLORIDA in the winter so it's easy for him to talk about efficiency and insulation. Here in New Hampshire, you can have has much insulation as an elephant but if you ain't got no good source of heat it still feels cold, big time!

Learn to love the NH winter; go with a Toyo oil or Rinnai propane hot air heater as an addition to an existing forced hot water heating system, and start thinking about a little outdoor hot tub.

Wood stoves are terrific, but for most people, they are just a form of recreational heat.

[LIforrelaxin]

Originally Posted by fatlazyless

Wood stoves are terrific, but for most people, they are just a form of recreational heat.

Unless you are willing to keep a wood stove stocked and burning all the time FLL has a point here. However I believe it is one of the best ways to go, even if you don't have your own source of wood, as a supplement to a home primary source of heat. Most people I know that use woodstove in this capacity have fairly good luck at reducing there oil costs. And by only using it to supplement the primary heat source you are not prone to going through as much wood, as someone who is buring for primary heat.

People I know that have used this technique, keep there thermostats down around 63 or so (i.e. some where reasonable so that pipes freezing and personal discomfort never become a concern) and when they are at home at night and on the weekends fire up the woodstove and take the chill out of the air. The big note here is to make sure the woodstove is big enough to warm the space you are trying to heat. Nothing worse then having a stove that isn't big enough to meet your heating needs.

I know from experience at my camp that if I get the wood stove going and get it up to temp. and then throw an extra log or two in, that I am able to heat a camp, that has no insulation in the roof, enough to be comfortable even when the night are dipping down into the 30s..... Mind you because I am unwilling to get up at 3 or 4 in the morning and throw a log or two on the fire the mornings are a bit nippy...... Now I know that in the middle of the winter it gets much colder, but my point is simply that with a small amount of wood you can boost the temperature and make things comfortable.

[secondcurve]

What about those pellet stoves? I had one years ago and it was very good. Load up the hopper and I'm pretty sure it will run close to 24 hours without a refill. It sure beats a wood stove!

[ApS]

Originally Posted by LIforrelaxin

"...Mind you because I am unwilling to get up at 3 or 4 in the morning and throw a log or two on the fire the mornings are a bit nippy..."

Try tossing in a piece of unsplit wood when turning in and turn the air intake to zero (which is really very low). A round piece of 4" or 5" oak or maple (even hemlock), placed on glowing ashes will still keep things comfortable by daybreak.

Originally Posted by Blue Thunder

"...Wood has 20 million BTU/Cord with an efficiency of 77%..."

Where a wood supply can be supplemented with winter windfalls on one's property, efficiency is of less concern. Relatives nearby have a woodlot mostly for privacy, and give away the wood that they pay to have cut down.

Originally Posted by Argie's Wife

"...If electricity was less expensive it would have been a option..."

It sounds like you have a newer, tight, house—a good thing. Is the fireplace tightly sealed? A lot of heat can go outdoors that way.

Electricity can still "spot heat" economically. At the computer, I put my feet on a rubber heating pad—bought at a yard sale—that originally was designed as a water bed heater, and uses only 75 watts. After an hour, it gets too hot! Last year, I bought a backup water bed heating pad for $1.

Now that I think of it, a water bed holds a lot of water-mass (radiant heat), and it is heated by just a 75 watt heater. Even if (or especially if) unused, is a water bed an economical source of radiant heat?