Which outdoor wood furnace?

[ohsoloco]

Okay, I figure this is the best place to ask this question, cuz I know quite a few of you have outdoor wood furnaces.  I may be buying a house pretty soon from a friend of mine.  This past year the wood furnace he was heating the house with rusted out.  I need to buy a new one before winter (if I buy this place...I'm hoping I do), and I was wondering what kind I should go with?   The old one is a Taylor.  The furnace will be heating the first and second floor (radiant floor heat) of an old farm house.  I'd also like to set it up to heat my hot water for the house (at least during the winter months).  Any help is appreciated  

[chet]

Mine is a Central Boiler, had it for a half dozen years now with no problems. It has not been shut down since I built my first fire, it runs 365 days a year. I heat my home, domestic hot water, and my 1100 square foot shop. It's also going to be used to help heat my solar kiln that I am now building.

[Tarm]

What ever you do don't buy and outdoor wood boiler. Those things are filthy. Woodstoves are regulated by the EPA and are limited to emitting no more than 7.5 grams of particulates per hour. Outdoor boilers are exempt from the limits (a mistake in my opinion ) and emit over 50 grams per hour. The regular steel models have terrible corrosion problems. In six or seven years they start to leak and are junk by ten. Outdoor wood boilers are very inefficient. Fifty percent is what an EPA study found. If you go from and indoor woodburner to an outdoor boiler you will most likely use 50% more wood. A lot of information about woodburning can be found at www.woodheat.org.
Three years ago I bought a Tarm wood gasification boiler. It sits in my basement, heats my house and all of my hot water for the five to six months a year I use it. Last year I only burned  3 1/2 full cords of hardwood.  

[Bro. Noble]

We have a Victor wood furnace in our basement.  It is over 30 years old and hasn't caused any problems.  I would never put a furnace in the house/basement however because of the dirt, smoke, and fire hazard.

Noble

[ohsoloco]

Too bad I wasn't building a new house...I would love to have a masonry heater to heat the whole house.  I know there are masonry bake ovens that can heat a small house, but it would take some riggin' to put a stove in the house that weighs several tons  

[ohsoloco]

Oh yeah, here's a link if anyone else is interested in masonry heaters...    http://mha-net.org/

[Mark M]

I have an Aqua-therm in a small building about 50 feet from the house. It is 11 years old and still going strong. I also have a propane boiler plumbed into the same system. It too is in the "fire house".

Mark

[Minnesota_boy]

I'll agree with Tarm, outside boilers are quite inefficient.  However, other considerations must be taken into account too.  If I put a wood burning stove into my house and the insurance company finds out, I have no insurance.  Nobody will insure a home heated by wood in this area. I pay an extra $80 per year for the priveledge of having a wood boiler on my property, even though itis 75 feet from my house.
The particulates per hour would be something to really consider in an urban setting as it really affects the air quality for those downwind, but in a rural setting, the point becomes moot as the next forest fire damps out any additions you might make.  We need the EPA to regualte the particualte output of those wildfires!!!  

[OneWithWood]

We heat our house, greenhouse and domestic H2O with a Central Boiler wood fired boiler.  Even though the insulation I used for the buried water lines is not working the unit keeps us toasty even on the coldest winter days.
I will be digging up the lines and replacing the insulation this summer.  Anyone have a suggestion of an insulation that is better than styrofoam wrapped with poly?

[EZ]

Onewithwood, the guy that put my Hardy outside furnace in, used the same stuff and pulled all 4 lines threw a 4 inch pvc pipe. Seems to work good.
EZ

[chet]

I built a box of 2" polar foam to run my lines in, I also sealed all the joints with expansion foam. The top of the boxes are only buried by about 8", but I still do not loose enough heet to melt frost or snow.

[Sawyerfortyish]

I always put a deep layer of saw dust down lay my water pipe in the middle and put down another layer of saw dust then cover over with dirt. The saw dust insulates as well as providing a soft cushion for the pipe don't have to worry about rocks crushing the pipe. The saw dust will last for years underground as long as no air can get to it! I know it may be expensive around a sawmill  ::)so if you can afford the saw dust give it a try.

[Jeff]

I used to live in a house that was insulated with sawdust. Good insulation but fire proof it aint. We found all this out when we had a chimney fire. Last time I ever burnt wood anywhere. Scared the hell out of me. We found out that the place had been latthed and platered twice, and in between those times it had been wallpapered with auction handbills from 1913. In 1982 the sawdust was still there.

[Sawyerfortyish]

They use ground up newspaper for insulation today is that any better than saw dust for a fire  :-/. You would think that someone might find a fire proof treatment for saw dust so it could be used as insulation.I know it works real good underground

[Furby]

 The newspaper has a fire resistent agent on it. I guess they could use it on saw dust, but saw dust has a lot more wieght to it and will make your drywall bow out in places. It also settles over time and leves a void at the top of walls that will let cold through. Also saw dust doesn't have as many small air spaces that add R-value, so you would need much thicker walls to get as good of R-value as say, newspaper.

[Sawyerfortyish]

It was just a thought some times it piles up around the mill

[Furby]

 If you end up finding a way to get it to work, let us know.