outdoor wood heater

[mescalero1]

AJMD429,
Check out a website Bradley outdoor wood heater.
See if it takes you as long to figure out how it heats the whole house as opposed to localized heating where the duct enters the house. As it did me.

[Grizz]

I heated a house in Alaska for about thirty years with firewood. I can't imagine moving cord wood to an unsheltered area open to snow and rain. Just wouldn't work out too well where I lived. The heater could be in an attached woodshed. It has the benefit of keeping the dirt, snow, ice, and spiders out of the house, but I don't think it's such a great idea the way it's pictured. It's hard enough having to shovel out logs to create firewood. Having to shovel out the woodstove would be adding insult to injury.

[Hobie]

Such are used a lot around here.

[BenT]

Two thirds of my neighbors have outdoor woodburners. But they are boilers. This looks like it pumps hot air. Half of them build a roof over their burners large enough to store firewood under it also.

[mescalero1]

I kept going back to the site, trying to figure it out, nothing on the site helped ... it finally dawned on me by accident.
And I understand airflow!

[mescalero1]

Hobie,
Have you spoken with any of the users about it?

[scr83jp]

AJMD429,
Check out a website Bradley outdoor wood heater.
See if it takes you as long to figure out how it heats the whole house as opposed to localized heating where the duct enters the house. As it did me.

A friend of ours in PA sells wood boilers that they use to heat their new home,they built their new home & had a local company pour the pad with built in coated aluminum tubing thru which they pump hot water that heats the basement floor & radiates upward heating their home.It was great getting up & putting our feet on the comfortably warm comcrete floor in the morning when outside temps were 5 deg.Our friends are hardwood loggers,have their own sawmill & finish mill so slab wood is readily available.

[BigSky56]

Mescalero
If you put a large wood stove in your home and put in a outside air pipe for the stove it will pressurize the house,you can accomplish the same results, the only benefit to a outside furnace would be size to hold a rick of wood for a longer burn time. I know several people that have a large furnace in the basement with a firewood chute to feed it from the wood shed or garage and a cold air exhaust system. Those outside furnace burners add extra work in snow country. danny

[mescalero1]

Danny,
You might be pleased to know I ordered the mill, should be in New Mexico in two weeks.
Also picked up a 1977 Dodge 3/4 ton pickup, 4x4 from an auction; it was obviously the supervisors truck, all the mirrors are still there, no dents Tailgate is not scratched, nothing.
It was a supervisors truck , only driven to the coffe shop & Burger King.

[BigSky56]

You'll like that mill, what size saw did you get for a power head. Keep the chain sharp it will keep it from wandering when you make the cut.That truck will come in handy for getting firewood and such. danny

[mescalero1]

Husqvarna, need the power
That truck will have the right stuff.

[BenT]

The neighbors with the outside burners also heat a workshop with them also. They cut firewood all year long to keep it feed . It is a little overkill for just heating a house. I have a freestanding woodstove that I heat my house with. I can cut enough firewood in a few weekends to last all winter. That's not the case with the outside wood burners they eat alot of wood. My nextdoor neightbor put one in a few years ago and told me how his 60 acres of woods would have plenty of deadwood to last him a while . Well after the first winter he was buying semi loads of wood because his 60 acres was cleaned out.

[mescalero1]

I will re-visit the site, don't recall consumption being discussed.

[AJMD429]

I like the airflow-vs-liquid systems because less to go wrong and easier to fix for an amateur like me - our system just used a scavanged window fan for a couple years, because when I asked the local building supply stores for a low-speed, high-ambient-temperature (the furnace room is a jacket and stays 140 to 160 degrees) dust-proof motor, they said "they don't make them" - I then asked about a "furnace fan" and they said the same thing.

I commented that it was pretty cool how Carrier and all those manufacturers could make furnaces without fans, and then while sitting in the warehouse the fans just 'appeared' in the units - since "they don't make them".

Finally a friend hooked me up with Grainger supply, and whaddya know - they DO make them...

If we ever do a major re-do of the house, I would do the 'outside' thing sort of - I'd do a garage/workshop attached by a breezeway and run the airflow ducts through there.

[Hobie]

Hobie,
Have you spoken with any of the users about it?

Well, I don't know exactly which system is being used but the 3 or 4 I know who use it like it. No smoke or ashes in the house, the chimney (and possibility of fire from that source) are away from the house), they don't have to haul wood through the house, and it works.

[Grizz]

the hot air can't heat the structure, it only heats the air. the thing I love about wood fire is the radiant heat. the wood stove in my Alaska living room heats the entire two floors of the house STRUCTURALLY. If the fire goes out and the oil heater starts heating the air it takes about 24 hours for the house to return to it's unheated ambient condition.

nothing beats a hot stove on a cold cold miserable day. standing in front of a hot air vent isn't the same thing. it's like having some sunshine in the middle of the house; and really, isn't a wood fire a way of putting sunshine in the middle of the house?

I thought about the exterior fire a lot when I heated with wood, and there are some advantages, but I like having the fire inside... and the oil furnace never had that same feeling of well-being the hearth has. but I guess that's a me thing.

[Hobie]

the hot air can't heat the structure, it only heats the air. the thing I love about wood fire is the radiant heat. the wood stove in my Alaska living room heats the entire two floors of the house STRUCTURALLY. If the fire goes out and the oil heater starts heating the air it takes about 24 hours for the house to return to it's unheated ambient condition.

nothing beats a hot stove on a cold cold miserable day. standing in front of a hot air vent isn't the same thing. it's like having some sunshine in the middle of the house; and really, isn't a wood fire a way of putting sunshine in the middle of the house?

I thought about the exterior fire a lot when I heated with wood, and there are some advantages, but I like having the fire inside... and the oil furnace never had that same feeling of well-being the hearth has. but I guess that's a me thing.

I'm with you on this. That radiant heat makes the work worthwhile! It DOES feel different!