New England B.S. Thread

I often see women in their 20s climbing up the Old Bridle Path to Greenleaf Hut with huge crates on their backs. That trail is pretty tough, never mind with that kind of weight, especially at the pace they're going.

EDIT: https://www.outdoors.org/articles/amc-outdoors/a-hut-tradition-packboarding

Looks like sometimes they're 100+ lbs!

 

That's about what I go through too. Last winter I was a touch under $1000. House is 1500 sq ft built in the 50s, boiler is 30 years old but is a triple pass low mass unit, so it's efficient even by today's standards. I waste some, too, since I rely on the schedule on the thermostat so sometimes it heats for no reason if I get home late. I keep meaning to get a geofencing wifi thermostat for the main zone.

I have a propane insert in one fireplace that's really better for ambiance than for heat. I want to put a pellet insert in the other fireplace eventually, but it's tough to motivate myself to do it when I'm only spending around $1000 in oil.

 

First thing I did was tear out the aquabooster hot water unit on the boiler and put in an electric. It was mostly because it had a bad tempering valve and barely provided any hot water, but I also figured I didn't want to run the boiler in the summer just for hot water and eventually want to move to mostly pellets.

Thought about an on-demand electric, but I thought that might end badly trying to instantly heat super cold well water, especially with 23 cent/kwh electricity rates.

My oil guy says heat-pump units (with backup traditional 240v elements) are the way to go, but they aren't cheap!

 

Yeah, if I was to install an electric water heater it'd be one of the heat pump hybrid units. But since we don't plan on being here permanently the expense of the water heater isn't really worth it.

 

We have a hybrid system in our business. So far it works well, and it doesn't get used really at all during the week. I think in our home we are building we will be doing propane everything as much as we can. I hate the electric companies around here (about $300 a month for "delivery" before the bill even starts where I live now) and would rather pay the guys at the propane company. We will have good insulation and new efficient heating/cooling system so I am hoping our bills will be low. Home will be about 1200-1300sqft, so it won't be a huge place to heat up either.

 

Sacrificing efficiency for performance on the W/H side. Adding an indirect off the boiler when I get time to pipe it in.
We have 3 daughters, 2 of which are teenagers. 120gallon electric cant keep up.

I've delayed getting a boiler, as I'm not sure if I want to stay oil, or switch to LP....

Kinda low on the plate right now.

House is around 2k sq ft, and 100 years old... no snow on my roof during the winter

 

My brother has a house like that, it is insulated but there really isn't space between walls in the older houses to put much in. They redid all the windows and new boiler...but he still burns a lot of wood to help keep the bills down.

 

Yeah, the sense pack really helps with older houses. Helps with drafts, and adds insulation.

The key is insulation up top. Cant just do blown in, I'll lose all the 3rd floor/walk up, and I have a hydroair up there for the 2nd floor. Plus, no way to properly insulate the stair cage, blah blah

 

I love hiking, but I never get out there to do it...Just things getting in the way and zero time. I think starting next spring I'll drag my kid out to some places with the dog on Saturdays when my wife is working...I really want to hike mt washington...It's always been a goal. I was out in yosemite a few years ago and sequoia/kings canyon and then grand canyon...Hiked probably a total of 30 miles on the trip...and a few years ago in italy we did 20 miles of walking in just Rome alone not including climbing up vesuvius...
Maybe if I buy some pricey new hiking shoes I'll be inspired

Our new pellet stove gets installed this week...It's a normal thing for the house to be in the 50's if the wood stove wasn't lit...It was already getting chilly and if we have a cloudy day and the sun doesn't warm the house it's just got that cooooold feeling.

A tip for you wood burners...Little fans on the floor blowing back towards the stove. They push the cold air out of rooms/spaces and force the hot air to "Pop" in the room at the tops of the doorways. We have a 1900sq/ft slab and the only heat we turn on is the stove (All electric baseboard) We have cathedral ceilings in the master and the livingroom...The master is an insane 28x15 with a tongue and groove pine ceiling and the livingroom is 12x28 with the same...It takes 2 fans, one in the master on the floor and one in the hall pointing at the stove and the bedroom goes from 52F to about 65F...The fans are small and quite too..and of course last about 2 years and shit out or need to be rebuilt...

 

I've got one of those thermoelectric units on mine for air circulation. Works good and is completely silent.
Of course, it's in the basement, so it wouldn't really matter if it made noise anyway...

Edit- For the cookstove in the addition we rely on the ceiling fan and a pair of little bitty doorway fans to push the warmer air around to the rest of the house, though. It's not that large of a room so more fans would be overkill.

 

diabetes

 

Holy crap, 1200+!?! I only went through 300. I burn wood too though.

 

I see people with little fans mounted at the top of the doorway blowing heat, but because of the properties of air if you blow the cold towards the stove it will ALWAYS bring heat back..but if you are blowing hot out of the room and the adjacent room reaches the same temperature it won't travel any further. It creates a heat dam of air...This then causes the room the stove is in to keep climbing in temperature while never sharing the heat.

 

I was at stop and shop the other day because I needed a yogurt for my lunch. I don't like that greek crap...I go old school...So I am searching and searching for ANY yogurt without added sugar...they DON'T sell it. I asked the girl stocking the shelves if they have any non-greek sugar free yogurt...she's like "Sure..it's right...over...umm...try the nature area?" I told her I already checked there, and what do they suppose diabetic people should buy? She said she never realized that EVERY yogurt on the shelf has added sugar...
Wegmans and Hannafords rocks a great low fat no sugar added vanilla that i live on
I'm not diabetic, but I try to get my sugar from fruit in yogurt by adding raisins

 

Well, the problem with that is that if I put the fans at the bottom of the door then they'd be in the way...

Once the warmer gets pushed through the door into the kitchen by the ceiling fan and the small doorway fans the ceiling fans in the kitchen and the living room do a good job of dispersing it to the rest of the upstairs, since it's basically just one big room.

 

I'm not diabetic either, my comment was in jest. But yeah, they put that shit in everything!

 

Oh, you have an upstairs
The fans I use I actually put about 6 feet into the room blowing out the door...and if you drop a tissue or dryer sheet at the top of the door the hot breeze coming in will carry it into the room...The comes in at the same rate as the cold blows out.

 

All this talk of oil. Planning on burning A LOT more wood than I did last year to see how well it offsets but keeping the thermostats at ~62-65* last winter we went through 3.5 full tanks of oil at 275 gallons each

It was our first winter in this house and we moved in December 1st so there was no time for planning. Our boiler is original to the house and I honestly don’t know much about it but I’m trying to find someone to come out, take a look, and possibly a tune up if need be because we just went through way too much oil for one season

 

We have a fan on the wood stove surround itself and to get the upstairs we have a piece of PVC mounted on the stairwell

 

Greek yogurt has really taken over. And yes, almost all yogurt has a lot of sugar. All I get is the Oikos with the black label, no sugar added, but I don't know what you do for something that isn't Greek style. Probably best off making your own.