House heating that isn't wood fueled?

[billpierce]

Jonathan, before you plump on anything I'd do your best to visit and ideally stay in a number of houses with different heating systems. Obviously there is alot of variation but I have a number of mates of new build houses with very high insulation spec even now they are only lighting their stove ( which does all hot water and rads) for a few hours in the evening. Arm full of logs per night. I have been well impressed/ depressed about my down log consumption in 1750's stone house.

[Big J]

1 minute ago, billpierce said:

Jonathan, before you plump on anything I'd do your best to visit and ideally stay in a number of houses with different heating systems. Obviously there is alot of variation but I have a number of mates of new build houses with very high insulation spec even now they are only lighting their stove ( which does all hot water and rads) for a few hours in the evening. Arm full of logs per night. I have been well impressed/ depressed about my down log consumption in 1750's stone house.

A friend in Aviemore built his own house a few years ago, and has my old Bullerjan stove to heat it. Three logs every other day and it's toasty!

[teepeeat]

18 hours ago, Big J said:

I just like a warm house. I spend my whole working life outside in all weathers, and my preference is to shed my outer layers as soon as I step through the door and grab some shorts and a t-shirt for indoors. 

 

To get a house to passive standard from an economic point of view doesn't make sense (or at least, not quite). It's cheaper in the long run to build a very well insulated house with minimal heat imput than go that extra mile for passive standard. The issue with MVHR is that it's commonly installed, especially in Europe but there is very little market for the filters that need to be replaced at regular intervals. As such, people are living in enviroments where all the air is filtered through filthy filters, which is bad for indoor air quality.

 

Very interesting post though, and thanks for taking the time.

Appreciate liking a warm house, but do find that the more I work outside, the lower I prefer the temperature indoors - each to his own I guess :-) similarly quite happy to have a jumper on in doors.

I do think that the target temperature needs to be carefully assessed, based on your future heating delivery system as modern UFH or other systems are very different to traditional radiator set-ups as far as even distribution etc go. Its partly why I did up my own place as my experience of UK housing has been very frustrating when it comes to heating systems - ie radiators. Cant understand why they even still exist :-)

Agreed re going full passive house route - the expense & paperwork hastle is partly why I didnt bother. I did however do what I could practically re insulation & sealing to gain the benefits. Its been a while since I did my place and no doubt the building industry has moved on a fair bit, but my biggest problem was making sure I was labouring for the tradesmen I used to ensure the detailing was right as they were not particularly interested or fussed. It does not cost a huge amount extra to do this, but I think it will pay off long term. We have had the heating pump pack up at one point and the internal temp dropped to 10 over 10 days (I was away and missus wanted me to deal with it) but went no lower with sub zero outside.

Re the filters for MVHR, they are available, so that should not hold you back. I used a modular system from europe where I can buy the filter material in a bulk roll if I want to and just replace as & when. Would have thought the market would have moved on by now to make this a non-issue ....

[hplp]

Hey,

 

Really enjoying this conversation. I have been debating this my self as I have a late 1800s stone built Irish farmhouse. Its south facing and the conclusion Im coming to is that insulating it will be a challenge. Heating wise Im wondering about trying to plan for a few input routes so that I can vary what Im using at different times of the day/different seasons.

I was looking at a largish thermal store with infeed for solar hot water and then either a back boiler range (there are a few continental ones that have a bias control between heating water and cooking) and then a back boiler stove. The house is in Ireland so RHI isnt a option but also I have a limited budget.

If i dig up the floor, Im then looking at putting down very rudimentary underfloor that if I go away I can then get the solar to heat either rads or the underfloor if fitted to keep a low heat flowing through it. Ive found having lived in a number of old houses over the years, the biggest thing is to keep some sort of heat flowing through regardless of whether you are there or not as the cold and damp can take a while to shift otherwise.

 

H

 

[Yorkshire Brummie]

On 29 December 2018 at 11:45, Big J said:

Most of us here heat our houses with wood fuel, or at least partially so. 

 

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm sick of the sight of the stuff, and I've often reflected on the fact that it would be better to simply sell the wood and use that to fund alternate, less labour intensive methods of house heating. For instance, I'm most of the way through cutting and splitting 15 tonnes of ash for the house and I'm struggling, motivationally. It will end up as best part of 45 cube (it was quite dry coming in) and it will last us almost 2 years, but it'll have taken three days to process and I could have sold it at roadside for £800.

A really good thread Big J, I guess it's got a lot of us all thinking. But does it go all the way back round to the fact that if you have a pretty much infinite wood fuel supply, that pretty much the only cost of converting it into heat is your labour, then to have it as one of your heat sources (albeit not solely relied on, so not to require constant labour intensive wood processing on your part) in tandem with perhaps a GSHP system is the answer?

Again, great read guys thank you

Cheers

I

On 29 December 2018 at 11:45, Big J said: