[SWEET_Z]

I am supposed to be meeting with the realtor Friday AM to put in an offer on a house. We love the house, it's on a little lake and reasonably priced for the area. Thing is there is no natural gas on the street so that means oil heat. It is a radiant system which I've read is pretty good, it doesn't have any of the old school radiators.

House was completly rebuilt 6 yrs ago so that means new insulation and windows. It should be a pretty efficient home to heat. The tank is full now so I get one tankful at the old rate. If the prices come down in a few months it wont be bad.

My concern is that now with gas reaching $4 a gallon (I saw 3.27 this afternoon) heating oil prices will be affected similarly. Do you think the difference will be enough to warrant not buying the home just because of oil? My gut feeling is that gas prices will rise with oil simply because there isn't an alternative.

[joberly]

Get a wood stove

[LuvDog]

The forecasts are for natural gas prices to go through the roof this winter.

Oil heat wouldn't turn me away from a house as long as the oil furnace is fairly new.

[JeffL]

What type of boiler is it, and how large is the house, and how many zones is the heating broken into? I could probably give you a pretty good idea of how much oil you might use. Also just the general age of the boiler plays a role, if its fairly brand new, expect minimal usage.

[SWEET_Z]

1700 sq/ft house. Most of the footage is downstairs. Upstairs is 2BR plus loft. It has a wood fireplace in the living room which is 2 stories. On the second floor of the living room are two stained glass windows that swing open to allow heat into the bedrooms.

Boiler and all other systems in the house is 6yrs old. I don't know for sure how many zones. Only saw one thermostat so at least 1!

In fact you can check it out here:
http://crmls.fnismls.com/publink/def...34d&Report=Yes

[JeffL]

If you run that wood stove even a few months of the winter, that will help alot. Not a terribly large house, but you're on a lake, which will cool things off a bit. If you run the fireplace, make sure the thermostat isnt in the same room or even the next room. You'll have the nearest rooms warm, and the thermostat will be satisfied and wont call for heat. This will leave the rest of the house cold, and if the boiler isnt running, if its newly insulated probably not much of a problem, but leaves open the possibility of freezing pipes, especially in the upstairs, which sucks.

If you ran that fireplace a month or two of the winter, if you used over 900-1000 gallons, I'd be surprised. More likely in the 750-900 gallon range.

[R7]

It's gonna cost you A LOT more than normal this year to heat whether it's electric, gas, propane, oil or even wood (if you have to buy it).
I filled the heating oil tank today @$2.24/gallon

[sandman]

gallon to gallon you get more btu's from oil then from gas or propane.

oil 138000 btu's per gallon
gas 100000 btu's per gallon
propane 91000 btu's per gallon

additionally you can increase your storage, so you only buy your oil in the fall (when it's used to be the cheapest)

[SWEET_Z]

Thanks. I would def run the fireplace any time it was below 25 degrees or so. I love natural fireplaces.

The thermostat will need to be moved to the other side of the house. It was in the same room as the fireplace. Don't have to worry about freezing pipes upstairs because there is no plumbing at all upstairs. The only bathroom is at the base of the stairs.

[JeffL]

Originally posted by SWEET_Z
Thanks. I would def run the fireplace any time it was below 25 degrees or so. I love natural fireplaces.

The thermostat will need to be moved to the other side of the house. It was in the same room as the fireplace. Don't have to worry about freezing pipes upstairs because there is no plumbing at all upstairs. The only bathroom is at the base of the stairs.

Heating pipes.

Freezing radiant tubing in your floor and having it burst is a disaster, especially if its upstairs. It ruins the floors, ruins the ceilings/walls of the lower floors, etc.

[SWEET_Z]

Originally posted by JeffL
Heating pipes.

Freezing radiant tubing in your floor and having it burst is a disaster, especially if its upstairs. It ruins the floors, ruins the ceilings/walls of the lower floors, etc.

CRAP! So used to FA I didn't even think of that. I will be sure to move that thermostat if we get the place.

[JeffL]

Originally posted by SWEET_Z
CRAP! So used to FA I didn't even think of that. I will be sure to move that thermostat if we get the place.

Yeah, just move it out of a room thats going to be significantly warmed by the fireplace and you'll be fine.

Radiant is awesome from what I hear, keeps the footsies warm.

[theothersean]

to give you a rough idea .

I have a 2 story colonial 1936 sqft. oil fired forced hot water. there is a fire place in the living room and a small 3 log wood stove in the un finished basement. we burn roughly 3 cord of wood a year betwween the 2 my oil burner also heats my hot water. we buy 700 galons of oil a year . I am sure that would be much more with out the wood burning. The thing about wood as a supliment to your oil is you need to get it cheap or free to realize a savings over oil. I cut and split all my own wood off my property, if you have to buy it be prepared to bend over for it especially now with heating costs going up.

You also need to get glass doors for the fire place to be able to shut when you go to bed because you need to leave the flue open so the coals don't smoke out the house, with out the glass doors to shut, all your heat is going out the chimney.


Its a bit late to do now but the thing to do is find your local oil guy and set up a cap price with a service contract that way you won't get an unexpected price jump mid winter because you will have already locked in a price. But to give you an idea, my parents locked in 2 weeks ago $.20 cheaper a galon than I did the other day. and guy at work just locked in today at $.20 higher only a few days later.

[MnM]

buy it if you like the house... but u might want to wear some extra layers to save some $$

[JeffL]

Frankly, you can set your thermostat wherever you damn well please. And setting the temperature down at night doesnt really save any oil.

If you maintain a constant temperature in the house, when the boiler runs for heat, its going to run for a shorter period of time, more frequently. Whereas if you set back the heat for the night 6-10 degrees, now instead of running for 5-10-15 minutes to make up a few degrees in heat, its going to run 30-40-50 minutes not only heating the air, but also the furniture, floors, walls, ceilings that all cooled down to room temperature as well. So its going to run fewer times in the day, but will run longer when it does.

And what temperature you set your thermostat to isnt really an issue. Once you get the house to a certain temperature, its only a matter of maintaining that temp. Whether it be 65 or 75 degrees. So set it where your comfortable, and just forget about it after that.

[R7]

Originally posted by JeffL
Heating pipes.

Freezing radiant tubing in your floor and having it burst is a disaster, especially if its upstairs. It ruins the floors, ruins the ceilings/walls of the lower floors, etc.

I thought most modern radiant heat systems used a antifreeze mix in the system? At least back when I was building houses 6 or 7 years ago they were

Oil fired steem heat (big cast iron radiators) is said to be the best $ value for heat (though a new system is VERY expensive). The steem and cast iron heats up very quick and takes a long time to fully cool down giving off heat for 10-15 minutes after the boiler shuts down

We burn about 200 gallons of oil per year and close to 3 cord of wood. If I don't burn the wood, the oil consumption triples

[JeffL]

Steam is awesome. Just nobody is using it for new installs due to setup and no one knows how to size the systems anymore. At least thats what I'm told.

Any installation we do involving steam is usually just a boiler swap. We break the pipes, throw in a union and pipe the boiler to the old pipes, thats about it.

Those radiators get HOT, they rule.

[TheIglu]

If there was a house like that near my new job for that price, I'd buy it right NOW.

That house is CHEAP! Don't worry about the price of oil!

Get a large Shenandoa (sp?) wood stove in the basement with a heat reclaimer. You'll be baking out your family every night!

[RandyO]

rather than use the fireplace (fireplaces waste wood without throweing much heat) get an insert and run a wood stove into it, you will get much better heating and use less wood

[SSearchVT]

One thing to take into consideration regardless of the type of heat system used is insulation and weather proofing. If the place leaks heat like a siv no matter what you are using it's going to cost a fortune. Good Luck...

[bigred875]

Originally posted by RandyO
rather than use the fireplace (fireplaces waste wood without throweing much heat) get an insert and run a wood stove into it, you will get much better heating and use less wood

do they make a pellet stove insert yet? I want one of them

[snowborder]

Steam is NOT the way to go because every BTU you need to create steam approx 10% to 20% is wasted to create in the efficiency of the oil burner.

Radiant heat is the most efficient because the boiler is run at 140F, thereby reducing the loss in the inefficient boiler. The negative is that it heats living space slower because the Delta T is not as high.

Yes they do make a pellet insert.

Electric is just as inefficient and subject to increase rates as most of our electric is made with oil and nat gas as well.

[TheIglu]

Originally posted by bigred875
do they make a pellet stove insert yet? I want one of them

You can buy ours. It sucks.

It was convenient over wood for about 1 year. Then it doesn't work when the power is out, it's loud, always running, dusty and doesn't take the chill out of the air on a cold damp day like a real wood stove does. I'll never buy another.

[bigred875]

Originally posted by TheIglu
You can buy ours. It sucks.

It was convenient over wood for about 1 year. Then it doesn't work when the power is out, it's loud, always running, dusty and doesn't take the chill out of the air on a cold damp day like a real wood stove does. I'll never buy another.

really...how loud? maybe a stand alone in the basement is a better choice...


would you really sell it? how much?

[SWEET_Z]

Originally posted by TheIglu
If there was a house like that near my new job for that price, I'd buy it right NOW.

That house is CHEAP! Don't worry about the price of oil!

Get a large Shenandoa (sp?) wood stove in the basement with a heat reclaimer. You'll be baking out your family every night!

Yeh, the initial offer is going in tomorrow. Hope I get it. The basement is basically useless for storage. Half of the basement is natural rock that the foundation was built around. The foundation was put in in the 20's and they just left the rock in the basement, it's like being in a cave down there.