pond rehab

[pondlover]

Very nice pond. :>)
JW who stacks your wood so nice and neat. I would hate to burn it. LOL

 

[JohnHuff]

[quote name='don't ask' timestamp='1339982175' post='124881']
j.w. if you fill it then where ya gonna put your rake, trash can and wheel barrel?
[/quote]
Behind the woodshed where you won't see them of course!

 

[j.w]

don't ask, the garbage can is full of wood chips from our wood cutting that I need to spread around as mulch. The wheel barrow could just lean up on the side of the shed as it's kinda covered out there. And who cares about the rake,its skinny!

PL, I do all the stacking and most of the loading of the wheel barrow while DH does the gathering and cutting. It's been a lot easier since we got the gas splitter at least for him. Mine is still just as much work.............oh my aching back!

 

[Mucky_Waters]

There's a forum for woodcutting? Now I've seen everything!

Actually John, The woodshed is just one aspect of the forum, it's more of a wood heating forum, and it has a lot of active members, much more than any pond forum I've been in. That's probably because it has a more practical application than just having a pretty water garden or keeping fish, and that is to heat one's home and save money in the process. And just like anything else, there are right ways, and wrong ways to go about it. For instance, if you install a wood heating device in your home and you do it wrong the consequences can be a lot worse that installing a pond wrong, so it pays to learn as much as you can about it.
check it out http://www.hearth.com/talk/

 

[herzausstahl]

really like the rebuild and how the stream winds around the house, how many gallons is it?

 

[micaaronfl76]

thanks everyone, under the deck is a trap door with ultraviolet light and hoses and some electrical, it was originally meant for the skimmer.

yes muddy hearth.com is a great forum, and yes i do recognize your mammoth shed.


its around 400-500 gallons

 

[JohnHuff]

Actually John, The woodshed is just one aspect of the forum, it's more of a wood heating forum, and it has a lot of active members, much more than any pond forum I've been in. That's probably because it has a more practical application than just having a pretty water garden or keeping fish, and that is to heat one's home and save money in the process. And just like anything else, there are right ways, and wrong ways to go about it. For instance, if you install a wood heating device in your home and you do it wrong the consequences can be a lot worse that installing a pond wrong, so it pays to learn as much as you can about it.
check it out http://www.hearth.com/talk/

Thread hijack: I know that some people use wood to heat, but I didn't think there would be that many because, pardon me if I'm wrong, I thought burning wood was bad for the environment and not very efficient. I also know that there is a sometimes a wood burning ban when the air is bad and they don't want wood stoves to make it worse.

 

[Nova]

Wonderful pond and stream. Nicely done.

 

[j.w]

Well if we answer your question John on how we feel about burning wood we will be continuing to hijack so lets get back to admiring the nice pond and stream

 

[Mucky_Waters]

Thread hijack: I know that some people use wood to heat, but I didn't think there would be that many because, pardon me if I'm wrong, I thought burning wood was bad for the environment and not very efficient. I also know that there is a sometimes a wood burning ban when the air is bad and they don't want wood stoves to make it worse.

Ah! That is a common topic for discussion in that forum, and it takes you down a couple different roads. One obvious road is how to burn cleaner, and what many people aren’t aware of is that there has been some big changes in stove design since the newer EPA standards that were established in 1988 and the newer catalytic stoves and secondary burner stoves burn very cleanly compared to the wood stoves and fireplaces of years ago.
The other road explores the fact that wood fuel is considered a renewable resource, while fossil fuels, that are commonly used to heat homes, are not.

Here is a good read on the subject
http://www.woodheat.org/argument.html

And a video with a bit of an explanation of how the newer EPA wood burning stoves work.

Sorry to hijack your thread micaaron, but if you go around posting pictures of your woodshed that's what's gona happen. LOL
You have a nice pond by the way.

 

[j.w]

We have that exact stove.....the good one!





Now back to our regularly scheduled program of mica's lovely pond rehab!

 

[JohnHuff]

Ah! That is a common topic for discussion in that forum, and it takes you down a couple different roads. One obvious road is how to burn cleaner, and what many people aren’t aware of is that there has been some big changes in stove design since the newer EPA standards that were established in 1988 and the newer catalytic stoves and secondary burner stoves burn very cleanly compared to the wood stoves and fireplaces of years ago.
The other road explores the fact that wood fuel is considered a renewable resource, while fossil fuels, that are commonly used to heat homes, are not.

Here is a good read on the subject
http://www.woodheat.org/argument.html

And a video with a bit of an explanation of how the newer EPA wood burning stoves work.

Thanks for that info. Knowledge is power. My other question is that how would these wood stoves heat up an entire house. Wouldn't they be useful only for a room or 2?

 

[micaaronfl76]

i have a 4500 sq ft colonial that is all electric, my electric bill easily reaches a 1,000 bucks a month, my wood stove has helped shave a couple hundred off of that each month. plus with electric heat you never get real warmth, the wood stove you do. wood burning isnt for everyone and in the end i paid about 5k for the stove itself, so i am not going to see a return in awhile.



yes heat will creep around your house, you just have to burn for few hours, also i installed vents in the celing where my wood stove is so it takes it upstairs quicker.

 

[j.w]

We can turn on our recirculating fan on our furnace to move the warm air all around the house upstairs and down if we want to but most of the time we don't even need to. Love the warmth of the wood stove. Ours was put in when the house was built in 2000. Very efficient and clean burning. We can burn here if it is a stage 1 burn ban as long as we have a certified stove. If a stage 2 ban then we can not burn unless it is our only form of heat. Laws are going to get stiffer tho I'm sure so might come a day when no burning in stoves at all.

 

[Mucky_Waters]

Yep, there are different ways to circulate the heat around the house. I have a heat pump in my house, but almost never run it during the winter months, but put the system in "circulate" mode when wood burning, all this does is turn the duct blower on low so it slowly circulates the air around the house moderating the temps though out the house.

Obviously how big your house is and where the stove is situated in the house plays a large role in how well the heat gets distributed throughout the home. Again these are things it’s good for people to learn about before getting or installing a wood stove in your home.

One of the biggest problems people run into when starting out in the world of wood heating, and one that is the most often overlooked, is securing wood that is properly seasoned (dry). Trying to heat your home efficiently with green (wet) wood is next to impossible, and yet it’s the trap most new wood burner find themselves in. What often happens is they’ll buy a new expensive high efficiency wood stove hoping to heat their home an save money burning wood, but then they’ll go out and buy or cut their wood supply after the fact, only to find out it doesn’t burn properly because it hasn’t been seasoned (dried) properly and they end up very disillusioned (and cold), with the whole wood heating thing.

So you can see, there is a bit of a learning curve, and having a forum like hearth.com really helps newbies get a good start.