Wood furnace

[fitzw]

Many years ago, I lived in a small house with a stove that could burn wood or coal, which we used as the main source of heat (not that we could tell the insurance company that; they wouldn't accept that on the house information). It was inconsistent; some nights, the fire would burn slowly and fitfully, and I would have to poke it up every few hours. On some other nights, I would have feed the stove every 3 hours or so. It didn't seem to matter what kind of wood I was using. Either way, it made for some difficulties in getting a good night's sleep during the winter.

This morning, the wood-fired furnace for the farmhouse was dead empty, when I had stocked it fully last night. Not even embers. At least the water was still hot for the radiators.

Here we go again.

Comments

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

Does wind velocity create a Bernoulli effect that runs the fire faster/hotter?

It was quite windy last night.

[fitzw.livejournal.com]

That's got possibilities -- we were having some trouble earlier with smoke from the furnace blowing down the flue for our woodstove (we had to light the woodstove in self-defense).

Last night, fed the furnace at 9:00 PM (had a really nice ember bed from the morning), checked it a little after 2:00 AM, still fine, and still about a quarter full this morning at 7:00 AM.

Something transient, I guess.