Just had an oil fill-up

Skinny Shooter · #1 12-18-2007, 12:12 PM

Our fuel oil tank for the studio took 230gals at $3.199/gal and the price was $735.77

The delivery guy stated it had been $3.35 and recently came down.
After we put a pellet stove into service there is still a full tank of fuel oil left-over for the house from last February.
We estimate that we will burn about 3.5 tons (at $204.00/ton) of pellets at an approx cost of $700 for the entire winter.
We have two tons stored under roof out back and will be getting another ton after Christmas.

Wood would be nice (and I prefer it) because I can get it for free but have limited time to cut, split and stack wood for a sole source of home heat.
That's a lot of firewood for the winter.
I do have a woodstove in my forge and don't even burn through more than a cord over winter.

skeet · #2 12-18-2007, 01:11 PM

Just bought a couple of Pellet Stoves out here in Wy. Pellets are at about 180 a ton. Just built a garage and put one out there so i can finish it off in relative comfort. Put the other in the basement of the house. Heat the basement and the floors are warm upstairs too. The house has electric baseboard heat. Very efficient liquid/gel based heaters but we mostly use the wood stove. We'll burn about 4 cords in a normal year...but the wood here is mostly pine/spruce/cedar. I have been cleaning up some cottonwoods my neighbor killed a few years ago. 6 trees and they all have about 2 or more cords each. Picking up all that wood that the cleanup crews are leaving around is a great idea. BTW to get firewood in this area..ya go to the forest service people and for about 20 bucks ya get a permit to cut 4 cords of firewood in the National Forest. All dead trees ..some are already cut down and dry. Mostly beetle killed trees i guess. Pellets are much easier to deal with though. Meaning to ask Is Shyda's still in operation?? Hunker down and stay warm guy..winter is here ya know?

multibeard · #3 12-18-2007, 01:12 PM

Crooks here get as much for furnace oil as they get for diesel out of the pumps at the gas station. Road diesel has at least 40 cents road tax.

I burn wood except for when I am out of town. I haven't had my fuel oil tank filled in years. It is a little low now so I will just put in enough road desiel to get me through.

Problem is I still have a cord or so of wood split and stacked on the property that needs to be hauled home. Too much snow right now tro get in and get it.

One of my buddies has an outside wood funace. He is burning cob corn. He raises corn so he can grow his own fuel that way if it works out and doesn't have to shell it this way.

Skinny Shooter · #4 12-18-2007, 01:18 PM

Carl, are you cleaning the chimney more than usual burning that pine and spruce?
Shyda's is till going strong.

Btw, this should be good predator hunting weather but won't get out this week due to work and training nights at the station. I did find a Mossberg 935 turkey gun that cabela's had accidently marked down $40 to $489.00. oops, its now mine.

Mounted a reddot Comp M and am itching to get it out.

multibeard, an outdoor furnace seems like a great idea. Did he need a special conversion to burn corn cob?

multibeard · #5 12-18-2007, 05:57 PM

He just shovels it in.He may be burning some wood along with it. I will try to remember to ask him at coffee in the morning.

I see they are installing an outside wood furmace at a house north of town today.

My neighbor and I have discussed putting a big one in between our houses to heat both of his houses and mine. Sure would be easier than ptting wood down in out basements. Plus less wood splitting.

He is putting a new well in next summer that will be hooked up to both of his houses with a provison for me to hook up to it when my well goes bad.

Dang it is great to live in a small town where neighbors are NEIGHBORS.

skeet · #6 12-18-2007, 06:32 PM

Surprisingly the coyotes are running all over the place here. I saw a large pack of them the other evening about 4 PM. There was 10 of 'em making the biggest racket you ever did hear. I wasn't close to the house as i was out cutting wood and when I was walkin howm they started in to howling so I went over the hill to take a look. NO gun and they were not over 40 yds away. And I almost always carry my 45. They looked at me for about 10 seconds yapped a couple more times and took off. Oh well! maybe next time. Not having much problems as i usually burn the ash and cottonwood with it. Hot fire and keeps the chimney a bit cleaner. The ash is great wood. Glad to hear Brian is still kicking along. Hate to see small gun shops go out of business. The guys back east where I was are really scrambling to find shooting stuff. In the small area where I was I probably had 80% of the reloading business and probably 40-50% of the clay target business too. Hope the 935 works out for ya. Let me know how it does as i was contemplating one for duck hunting on the rivers here. If it happened to go overboard I wouldn't worry as much about the mossy asI would if it was an SBE

Skinny Shooter · #7 12-18-2007, 11:06 PM

Hey it shoots 2 3/4" hi brass too.

Swift · #8 12-19-2007, 01:36 AM

Yeh oil prices are out of control. We are a wood burning family and use the furnace as back up. Takes me about 3 cord per year to heat our place a year. Between what I cut for free and the $100 per cord delivered I try and stay ahead at least a year.

So I guess my heating bill is about $400 per year.

fabsroman · #9 12-19-2007, 09:51 AM

We use natural gas and I am expecting to pay $250+ a month right now and we only live in a townhouse. When we buy a single family home, I am definitely putting a wood stove or two in the place.

multibeard · #10 12-19-2007, 06:32 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Skinny Shooter
multibeard, an outdoor furnace seems like a great idea. Did he need a special conversion to burn corn cob?

I talked to him this morning. He had trouble with the ear corn not burning up completely so he has been burning it with some wood so he just has ashes not junk left.

Went over to a taxidermist friends today to do my grandsons turkey fan from last spring. He had let the fire in his out side wood furnace go down so that the 12+ inches of charcoal burn up that had built up in the bottom of the stove.

Lilred · #11 12-20-2007, 07:16 AM

First off, I gotta give multibeard a big ole howdy..hope MI is treatin ya well

And, iffn ya got a wood-burnin furnace outside, ya might as well hook up yer hot water to it too. It's really not that difficult as it may sound, and even if you don't run it to the house, when the power's out, it's nice to have a big tank of hot water waitin fer ya.
I been burnin wood all my life and wouldn't trade it fer nothin. We do have propane heat here, and use it for backup only...but I can say we aint never hardly used it.
We should count ourselves lucky that we can heat our homes..it's a tough thing to do fer some folks...esp. as high as oil is these days.

multibeard · #12 12-20-2007, 06:18 PM

HOW ya doing Red?

I am heating my house with a little ole wood stove with a blower down in the basement. I think almost all of the outdoor frunaces are also hooked up to the domestic water systems.

It is my neighbor that is talking about putting in a big outdoor furnace and splitting the cost and wood supply.

I still don't have all my wood hauled in from the property as I didn't want to disturb the three whole deer I saw on my 30 acre property. Now it is all I can do to bust my way in with my 4wd due to the snow, let alone haul a trailer in and out with wood. Hoping for a January thaw.

If you decide to go to Disney World some time I can probably hook you up with your old freind Boehr.LOL I think he might be driving a bus down there since he retired and moved to Fla.

Little private joke about lilred not being literate enough to understand the Michigan dog hunting/training laws. The natives can't understand our stupd regs let alone a tranplant.

Lilred · #13 12-21-2007, 06:44 AM

LOL! I had all but fergot bout that fool...retired and drivin a bus in Florida. He's livin the American dream...

I know what his problem is...he just never got a good ole fashioned butt whoopin...really..how many folks do we all know that just needs a butt whoopin and then they'd be fine lol

Dan Morris · #14 12-21-2007, 08:51 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by fabsroman
We use natural gas and I am expecting to pay $250+ a month right now and we only live in a townhouse. When we buy a single family home, I am definitely putting a wood stove or two in the place.

Dang son, my entire utility bill for last month...elec/gas...was only
$118.00 on a 2800ft house....course, we keep it about 65.
Dan

petey · #15 12-21-2007, 09:24 AM

Dan,

Glad we're paying the same in the Appalachin basin as you are in Colorado. My gas bill is compairable with about the same size house (heating upstairs, not basement) , average about 65-70 degrees and no more. If we need more, I supplement the living room with wood in the fireplace.

Sometimes I can get that room up to 75 degrees just by burning wood. I have that room on it's own zone for that reason (and the fact that it's got a loft with 16' ceilings and skylights to boot... not the best for keeping heat in such a large space.

That'll all change once they spud that well on my property in the spring. My lease is up early summer and the gas company I signed with confirmed at least 1 well on my property by springtime. I burn up about 150-170,000 cubic feet in a year. I get 300,000 (free gas) per year off the well and 1/8th royalties or 12.5 % after lifting costs. If she's a boomer or is a good oil producer, it could pay my mortgage too. I'm not expecting that much from royaties, but it could be a good one. They planted 50 wells within 2 miles of my place this summer, (mostly a promoter company). My neighbor's one well that's closest to me is a good gas well, with no fluids. He's getting some hefty royalties. Another 1/4 mile down the road is more of an oil producer not so much gas.... being in the drilling business, I know that even 5 acres away from a great well, may produce a not so good well depending on the sandstone payzones. BTW these are shallow wells around 2100-2700 ft

Free gas will be good, but at close to $100 per Bbl of oil and $7 per MCF of gas could be good. Even an average well for the area that produces 300 MCF per month could put $250 in my pocket each month. How's that for a kicker?? Get free gas, then get a check for more than you would have paid for gas you use?? Initial 3 month flush could get me up in the thousands on roayalties, so I'm all for them planting 1 or 2 or however many wells they want on my tract of land. Looks pretty promising

That's why you won't find my complaining at the pumps. Yeah I may gripe a little, but I can't produce natural gas and or oil and make money off of it, then turn around and complain when I have to pay for gas to put in a vehicle. That would be a bit hypocritical I think.