As you know from a previous post, we have a large old home in Maine. It would cost us over $5000 to heat our home this coming winter, if we used strictly oil. I called the oil company the other day to see how much oil we had actually used this year, and something (the Lord) prompted me to inquire how much we've used over the last few years.
Oil usage in gallons:
03-04 1384.7 g
04-05 1277.8 g
05-06 773 0 g *This is the year we put a wood stove in the basement
06-07 1279.01g *We had a new baby this year, so we turned the heat up a a bit
07-08 824. g *We used the wood stove ALOT, and had a new boiler
So just having a wood stove in the basement of our 2 story house (2 stories on top of the basement) saves us about 500 gallons of oil a year.....imagine what a wood stove on the first floor will do for us!
We were going to buy a used wood stove, but were a little leary of it because any money saved int e price of the stove might just be eatten up by using more wood, if the stove isn't as airtight as a new one. Then, the Northern Tool magazine arrived, and Calvin found a wood stove fro $499 (not sure what shipping will be yet). Here is a link to the site : http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200307955_200307955
The used wood stove we were looking at was over 3 hours away, and they were asking $350 for it. So, once you figured in gas, the time to go get it, and the $350 for it, it makes more sense to us to purchase new.
On another note, we had debated getting tree length wood and cutting it ourselves, but Calvin doesn't have a good chain saw or log splitter, so we were probably going to just buy split wood. Then, Calvin's daddy offered to send us his chain saw, a Husquavarna, which he was actually trying to sell....what a blessing....and we're pretty sure we'll be able to borrow my father's log splitter. If we get the wood early enough, Calvin and the boys can just whittle away at it. (tree length wood will cost about $100 a cord compared to $180 or more).
See how good God is!
Hope
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