Author Topic: Case Study:It's never too late ..  (Read 15894 times)

RetiredAt63

  • CMTO 2023 Attendees
  • Senior Mustachian
  • *
  • Posts: 20709
  • Location: Eastern Ontario, Canada
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #50 on: October 28, 2015, 06:02:09 AM »
And premium fuel! Here it is usually 5-6 cents difference per litre, so definitely worthwhile to drive a car that takes regular.

Petuniajo

  • 5 O'Clock Shadow
  • *
  • Posts: 94
  • Location: Southeastern US
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #51 on: October 28, 2015, 08:07:16 AM »
You have made amazing progress--good for you! The best part is the stress that has been lifted!

LiseE

  • Stubble
  • **
  • Posts: 189
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #52 on: October 28, 2015, 08:46:27 AM »
Thanks everybody .. I'm just so happy to have a handle on it all .. whew! 

Quote
One question - I thought that Oil bill was high. Was there anything you could do to address that?

So we had an energy assessment done last year and as part of that, they measured the heat loss in our home .. then they caulked the entire foundation, windows and doors and measured again.  This showed a significant improvement so I wanted to see how it effected our heating overall before trying alternate plans.  Last winter was a very very cold one in the northeast so it's hard to assess.  Oil is so cheap right now and we locked in a great rate over the summer when it was really low.  I'm very interested though in converting our fireplace to a wood burning insert.  Friends of our have one and I cannot believe the heat it generates.  Our fireplace is central to our home so it would keep us quite toasty. 

UnleashHell

  • Walrus Stache
  • *******
  • Posts: 8863
  • Age: 56
  • Location: Florida
  • Chapter IV - A New ... er.. something
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #53 on: October 28, 2015, 09:03:32 AM »
Interesting.
I used to Live in the Northeast in an older home. The fuel bills were horrible. On the end of the house was a family room with a fireplace – the room was a couple of steps lower than the rest of the house and wouldn’t it be nice to have a fireplace!! Wrong! Open fireplaces were horrible for doing much else than look pretty and make a mess when cleaning them or getting them lit.

I had the ceiling in the room insulated (it never had anything above it before!!) and invested in a wood stove. I bought one slightly too  big – a little small and a small fan would have circulated the heat far better. Anyway it was far easier to get going and the heat – OMG – incredible. Even thought the fireplace was at the end of the house it could heat everything in it. The furthest bedrooms only got cold when the doors were shut preventing the heat getting in. Otherwise it was warm everywhere and baking hot in the family room. We even had to set a fan up to move the hot air out into the next room and around the house.

I reckon I dropped my oil bill by 50%. The stove paid for itself in 2 winters. Add in the cost of wood (I was in the city) and it was minimal cost by the end of the third winter. Looking back I’d consider adding more stonework that could absorb and hold the heat around the fireplace too.
I’d recommend looking at a full stove (great for power outages too). Be careful of the pellet stoves. My neighbor had one and it was great with the auto feed – until the power went down and the pellet auto feed stopped!!

zephyr911

  • Magnum Stache
  • ******
  • Posts: 3619
  • Age: 45
  • Location: Northern Alabama
  • I'm just happy to be here. \m/ ^_^ \m/
    • Pinhook Development LLC
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #54 on: October 28, 2015, 11:14:53 AM »
And premium fuel! Here it is usually 5-6 cents difference per litre, so definitely worthwhile to drive a car that takes regular.
My Volt takes premium if/when it needs gas, but has eliminated 90-95% of my previous usage... let's call it a wash ;)

dude

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 2369
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #55 on: October 28, 2015, 12:05:09 PM »
Impressive, LiseE! 

travelbug

  • Bristles
  • ***
  • Posts: 277
  • Location: Australia
Re: Case Study:It's never too late ..
« Reply #56 on: October 29, 2015, 03:43:49 PM »
Thanks for coming back and letting us know what you guys did. How exciting for you and your family!