Heating season is coming!

[Reynolds531]

So it's going to drop to 8 degrees C here tonight, and we're looking at six long months of cold. My little 1958 ranch costs about $160 a month for gas in a really cold winter. That's with R50 in the attic and the basement reasonable well sealed. I have half the windows covered in plastic, and I've sealed all the leaks I can find. The furnace is circa 1989, and highly inefficient but in very good shape. A replacement would only return about 5% a year ROE.

Feel free to add your own experiences, what worked and what didn't cut your heating bill on this thread.

[FIRE Artist]

I have a Nest to optimize the temp in my 1970's house.  It helps.

[Mikila]

Our heating is electric, so...exorbitant.  Our near-term plan is to get our heat pump working. That should drop our heating bill to merely outrageous.  Next year we are installing a wood stove.  It heats you thrice!  Wood is so plentiful here people give it away. 

[zephyr911]

So it's going to drop to 8 degrees C here tonight, and we're looking at six long months of cold. My little 1958 ranch costs about $160 a month for gas in a really cold winter. That's with R50 in the attic and the basement reasonable well sealed. I have half the windows covered in plastic, and I've sealed all the leaks I can find. The furnace is circa 1989, and highly inefficient but in very good shape. A replacement would only return about 5% a year ROE.

Feel free to add your own experiences, what worked and what didn't cut your heating bill on this thread.

A predictable, reliable, risk-free 5% is still worth doing.
What temps do you run in your house? We did 60 at night and 65 in the daytime last year, and I'll see if we can push our tolerance down a bit more this time around.
I insulated the garage this summer, and since it shares a wall with our bedroom I'm sure it'll help this winter. It was our first summer so I have no basis for comparison.

[kudy]

I am really excited to see how my new 2 zone heatpump system in our bedrooms will reduce my electric cost this winter. Something that might hurt my savings: I moved my office to the garden-level basement, so I may be tempted to keep the temp above 57 degrees down here this winter.

[regulator]

We replaced our 30 year old fireplace insert with a modern, EPA-rated one that is 75% efficient and has clean enough emissions that we can ignore no-burn days.  Unlike the old stove it also will run 4 to 6 hours on a firebox full of logs at a time.  I scrounged a ton of free firewood this spring in time to get it all seasoned for the winter, so I imagine we will largely heat the house with free wood this winter.

[lordmetroid]

Night are getting cooler.I am expecting sub zero temperature within a couple of months.
To save on energy, I have my thermostat set to 19°C

[alsoknownasDean]

I'm on the other end, it's now spring and I'm not even using my heater some nights. I don't have central heating either.

I notice some people on here keep their central heating on even when not at home. I guess if you're in an area where the pipes would otherwise freeze, it would make sense.

Sent from my LG-D855 using Tapatalk

[Kimchi Bleu]

I have a Nest to optimize the temp in my 1970's house.  It helps.

We have a Nest as well.  I have really seen a difference in the energy savings during the winter.  Not so much during the summer.  I like to keep the house at 60 during the night.  I warm it up to 65 an hour before everyone gets up.  Then around the time the kids come home I keep it at 68 for a couple of hours.

[Stachetastic]

We're in the Midwest and temps are dropping. It was 46F this morning on the way to work. Bought our 1957 ranch last fall and immediately installed a new furnace, and kept the thermostat around 65F (we have young children, so don't keep it too low). We are having a new wood burning insert installed next week and are looking forward to a warm, toasty house instead of a drafty fireplace with a broken damper sucking all the heat out of the house. We also had five trees recently taken down, so we will be set once that wood is seasoned. We will likely need to buy a bit of wood to get us started this winter.

[SailorGirl]

I made curtains out of an old quilt to hang over the windows and kept the mostly-used room warmer than the rest of the house (zonal heating).  Makes it a bit of a shock to walk out to the kitchen, but then that cuts down on the snacking I guess.

[Gone Fishing]

6 cords cut, stacked, and under cover since last winter. I'll probably go through about 4-5 cords of it.  We generally knock around $50-70 off the power bill once the cooling season ends. The surplus funds get thrown into fun money, I'm looking forward to it!   

[BlueMR2]

Added whole house fan insulating cover last Winter and that, best I can tell paid for itself in 2-3 months.  Other than that, I've done caulking jobs in previous years and noticed no difference.  Same lack of difference with re-sealing leaky doors.

This Winter I did another round of caulking, I have a new higher efficiency furnace, and I'm hoping to get some help to get more insulation into hard to reach areas...

[zephyr911]

I'm on the other end, it's now spring and I'm not even using my heater some nights. I don't have central heating either.

I notice some people on here keep their central heating on even when not at home. I guess if you're in an area where the pipes would otherwise freeze, it would make sense.

Sent from my LG-D855 using Tapatalk

It makes sense to keep it above freezing. We run at 60 most of the day with a brief pulse of 65 for our wakeup hour and a couple hours when we walk in from work.

[going2ER]

We have an old house that we have been doing work on and adding insulation, new windows and doors and making sure it is sealed up well. We have a newer oil furnace and a propane fireplace, 2 of the most expensive ways to heat, but it is what we are able to source. We looked at wood burning furnaces and such, but our insurance would go up so much that it is not worth it. A couple of weeks ago we also picked up wall panel convection heaters to install in the bedrooms, they are 400 watt so suppose to be easy on electricity. Fingers crossed that it is not a cold winter this year.

[asauer]

Got a FREE heating assessment from our gas company.  Found 2 leaky doors- now fixed by moving the strike plate.  I also bake a lot in the fall/ winter so after I've finished baking- I leave the oven door open which surprisingly helps.  Also, we keep it pretty freakin cold in the house in winter- well, cold for us- 67.

[lauren_knows]

We just moved to a new home in May, in which we plan on being for 20 years or so.  We had some chimney repairs done, and had them set up the flue for a wood-burning stove. We won't be installing the stove this year quite yet (for various reasons), but I can't wait to heat the place with wood.

[1967mama]

*Helping kids adapt to putting on socks, pants, and a sweater over their tee shirt. Funny, my 10 year old just did that when asked, and just said, "Oh, I'm so much warmer now!" (we homeschool so they are home during the day so I have to keep it a little warmer than if I were home alone)

*Opening up all the blinds early to catch the morning sun to take advantage of that free solar gain

*Moving around more when I feel a chill - takes the edge off to run upstairs, grab all the laundry from the bedrooms, hang up some towels, put a load in the washer and fold the load from the dryer.

*Running 2 crockpots every day (beans for dinner and the extra bagged up for the freezer; soups, stews. I like to cook extra for the freezer at this time of year for busy nights of activities when I might be tempted 

*Drinking more hot tea than in the summer. A mug every 2 hours or so keeps me warm.

*Every fall, I challenge myself to see how long I can go without putting on the furnace for the first time. There's often a gauntlet thread here about that but the California and Florida Mustachians always win!

[BDWW]

*Helping kids adapt to putting on socks, pants, and a sweater over their tee shirt. Funny, my 10 year old just did that when asked, and just said, "Oh, I'm so much warmer now!" (we homeschool so they are home during the day so I have to keep it a little warmer than if I were home alone)

*Opening up all the blinds early to catch the morning sun to take advantage of that free solar gain

*Moving around more when I feel a chill - takes the edge off to run upstairs, grab all the laundry from the bedrooms, hang up some towels, put a load in the washer and fold the load from the dryer.

*Running 2 crockpots every day (beans for dinner and the extra bagged up for the freezer; soups, stews. I like to cook extra for the freezer at this time of year for busy nights of activities when I might be tempted 

*Drinking more hot tea than in the summer. A mug every 2 hours or so keeps me warm.

*Every fall, I challenge myself to see how long I can go without putting on the furnace for the first time. There's often a gauntlet thread here about that but the California and Florida Mustachians always win!

Ha, base it on outside temperature rather than time, and I'd doubt they would win :P. I just checked the pilot light and fired up the furnace for the first time last week. Got down close to freezing a couple nights and snow on the mountains. 

Remodeling the basement, and replacing the forced air with a combination boiler. Didn't get it done this summer, so we're on the furnace for another winter. Might be a bit more expensive as all the ductwork is exposed right now.

[Lis]

My bedroom got down to 45 degrees F last night. It was wonderful! I despise heat (actually allergic to forced heat - didn't realize that was a thing until last winter). I'm the top floor of an apartment complex so I suspect I'll be getting everyone else's heat. This makes me wish I could pay for heat instead of my AC in the summer...

- Layers. In the summer I'm in very light layers. Once it starts getting colder, the heavier layers come out. Last night was a tank top and a light long sleeve shirt and light sweat pants. I have another heavier long sleeve shirt to add and thicker sweatpants when it comes to it.
- Blankets. Lots of them. I 100% admit I am a blanket hoarder - in an apartment for one, I have at least 8 or 9 blankets around. Just keep piling them up on the bed.
- Personal furry space heaters - aka my cats. The long furred one is a cuddler by nature (which is adorable but terrible in the summer). The short haired one gets cold and burrows under the blankets with me, then magically heats himself up to roughly 500 degrees F. Again, horrible in the summer, lovely in the winter.
- Warmish cool showers. Advice I don't always follow myself since I'm a big lover of long, hot showers. But I'm always much more comfortable after a moderately warm shower - your body isn't changing temperatures as much, and you're not going from a 90 degree sauna bathroom to a cold rest of the house.

[Lanthiriel]

We paid almost $4000 to install a new sidearm hot water heater (replacing a standard one that was 20+ years old) and re-wire our boiler so that it's cold-fired (and therefore no longer sitting at 180 degrees all day) earlier this month. The boiler had been off all summer, and we didn't pick a moment too soon to get the work done--it was 28 degrees F when I got up this morning. We've only been in the house (1100sf ranch) since March, so I don't have previous years to compare to, but my goal is to keep the gas bill under $100/mo all winter if possible. This is probably a pie in the sky goal, and might be more like $120.

[music lover]

Natural gas heating is ridiculously cheap where I live. I heated a 1000 sq ft house for a total of $400 last year, with about $160 - 180 of that being fixed charges to the gas company. This is in one of the coldest cities on the planet where -35 is "normal" and where snow stays on the ground for 6 months.

I have added insulation (R25 walls, R50+ ceiling) and installed triple pane windows. Weather stripping is always kept in good working order. Considering how little it costs me to heat my home, any further improvements will make little to no effect on the bottom line.

I keep the house at 19C (66F) when I'm home, 16C (61F) at night when I'm sleeping or out. The furnace fan runs 24/7 to circulate air, and curtains are generally left open to prevent window condensation from lack of air movement. Since 6 months every year is spent dealing with winter, I keep the inside warm enough to wear a T-shirt comfortably...I have no desire to be cold both outside and inside.

[stlbrah]

love winter. Replacing my $100 electric bill with a $40 heater bill. I keep it at 60 degrees and love every minute of it

[sol]

Got a FREE heating assessment from our gas company. 

My free gas company energy assessment was disappointing.  He asked me how big the house was (2260sqft, 5 people) and then looked at my annual gas consumption (375 therms, about $40/mo for heating during the winter) and then he told me to stop worrying about it.

With a total annual heating bill for house plus hot water of $500, it's hard to justify making any changes based on cost unless I can make the building 10% more efficient overall for less than $50.  Seems unlikely.  Well ride out our current gas water heater and furnace until they die.

[russianswinga]

It has been in the mid-30c, for the last few weeks, and topped 40c several times, and with a 6-month old baby, our air conditioning was running even at night :( Normally we run the AC sparingly throughout the day and open windows to vent the condo at night... Well, it has been 25-27c  at night too! Abnormally warm nights.
Just got our electricity bill - extra $200 for last month. The AC is circa 1982, and while the condo is insulated fine, our townhouse is a corner unit - we have a wall that is exposed to direct sunlight pretty much the entire time the sun is up, then radiates heat back into the house at night :( :(

We would grin and bear it, but... baby.
Looking forward to October when our total gas/elec bill will drop from $280 back to $100 where it normally stays.

[albijaji]

Our heating is electric, so...exorbitant.  Our near-term plan is to get our heat pump working. That should drop our heating bill to merely outrageous.  Next year we are installing a wood stove.  It heats you thrice!  Wood is so plentiful here people give it away.

we will be getting a woodstove next year too..
we had a woodstove in our old house
and used to heat with free wood and/or woodpallets
it was so cheap.. the stove basically pays for itself after a couple of winters

[NV Teacher]

We have a 50 year old coal furnace and it costs about $600 a year for a house that is just under 4000 sqft.  We are high in the mountains of Utah so it is snowing and cold from October to April.  It's a little extra work to fill the stoker and empty the clinkers from the fire box, but it is a nice steady heat. 

[psinguine]

I'm actually looking forward to how this year pans out. So far the house has held up on its own with no added heat. We had a week long run last week or so where the temp never rose above 15C outside, and the interior temp never dropped below 25C.

But I also poured a lot of time and effort into this place. The walls are double insulated with staggered seams and the wall framing is double thick with offset studs to prevent thermal bridging. All door and window headers have insulated cores for the same reasons. The attic is R60, and the crawlspace is layered fiberglass and Styrofoam insulation, air sealed all the way down to (and over) the dirt.

Last year we were still running the 30 year old furnace, and had some pretty egregious leaks in the crawlspace, and our electric bill still came in at average for our area. We're still running 100% electric heat (no gas on our area) but we've ditched the furnace and gone with the classic baseboard/ceiling fan combo. I anticipate sub $200 electric bills; which, for the record, is what the average consumer in our area pays during the summer months.

[powskier]

Lift weights, eat more up your metabolism and stay warm with the heat setting low.
Extra food costs may off set utilities savings,,,,:)

[asauer]

Got a FREE heating assessment from our gas company. 

My free gas company energy assessment was disappointing.  He asked me how big the house was (2260sqft, 5 people) and then looked at my annual gas consumption (375 therms, about $40/mo for heating during the winter) and then he told me to stop worrying about it.

With a total annual heating bill for house plus hot water of $500, it's hard to justify making any changes based on cost unless I can make the building 10% more efficient overall for less than $50.  Seems unlikely.  Well ride out our current gas water heater and furnace until they die.

Really?  What a jerk.  Our assessor actually measured just about every nook and cranny of our house.  She also asked us about usage and gave me a high five when I told her.  Guess it just depends on who you get.

[ketchup]

This will be our first winter (northern Illinois) in our new house, which has a furnace from 1983. We'll see how it goes!  We're pretty conservative with the heater use, so even if the furnace is atrociously inefficient it "shouldn't be *too* bad."

[morning owl]

Question for those with Nests -- are they really that much better than a regular old $50 programmable thermostat? We have the latter, and I work from home, so I can change the temp whenever I want. And it's set to go down at night already. I don't get why a Nest would be that much better... What am I missing?

[zephyr911]

I'm about to get a quote for spray-foaming the underside of my roof deck. I think it makes more of a difference in summer, but I have a bit of spare cash and year-end is coming. I believe the tax credit is 30% for this... need to check.

[PencilThinStash]

Last year I was living alone in a first floor apartment - Having thick northern blood in Georgia meant I didn't have to use the heater too much, but it did get some use just to keep pipes unfrozen when temps dropped below freezing. Not bad, but still more money than I wanted to spend.

Since then, moved in with some fellow frugal roommates in a third floor apartment. We've already discussed keeping the heat set <60 all winter, and letting the heat rising from the neighbors below provide any additional warmth that we need. I'm psyched.

[mathlete]

Question for those with Nests -- are they really that much better than a regular old $50 programmable thermostat? We have the latter, and I work from home, so I can change the temp whenever I want. And it's set to go down at night already. I don't get why a Nest would be that much better... What am I missing?

It's better in that I would never remember to make changes as needed to a programmable thermostat.

If I go on vacation for a week, Nest will figure that out usually by the first day and stop cooling/heating the house (within reason).

Also, this may sound dumb, but it kind of "gameifys" saving power. If you adjust the AC/Heat Up/Down by a significant enough level, you earn a "leaf". I've found that it is genuinely easier to make the adjustment from 75 to 77 when I get rewarded with that dumb little leaf.

And finally, you can change the temp on your phone without getting up off the couch. :D

[Spork]

Just finished cutting/stacking.... ready to go.

[1967mama]

Great photo, Spork!

[The_path_less_taken]

Question for those with Nests -- are they really that much better than a regular old $50 programmable thermostat? We have the latter, and I work from home, so I can change the temp whenever I want. And it's set to go down at night already. I don't get why a Nest would be that much better... What am I missing?

hahahahahahah: I had just assumed Nest meant "warm down blanket with a couple of dogs sitting in your lap", like it does at my house. Toasty with the house thermostat set to 40F.

I'm guessing it's a power company smart meter?

[zephyr911]

Smart thermostat. It learns from your inputs and predicts your habits; it also turns off the heat or AC when it senses no activity for long enough.

NEST was the company that invented it. Google bought them a year or two ago. I have on in one of my rental houses... honestly, I don't think it helps much because the people that live there overcorrect the settings all the time. I use a 10-year-old programmable thermostat in a slightly smaller house and pay far less for power.

That said, it does have potential if/when used carefully.

[The_path_less_taken]

Smart thermostat. It learns from your inputs and predicts your habits; it also turns off the heat or AC when it senses no activity for long enough.

NEST was the company that invented it. Google bought them a year or two ago. I have on in one of my rental houses... honestly, I don't think it helps much because the people that live there overcorrect the settings all the time. I use a 10-year-old programmable thermostat in a slightly smaller house and pay far less for power.

That said, it does have potential if/when used carefully.

Not for me. While I'm not a 'complete' Luddite....I just halfway wrote a short story in my head about how easily a great hacker could tell who was home, and when, with that info.

Have a programmable thermostat. All electric house (no gas available here) means I heat with wood for the most part.

[Travis]

Lived in a 2nd floor apartment for the last four years with electric floor heating in each room.  Now I'm in a house with gas-powered central air furnace.  Looking forward to see how this house (and we) handle the temperature change.  WA winters were plenty cold, but in CO we'll have snow on the ground most of the winter.  We have a couple parts of the house we'll have no use in heating. Does closing the air vents in those rooms make a difference?

[music lover]

Smart thermostat. It learns from your inputs and predicts your habits; it also turns off the heat or AC when it senses no activity for long enough.

NEST was the company that invented it. Google bought them a year or two ago. I have on in one of my rental houses... honestly, I don't think it helps much because the people that live there overcorrect the settings all the time. I use a 10-year-old programmable thermostat in a slightly smaller house and pay far less for power.

That said, it does have potential if/when used carefully.

It would be completely useless for me. For one, my schedule is too erratic to predict and therefore, the heat or AC would run needlessly at times. Secondly, when I'm rehearsing with my band in the basement will it think I'm not home because there is no movement upstairs?

I have a programmable thermostat and never forget to adjust it or set the temp to "hold". However, the option to change the temp from my phone would be nice...

[MoonShadow]

We replaced our 30 year old fireplace insert with a modern, EPA-rated one that is 75% efficient and has clean enough emissions that we can ignore no-burn days.  Unlike the old stove it also will run 4 to 6 hours on a firebox full of logs at a time.  I scrounged a ton of free firewood this spring in time to get it all seasoned for the winter, so I imagine we will largely heat the house with free wood this winter.

Unless you have tested this, don't put too much stock into such claims.  My EPA rated woodstove claims the ability to run for up to 12 hours on a single full load.  It's a very large woodstove, but no, it really can't.  I can get it to keep some hot coals in the morning for an easy relight, but it's not really still burning after 6 or 7 hours.

Here's a tip for those who use wood heat, but have run out of properly seasoned wood.  If you have a gas or propane oven, preheat the oven to as low as it will allow, and bake some green wood for a few of hours on a cookie sheet.  The heat is not lost, as it displaces your furnace cycle, and after two or three hours you will end up with moderately dry wood.  Obviously, don't do this unless you are going to be nearby the oven.  After some practice, you will see how warm you can make it without much risk.  The goal is just over 212 F.  Your trying to drive out the water, not start it smoking.

[MoonShadow]

For those stuck with electric heat...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqJoXyBuxRw

http://richsoil.com/electric-heat.jsp

This is some serious Mustachian heating here.

[regulator]

We replaced our 30 year old fireplace insert with a modern, EPA-rated one that is 75% efficient and has clean enough emissions that we can ignore no-burn days.  Unlike the old stove it also will run 4 to 6 hours on a firebox full of logs at a time.  I scrounged a ton of free firewood this spring in time to get it all seasoned for the winter, so I imagine we will largely heat the house with free wood this winter.

Unless you have tested this, don't put too much stock into such claims.  My EPA rated woodstove claims the ability to run for up to 12 hours on a single full load.  It's a very large woodstove, but no, it really can't.  I can get it to keep some hot coals in the morning for an easy relight, but it's not really still burning after 6 or 7 hours.

Here's a tip for those who use wood heat, but have run out of properly seasoned wood.  If you have a gas or propane oven, preheat the oven to as low as it will allow, and bake some green wood for a few of hours on a cookie sheet.  The heat is not lost, as it displaces your furnace cycle, and after two or three hours you will end up with moderately dry wood.  Obviously, don't do this unless you are going to be nearby the oven.  After some practice, you will see how warm you can make it without much risk.  The goal is just over 212 F.  Your trying to drive out the water, not start it smoking.

We used the stove last winter and had to adjust from constant feeding to every few hours with the new stove.  Easily get 4 to 5 hours put of a load.

Happily wood dries FAST where I am.  The sopping wet apple I scrounged this spring is bone dry and ready to go.  Just scored all the logs off a pine that has been standing dead next door at least 3 years.  Completely dry and ready to go.  I carted them to my backyard in an old kids wagon and cut and split them this afternoon.  Bring on the cold...

[Thegoblinchief]

MoonShadow - what kind of wood are you burning? The BTUs of wood species are all over the map. It's quite possible the EPA claims were developed/tested with a higher BTU wood than what you're feeding it with.

I've got tables about this sitting on my desk, but it's probably easy enough to google.

[MoonShadow]

MoonShadow - what kind of wood are you burning? The BTUs of wood species are all over the map. It's quite possible the EPA claims were developed/tested with a higher BTU wood than what you're feeding it with.

I've got tables about this sitting on my desk, but it's probably easy enough to google.

I burn whatever I have, and it's all over the map, but I live in Kentucky; so mostly hardwoods.  Even black locust didn't make 12 hours.  But honestly, that wasn't a full load either.

[Thegoblinchief]

Okay, if you tried it with black locust you get a pass :P

[MoonShadow]

Okay, if you tried it with black locust you get a pass :P

Incidentally, the BTU values of different wood species are pretty close together if you measure by well dried (less than 20% water weight) mass instead of volume.  And black locust is freaking heavy.  I swear it's like picking up an I beam.

[Sibley]

My bedroom got down to 45 degrees F last night. It was wonderful! I despise heat (actually allergic to forced heat - didn't realize that was a thing until last winter). I'm the top floor of an apartment complex so I suspect I'll be getting everyone else's heat. This makes me wish I could pay for heat instead of my AC in the summer...

I also have problems with allergies. Stating the obvious (to me), just in case! Make sure you regularly replace any and all air filters, and take a look inside the vents if you can. You can get a bunch of stuff inside the vents, though it's not necessarily so. If you're dying it's worth checking though. I spend the extra for the really good filters, and will take a quick peek to see if its really dirty for some reason and replace it early. If you live in a dusty area, you may need to set your own schedule.

Also consider the role of humidity, or lack of it. I find I have more problems overall when the humidity is really low, but part of my problems are purely sinus.