August 26, 2010 | Posted by DDFD I hate to say it, but the leaves are starting to fall here in New England– that means woodstove fires before you know it. When I noticed the leaves, I started thinking it was time to review just some of the Self Reliance Exchange’s Heating With Wood and Firewood related posts. Here is a quick [...]
Categories: home energy | 
Tags: firewood, heating with wood, hints and tips, recap, self reliance | 
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March 30, 2010 | Posted by Mark Z This has been a very calm, cloudy winter and spring, which is bad news for those of us generating our own power. We’ve had to reduce our power consumption often lately. It’s enough to make us . . . . well, cranky! We really appreciate the increased availability of hand-cranked power sources for small electronics. [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: crank/solar radio, hand crank powered electronics, self reliance | 5 Comments »
March 23, 2010 | Posted by Mark Z Our unusually calm winter and spring has us contemplating drastic measures, namely, starting up the gas generator. Our three gas generators have pulled us through some tight spots in the early days on the homestead. The battery bank, housed in the outhouse, had lost half its capacity through freezing batteries. The wind generators stopped working [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: alternative energy, maximizing gas generator use, self reliance | No Comments »
February 16, 2010 | Posted by Mark Z Recently, a starry morning gave way to sunshine. The wind blew a steady 25 knots from the south. It was a classic alternative energy day, one that went beyond the power coming in from the wind generator and solar array. I spent about an hour hauling armloads of firewood from the wood shed to the [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: drying firewood, self reliance, using passive solar power, using passive wind power | No Comments »
December 27, 2009 | Posted by Mark Z If you’ve read any of my posts on heating with wood to this point, it must be clear to you that wood heat is an essential feature of our homestead. To close my offerings on the subject (for now!) I’d like to add a few thoughts, observations, and tips that didn’t make it in elsewhere. [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: heating with wood, how to, self reliance | No Comments »
December 22, 2009 | Posted by Mark Z When we bought our homestead, it already had a woodstove. It was a fairly large, ‘70s-era Earth Stove that was nearly burned out. The former owners told us they had removed some of the fittings, including heat baffles and firebrick panels that had been in the burn chamber. This caused a lot of problems, although [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: altering woodstoves, heating with wood, self reliance | No Comments »
December 20, 2009 | Posted by Mark Z In a previous article, I proposed thinking of fire as a living organism, and described the infant stage of its development. Let’s continue following fire through its “life stages.” Once your fire starts, it soon becomes a teenager, growing fast, often to the limits of your firebox, it consumes everything, and wants more. It will [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: heating with wood, self reliance, tending woodstoves | No Comments »
December 18, 2009 | Posted by Mark Z Fire is like a living organism, requiring oxygen, fuel, and warmth to “live.” Removing any of these reduces the burn until it “dies.” Thinking of fire as alive, and considering it wild, selfish, and treacherous develops good safety habits when heating one’s home with wood! All living things have stages of development. Understanding these stages [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: heating with wood, self reliance, starting a fire | No Comments »
December 4, 2009 | Posted by Mark Z Ever since human beings first gazed into flames, our species has been hypnotized by fire. It draws the eyes, the mind, perhaps even the soul inescapably. This, more than the practical benefit of providing extra light, is probably why so many wood stoves have tempered glass windows. This is also why it’s so important to [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: cleaning woodstove window, how to clean woodstove glass, self reliance | No Comments »
December 1, 2009 | Posted by Mark Z I’ve been sharing with you my strategies for cutting and stacking firewood for seasoning in rain country: Don’t be afraid to restack your wood a few times. Even if I’m not moving stacks from the beach to shelter, I sort my wood now and then, separating drier wood from the wet so that it can [...]
Categories: home energy | Tags: how to season firewood, how to stack firewood, self reliance | No Comments »
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