Cadillac Outdoor Wood Burner

[cadillac]

I got tired of watching the news and seeing all of my oil, gas, and LP $ going to mid-east countries helping to fund the lunatics....so I made a move towards personal energy independence....I bought a 5600 model Cadillac Outdoor Wood Burner.  I'm calculating a 3 year payback on this baby.   I have good access to a wood supply, I have a 5500 sf house and a 2500 sf shop to heat.  If you don't have one of these i'd strongly recommend you look into it.  I installed this completely by myself.

[LowGear]

It looks like a Cadillac.  I'll never need one but I'd like to look at the website to see how it works.

Casey

[Shipo]

Google is your friends...

http://www.nsteelmfg.com/cadillac_3600

$7 G .......

[Ronmar]

I have seen a few, never liked all the smoke down low to the ground.  Slow cold burn and that bitter smoke just dosn't go anywhere...

[LowGear]

So how do you get the heat from the stove to the house and shop?  How far do you have to move it?  How big of storage do you have at these spots?  Radiators or radiant floor?

What's the plan?

Casey

[wrightkiller]

Cadillac :  So how many have you sold?? 

[Randybee1]

7K is ridiculously overpriced! Everybody and his brother makes these things. Stay away from the stainless steel (SS) models. Since SS is so expensive they are made a lot thinner than cast iron and will burn through. Also be aware that there are a lot, and I mean a lot of counties/municipalities that have banned these things. Check first before you buy.

Randy B

[dieselgman]

Even Fairbanks Alaska has banned these things... but just another political football in my opinion.

Hydronic heat transfer to the buildings and hot burns is the way to go!

dieselgman

[Ronmar]

Yep, a hot clean burn and store the heat to be used slowly.  But that will mean more operator attention, and perhaps unplanned trips out to the boiler in the middle of a dark and stormy knight:)

[mbryner]

Umm, he has 1 post, his username is cadillac, and he's promoting....   "He's a witch! Burn him!"   oooppps, ban him!   (Sorry, too much Monty Python..)

[oiler]

Looks quite inefficient to me........

[JohnF]

I've had one of these things for over 10 years (not a Cadillac, but a Pacific Western, now out of business) and I find they work well.  Mine will heat up to 10,000 square feet and I have it connected to 6 buildings in my "compound".  The main reason for getting it was that we had a house fire caused by a poorly installed wood burner chimney and SWMBO would not have another wood burner in the house.

I like that I can heat multiple buildings with it but here is the BIG downside - it can be a a pig on wood, in the coldest days of the year up here (around -35 C at night) it can burn 1/3rd of a face cord a day.  My buddy has a smaller unit and it also uses a fair amount of wood, but obviously not as much as mine. 

Nowadays I tend to use my WMO boiler for most heating and use the wood furnace if it is going to be cold to supplement.  I'm getting too old to cut and split all that wood!

[Thob]

.....  I'm getting too old to cut and split all that wood!

But cutting and splitting the wood is where all the benefit is!  You get all that exercise, plus it keeps you warm before you burn it!  If you cut and split your own wood by hand, it warms you twice! 

[vdubnut62]

Yes it does warm you twice, but damn! The cost of Absorbine Jr at my age and condition is getting out of hand.
Really, I have a couple thousand dollars tied up in Stihl chainsaws, another couple thousand in a 35 ton splitter(that's a gas hog),
5 grand or so in my Belarus with the front end loader, and another thousand in my 68 Chevy log truck(that's a real gas hog).
The wood is free, I have a guy with a commercial sawmill that saves his cull logs for me, but I still have to haul, unload,cut, split and haul the stuff in.  Not to mention getting up every 5 or 6 hours to fill the furnace in 20 degree weather. Anybody else want to live in a 70 year old house?
5-7k isn't out of line with the outdoor boilers I've seen around here either.
It's all in your perspective in where you want to spend your money, there's no free lunch. Just my admittedly biased opinion!
Ron

[BioHazard]

Anybody else want to live in a 70 year old house?

I'm trying to buy a property right now with a house from 1928 and another from 1937. It's got a heat pump and stays pretty nice and cozy. 

If the deal goes through I'm looking at heating the whole place (5 buildings) with a central hydronic system probably mostly wood fired. I'm looking at investing in a 40 acre timber lot on the side of a mountain to provide me with firewood for the rest of my life and then some. 

I do have to wonder how much a good wood gas cogen setup would cost compared to one of these boilers...