Multi-fuel Wood/Oil Furnace

[snowdooer]

I'm considering replacing my oil furnace with a multi-fuel wood/oil unit. I've beeen searching the web for manufacturers and have found a few. I'm wondering if anyone has had any experience with these units, good or bad. They aren't cheap and I'd hate to buy one only to find out it's not all that they say it is.

Thanks in advance.

[ralphtheplumber]

Just a couple random thoughts on this. My father-in-law used to have a combination furnace in his house.

These things have no safeties, and no heat storage. His just had a thermostat in the plenum to kick the blower on and off. If you stick too much wood in it, it'll be 110º in your house. If you stick WAY too much wood in it, the ductwork might start glowing, or the flex melting.

Since there's no storage, you'll be getting up in the middle of the night to put more wood in it.

Personally, I'd go with a separate wood boiler and a hot water tank for heat storage. It should be pretty simple to chop hot water heating coil into your existing ductwork.

Build a nice fire in the boiler, and pump the hot water through the coil to heat your house. When you've got it warmed up in there, the heat that's still coming out of the boiler can go into the storage tank to use later. If that cools off before the morning, the oil heat comes on as a backup. Any of the boiler manufacturers can get you all the parts, and a diagram of how to wire it all up.

[rickboggs]

I was converting a mobile home from LP to Nature gas. The furnace was an old Intertherm, you know, the one with the round porthole to lite the pilot. The furnace didn't work so they built a fire right on top of the burner!!! Of cousre I had to cap off gas and red tag it! Multi-fuel? Old rocking chairs, plywood, 2x4s.

[mhafley]

When I was growing up in northern michigan we had one. We ran it most of the time on the wood, but if we left for vacation we could switch it to oil. I was not interested in HVAC at the time, so I don't know many specifics other than it was baseboard heat throughout the house, and if the fire went out, so did the heat. I had to fill it with firewood at night and then again in the morning. I believe the domestic hot water was tied into this also.

[golphinphool]

Check out the website for Yukon Eagle Multifuel furnaces. We sold one and the homeowner has been extremely happy with it. http://www.yukon-eagle.com/

[snowdooer]

I went to the Yukon site today and found a guy that left a testimonial from my home town. He's had his furnace for 8 years and is very happy with the unit overall.

After looking at several manufacturers, I think Yukon will best suit my needs and seems to have the best warranty.

If anyone else has any helpful opinions I'd like to hear them. I'm still a bit apprehensive about spending the money for it versus the return on investment, so I'm all ears for now.