Log Boiler

[Frodo]

I am keen to put in a log boiler for our farmhouse. We have a lot of low grade woodland on the farm and an old cattle court which can be used for seasoning wood. Are they a lot more work than and open fire?

I like the simplicity of them. Buying pellets defeats the advantage of our own wood and I think chipping wood will also be costly with storage implications.

Also want to keep any RHI payments simple.

All advice welcome

 

[Hilly]

Life sentence.

 

[Energy Energy]

You must be prepared to feed it each day. If you are only going to be heating your home then no problem. Once you get into heating other areas / properties then you need to think of who will feed the boiler while you are away.
On the whole though, the boilers are simple to use and will provide all your needs.
if you would like to see some case studies of what we have done with log boilers let me know and i will mail some info over.

 

[mushnt grummmble]

Life sentence.

yes agree,dont do it!

 

[all_arable]

I'm considering the same in a new build farmhouse. have a area of woodland on farm with a mix of hard& soft wood.

The 3 boilers that I like the look of best are

ETA
HDG
froling


also considering windhager & veissmann and possibly solarfocus.

not so sure myself about the polish eco Angus, seems rather blacksmith

 

[roscoe erf]

Build it yourself no rhi payments but don't half save money

 

[Penmoel]

We have bought a Farm 2000 80kw for the house and to heat a workshop, coming this week. A simple thing basically an incinerator, not full of sensors and augers. will take logs up to 1400mm long,.

Reckon it will cost best part of £20k finished including building a shed to put it in and a 10,000litre accumulator tank, from the ones I have seen a large heat store tank is essential if you are not to be lighting the fire every day and feeding it twice a day.

They say the Rhi on it could be something like up to £8k a year, if it pays £5k and saves on the £2k of oil we currently use it will be fine.

We have no end of wood from overgrown hedges on some land we have just have, it has to be cut down so may as well make use of it.

I have seen @roscoe erf and his own made boiler , very impressive and simple system not that far from the Farm 2000, except that he does not have a tank, which he could easily add mind, the system works well for him and to do it yourself the cost would be down to a quarter or third of what ours is but no rhi payment. Three , four or five years to pay for itself , not too bad.

 

[Frodo]

yes agree,dont do it!

Is it really worse than feeding livestock? On Penmoels figures above its a much better return than fattening cattle.

Do you really need a 10.000 litre tank? My current favourite system is a 40KW ETA boiler with 3000 litre Aktatherm tank. Its not the cheapest, but gets positive reviews and should be reliable.


I would be happier if the full rules for the domestic RHI were known, I really just want a warm house.

 

[Penmoel]

We saw a 60k Farm 2000 on a place with 2x 2000 litre tanks heating a couple of houses and a cottage, he was having to stoke it twice a day an three times in really cold weather, another place we saw with the same boiler had 10,000 litres and admittedly a brand new house with all the insulation and under floor heating which suits the system was only having to light it twice a week.

I think 80 litres per Kw is the minimum recommended by farm 2000, so 3000 with you @Frodo is on the small side perhaps

 

[all_arable]

Build it yourself no rhi payments but don't half save money

Not really a option with doing a new build in a smoke control zone.

Farm2000 systems don't seem half numb, but simple. What efficiency they achieve?

 

[roscoe erf]

Is it really worse than feeding livestock? On Penmoels figures above its a much better return than fattening cattle.

Do you really need a 10.000 litre tank? My current favourite system is a 40KW ETA boiler with 3000 litre Aktatherm tank. Its not the cheapest, but gets positive reviews and should be reliable.


I would be happier if the full rules for the domestic RHI were known, I really just want a warm house.

I don't have a second storage tank but the boiler tank dose hold
1500litres but as @Penmoel said if I need to can fit one as for hard work no if your organised I only load my twice a day as I'm burning pallets at the moment but if burning logs once a day is fine cleaning the ash out is the only other job once every 6 weeks again depending what I am burning as for cost working on Penmoels figures I saved 18k on building and installing but no rhi payments all in all ideal in a farm situation

 

[Penmoel]

http://farm2000.co.uk/farm2000.co.uk/Technical_Downloads_files/HT BROCHURE 0214.pdf

Very similar to roscoe's , a little more elaborate with the secondary chamber above the fire but very simple none the less.

 

[J B]

Will the Farm2000 pass the emissions test??

 

[mushnt grummmble]

Is it really worse than feeding livestock? On Penmoels figures above its a much better return than fattening cattle.

Do you really need a 10.000 litre tank? My current favourite system is a 40KW ETA boiler with 3000 litre Aktatherm tank. Its not the cheapest, but gets positive reviews and should be reliable.


I would be happier if the full rules for the domestic RHI were known, I really just want a warm house.

make life easier for your selfs
obviously livestock need daily care but why make work for yourselves unnecessary

 

[Frodo]

make life easier for your selfs
obviously livestock need daily care but why make work for yourselves unnecessary

because it pays better than other farm enterprises.

 

[mushnt grummmble]

because it pays better than other farm enterprises.

please share the costings

 

[Hilly]

We have bought a Farm 2000 80kw for the house and to heat a workshop, coming this week. A simple thing basically an incinerator, not full of sensors and augers. will take logs up to 1400mm long,.

Reckon it will cost best part of £20k finished including building a shed to put it in and a 10,000litre accumulator tank, from the ones I have seen a large heat store tank is essential if you are not to be lighting the fire every day and feeding it twice a day.

They say the Rhi on it could be something like up to £8k a year, if it pays £5k and saves on the £2k of oil we currently use it will be fine.

We have no end of wood from overgrown hedges on some land we have just have, it has to be cut down so may as well make use of it.

I have seen @roscoe erf and his own made boiler , very impressive and simple system not that far from the Farm 2000, except that he does not have a tank, which he could easily add mind, the system works well for him and to do it yourself the cost would be down to a quarter or third of what ours is but no rhi payment. Three , four or five years to pay for itself , not too bad.

Would an 80kw do two big bungalows ? my neighbour has one and to be fair for 8k a year I might be a little interested but they are a bit of a labour of love.

 

[Hilly]

because it pays better than other farm enterprises.

8k a year is hardly life changing, but wielding and running a chain saw every week lighting and stokeing a fire could be life changing.

 

[Frodo]

please share the costings

Which Ones?

Penmoel rekons on £8000 per year, which is roughly what suppliers have quoted me. (As I have said above not entirely confident about the RHI)

£20000 might buy you 20 store cattle. I very much doubt if the margin on finishing cattle is £400, otherwise I might do it.

£20,000 would buy you a fairly old tractor. Even if it ran on fresh air and never broke down I would have to sit in it for 400 hours to make £8000.

£20000 would buy you 2 acres, if I could make £4000/acre I wouldn't be worrying about the cost of heating the house.

That said I am still open minded and still need to be convinced. You know what they say about if things look too good to be true.

 

[roscoe erf]

make life easier for your selfs
obviously livestock need daily care but why make work for yourselves unnecessary

8k a year is hardly life changing, but wielding and running a chain saw every week lighting and stokeing a fire could be life changing.

and you two are from up north