how much oil per day

Live/Learn

Hi there , Due to the price of fuel oil here on Long Island I have taken every avenue to squeeze every drop of heat out of each drop of oil. My question is how many gallons per day should I be using? I,m heating a 1200sg ft home built in 1960 with updated windows and some added insulation in the attic. I have plugged and caulked all visible air leaks. I have a Burnham V83 forced hot water monoflo finned heating system. I also have a stand alone Bock hot water heater. I live on the eastern tip of Long Island. I realize that there are a lot of varibles so all I'm looking for is a guestiment. Oh I keep the heat at 66 degrees during the day and set back to 60 overnight. From November thru January I burnt 2.5 gals per day on average for heat and domestic hot water. Is this about right?

Thanks, Live/Learn

Al Gregory

I live in a 3000sq ft home just south of boston and I used about 700 gallons last year for heat and hot water with a similar system but my house is 2 years old with 2*6 framing
I keep the heat set at 68 during the day and 64 at night when we go to bed

michael_15

is your home efficient?

Try http://hes.lbl.gov. I've found it to be pretty good. You can use the input price for oil per gallon to translate from the energy costs they provide into gallons of usage, if you want.

-Michael

Weezbo

not knowing how many people or thier commings and..

goings,and a coupla few other variables i'd guess on a tight home of the 60's in your neck of the woods any where from 3 gallons a day downwards to probably 2.3...that would just be a guess...a home about three times that size might expend a similar useage were it built recently with triple pane low E vynil windows and best building practices and the guy with the sharp pencil installing the heating system ....and the surrounding terrain and the buildings orientation and designe.as a guess.

Jimmy Gillies

Insulation.

Hi Live/Learn,
Sorry it's costing you so much to heat your home, perhaps you could try to insulate your walls more?

My partner and I are just finished an extention(addition) to our home and all the insulation for the project only cost £280.00, a very, very small part of the overall project cost.
We put glasswool insulation to Building Regulation standards(codes)as follows:
10'' in attic.(wear a hat)
6'' in walls.(a big coat)
6'' under ground floor.(two pair of socks)

It's a case of 'supply and demand', we can pay £6.50 for a good quality TRV - cause lots are fitted.

I hope that's some help.
Regards.
Jimmy Gillies Scotland.

Joe Brix

@2.5 gal/day

over a six month heating season, that's less then 500 gals which I think is very good. The first half of this heating season was mild, so you could probably expect some very cold years to hit 3 or 4 gal/day. I would look more to getting into a fuel buying group and getting fixed pricing. Many people are paying under $2/gal while the retail price is around $2.30 this time of the season. I locked in at $1.85 and some are paying even less. Only problem is your usage is low and many co-op's and buying groups require 700 gal/yr. Checkout www.clickableoil.com
I would get a one year contract in the sumer when the retail price is at it's lowest.

Fred Harwood

Fuel use

Less than 5 gallons a day is pretty good for winter heating and hot water. How did you calculate you use? Hopefully not by the tank guage.

Constantin

Your home is very efficient, it seems

You're currently using 2.5 Gallons of #2 per day, which is about 350kBTU input. Given an 80% efficient boiler, that corresponds to about 280kBTU DOE output.

Accounting for home size, I get 233 BTU/(ft² x day). Over a 24 hour period that corresponds to 9.7 BTU/(ft² x hour). Conversely, if we assume that these results were achieved on a 70 degree day basis, we get 3.3 BTU/(ft² x DD)

As best as I can tell, your home is very energy efficient. To get better feedback, visit energystar.gov and have them subsidize a blower-door test for you.

Mijola

Oil per day

You're doing pretty good. I also live on long island 1900 sq. feet, 2 zones both kept at 70, also heat my hot water with seperate oil fired hot water heater. I go thru about 5 to 6 gallons per day when it gets really cold 10- 30 degrees.

Live/Learn

fuel usage on LI

Thanks for all your replies . I was surprised to hear from someone from Scotland but I guess my thirftiness came through as I'm part Scottish. Also to answer Weezbo's questions we are only two living in the home with an occassional grandchild in and out. About the insullation in the home. If it's like the stuff in the attic which was some kind of fiberglass but not like the stuff they use today it's pretty lousy as it seemed to compress a lot. I figured my usage by the amount after fill-ups then divided by 30. I used about 725 gals last season. This was from Jan.'04 through Jan.'05. Thanks again, Live/Learn

Ron Schroeder_2

Go over to Lowes and get a bunch of bales of cellulose and the blower and add more insulation into the attic. Not only will the cellulose help your heating bill a little more per inch than fiberglass, it will help even more in the summer since cellulose is opaque to radiant heat unlike fiberglass which is almost transparent to radiant heat.

For keeping track of fuel usage, I often just put a simple 115 volt runtime meter across the burner. Fuel usage is aproximatly the runtime multiplied by the GPH that the burner is set up for.

Ron