Speaking about hot...

[bikerdib]

We had a July cool front blow through so the last couple of days have been nice with dew points in the mid to upper 60% range and temps around 90° but today is the last day of that.

This weekend the winds are going to turn back around from the southeast like normal for here which will bring the humidity from the Gulf back in raising the dew points back into the 70% range. That will make the 95°+ temps feel more like 105° to 110°.

I have to say though, I grew up here and 95° is normal for this time of year. I get a real kick out of the local media harping about the feel like temps instead of actual numbers. It would not be that unusual to have temps in the upper 90 or even 100 with this same humidity. The entire area around Houston is getting too crowded so like the saying goes, if you can't take the heat, get out... LOL

 

[SidecarFlip]

It's supposed to get warm here over the next 5 days or so, then cool back down a bit.

That's an extremely good price on propane. I only use it for cooking, small 50 gallon or whatever.

Like most in the northeast, I heat with #2 fuel oil, and a supplemental wood pellet stove.

I know that propane is expensive out your way for some unknown reason. Our good friends that live in Stockton Springs, Maine, he worked as a delivery driver for many years so he get the 'employee price' on his, bu it's still appreciably higher than here.

He heats with wood with a fuel oil backup but his rental apartment (attached to the house) is on propane. He rents in via AirBNB and does quite well but then he's midway between Bangor and Bar Harbor so it's a 'touristy' location.

He's booked solid through October.

Pellets seem to be pretty much standard priced everywhere. I think (cannot remember exactly) but last season I paid around 300 bucks a skid on pre-buy. My issue with pellets is the quality. Some are good, some are terrible. I try to get Lignetics or Michigan Hardwood if I can and when field corn is cheap (not this year), I mix 50% field corn and 50% pellets. Corn burns much hotter but you need a multi-fuel stove to run it. I tried cherry pits, no good and pelletized switch grass (not much better).

Not sure what pellets will be at this year, have to wait and see.

Back when propane was high, we were running all pellets. 5 ton a year. That is a lot of bags of pellets and a lot of stove cleanouts plus the mid year vent pipe cleanout too.

My vent goes through the wall and vertically over the roof, about 20 feet.

 

[D2Cat]

I just received the paperwork for a winter contract for propane and the price is $1.49. The will prefill now until Sept for .99.

It would pay to have two 500 gal tanks interconnected. Have them both filled, shut one off and have your own reserve. Then really take advantage of the prefill price and never have a concern like about 10 years ago when propane went to over $5 a gallon.

 

[troverman]

For the last several years, a ton of pellets is $250 in NH. This year, it's $219 so far. These are the better Energex pellets. I won't bother with the junk brands.

Fuel oil price sometimes matches the price of off-road diesel, which it is, and sometimes costs quite a bit more to cover delivery. Since I have a transfer tank in the bed of my truck, if there's a decent price differential I often fill my tank with off-road and then pump it into my furnace tank in the basement.

 

[bikerdib]

Wait, wasn't this topic "Speaking about hot"? I cannot even think about heating yet. But on that subject, about 6 years ago I had an efficient wood burning stove installed in my living room. I then installed a blower system in the attic that draws heat from above the stove and blows it into the most northern room. This keeps the entire house warm. My house is all electric and heating it in the winter before the wood stove was the most expensive time of year. Now, I seldom turn the central electric heat on.