RedScare Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 You gonna be ok Red? Got enough blankets and all? Yeah, I have a somewhat similar situation to Niche. The thermostat is in a drafty cool hallway, so the heater keeps running. My bedroom and bath are actually hot. I may have just decided to stop working on my new garage in favor of replacement windows in the house, however. Oh, and I just found several leftover water pipe insulation tubes. Just finished wrapping the neighbor's pipes. Heading over to the other neighbor to see if they need one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sarahiki Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 Just curious-- what are people setting their thermostats at? I've had ours at about 68 for days. Shows how soft I've become, living here. In upstate NY we would turn it down to 58 at night to save money. Getting up in the a.m. was tough. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 I usually keep it at 67, but lately it has been at 68. Obviously, though, it has stayed at 64 all day, and probably will be there all weekend. Frankly, now that I've knocked much of the draft out, 64 isn't that bad...as long as I wear my sweats. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff8201 Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 It isn't till we get frigid temperatures and wind chills like this that you realize just how energy inefficient your windows are, and how many little hidden penetrations there are in your home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barracuda Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 Yeah, I have a somewhat similar situation to Niche. The thermostat is in a drafty cool hallway, so the heater keeps running. My bedroom and bath are actually hot. I may have just decided to stop working on my new garage in favor of replacement windows in the house, however. Don't forget that there's a tax credit available for replacing old windows with energy efficient ones through the end of 2010. Just curious-- what are people setting their thermostats at? I've had ours at about 68 for days. Shows how soft I've become, living here. In upstate NY we would turn it down to 58 at night to save money. Getting up in the a.m. was tough. I was keeping mine at 66 at day and 58 at night (with a space heater in the bedroom at night), but I raised it to 68 ahead of the cold snap and have left it there since. I'm afraid that if I lower it, the heater will never catch back up due to the colder temps. I am dreading my next electrical bill though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BryanS Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 I blew-in R-30 cellulose in the summer. Kept the house cool then, and warm now. Nothing beats a gas furnace. I feel sorry for anyone who has heat pumps or electrical resistance heating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Subdude Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 Just curious-- what are people setting their thermostats at? I've had ours at about 68 for days. Shows how soft I've become, living here. In upstate NY we would turn it down to 58 at night to save money. Getting up in the a.m. was tough. I don't have central heating (or AC, for that matter) so there's no thermostat to set. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sarahiki Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 OK, I'm in a bit of a panic this morning. The water coming out of the taps is brown. I can't see evidence of a burst pipe anywhere, but I don't know what this means. Is it a city water problem, or is it our house? My husband is away, I'm alone with the kids and I'm kind of freaking out... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heights2Bastrop Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 If a pipe has burst, chances are the water would not be running at all.It's a cool 10 degrees here in Bastrop at this moment. I have shut off the east wing of the house to save electricity. The west wing is one bedroom and bathroom which I am heating with two space heaters. I went to the kitchen earlier to get a bowl of cereal and thought my hands would get frostbitten. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sarahiki Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 Thanks H2B. I'm not in a panic anymore... I ran the water for a while and it's running clear. I think it's a reminder of what bad shape our pipes are in, though. It's a matter of time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtticaFlinch Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 I went by the San Felipe Target on my way home last night to pick up an additional space heater, and they were completely sold out. Every item was picked clean.I'd hate to see the gun section at the Academy in the event of a zombie attack. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sevfiv Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 We're keeping the thermostat around 68 (70 if it's shower time) and it runs intermittently (central air/gas furnace). It still feels colder than that in here, though. Also letting the faucets drip overnight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BryanS Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 ...all of you that have your thermostats set below 70... what's wrong with you guys? I thought you loved the Houston heat? Hot, hot, hot... You'd think you'd have your thermostats set on 80 or higher. The hotter, the better, right? But apparently not... which makes one wonder if you're secretly living in the closet, yearning - and LOVING - the cool temps...I see how it is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sevfiv Posted January 9, 2010 Share Posted January 9, 2010 I'm too much of a cheapskate to have it running constantly. I'll live with wearing a hoodie in the house for a couple weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HTX Posted January 10, 2010 Share Posted January 10, 2010 I spent Friday night on my boat, woke to see a thin sheet of ice covering a pretty big portion of the marina. I don't remember that happening at any time over the last 20 years.Tell me again why global warning is a bad thing? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fringe Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Made it through the weekend with no busted pipes and my two palms intact. The philodendron, however, is not a fan of the cold. Not a problem, though. I've been meaning to take a machete to that thing, and heavy trash day is this coming Monday. Worked out perfectly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highway6 Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Been living in the bedroom for most of the past month because our heater isn't strong enough to push heat all the way to the front of the house.It doesn't matter what we set it on.. 72 at night..76 when we wake up.. doesn't matter. It has to constantly be on to even keep the bedroom in the mid to high 60s. Living room.. We get home, it's in the 40s. We have a space heater... but we'll run it for hours at max and it's still hovering in the high 50s. It's also fun when we start the microwave, forgetting the space heater is on, and trip the circuit for half our unit.Just got my Dec elec bill... I'll be so glad when winter is behind us.. I've about had it up to here ( my nose ) with living in an older place.My wife and i wanted a rental with character.. with hardwood floors.. Well, we got what we wanted, a place that is half uninhabitable for 2 months. Go Away Winter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sevfiv Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Geez, that sucks! I have lived in rentals of all ages (though mostly 1 bed / bath sized) and never had that kind of heating failure (central, space, you name it). Have you talked to your landlord about better heating/insulation? Does he/she even care? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highway6 Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 (edited) Geez, that sucks! I have lived in rentals of all ages (though mostly 1 bed / bath sized) and never had that kind of heating failure (central, space, you name it). Have you talked to your landlord about better heating/insulation? Does he/she even care?Our hardwood floor has been freezing in the front of the house for the past month. Well, not freezing, but considerable colder than the bedroom.... the place was built in the 30s. Half the heat is escaping from the 80 yr old windows and half is escaping strait down to the crawl space.I emailed her today after i saw my elec bill.. I'm not sure what can be done. I don't think its just the inadequate heating unit size.. i think its also a duct and vent size issue.I may try the suggested duct tape at the window seams solution to see if that helps.Our last rental was equally as old, and only had two a/c only window units. Big difference though.. it was on the 2nd floor and about 100 sf smaller. We only had the one space heater that we switched from living room to bedroom throughout the day and we were reasonably comfortable all winter. Our current place is just a lemon.. a beautiful lemon. Edited January 11, 2010 by Highway6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtticaFlinch Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Been living in the bedroom for most of the past month because our heater isn't strong enough to push heat all the way to the front of the house.It doesn't matter what we set it on.. 72 at night..76 when we wake up.. doesn't matter. It has to constantly be on to even keep the bedroom in the mid to high 60s. Living room.. We get home, it's in the 40s. We have a space heater... but we'll run it for hours at max and it's still hovering in the high 50s. It's also fun when we start the microwave, forgetting the space heater is on, and trip the circuit for half our unit.Just got my Dec elec bill... I'll be so glad when winter is behind us.. I've about had it up to here ( my nose ) with living in an older place.My wife and i wanted a rental with character.. with hardwood floors.. Well, we got what we wanted, a place that is half uninhabitable for 2 months. Go Away Winter.Same thing with me. My wife and I are sleeping on our couches in the living room curled up next to the space heater since the place is drafty and the central heater is a pile of antique garbage. We don't have hardwood floors, but we do have a big sliding glass window that's an energy sieve. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fringe Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Made it through the weekend with no busted pipes and my two palms intact.  The philodendron, however, is not a fan of the cold.Not a problem, though.  I've been meaning to take a machete to that thing, and heavy trash day is this coming Monday.  Worked out perfectly.Yeah my philodendron isn't looking to great either. Although it's considerably smaller than yours. I tried to cover it along with a couple other tropicals but the dang covers blew off. Something tells me garden centers are going to be busy come spring.   Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Yeah my philodendron isn't looking to great either. Although it's considerably smaller than yours. I tried to cover it along with a couple other tropicals but the dang covers blew off. Something tells me garden centers are going to be busy come spring. Â Â Something tells me that the philodendron will come back with a vengeance. You can't kill that stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BryanS Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Same thing with me. My wife and I are sleeping on our couches in the living room curled up next to the space heater since the place is drafty and the central heater is a pile of antique garbage. We don't have hardwood floors, but we do have a big sliding glass window that's an energy sieve. Kerosene! Kerosene! Christ! There's no reason to be cold... other than you secretly like it... but other than that... http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200316420_200316420 23,000 BTU. $119. I guarantee, you put this thing in the middle of a 1/1, an efficiency, or any small apartment - built in any decade, drafts and all - you'll be toasty in no time. Those little fans with electric heating elements are no better than cheap hair dryers. Real heaters burn fuel... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mkultra25 Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 I'm pretty sure I have a duct issue of some sort, as the airflow out of the vent in our guest bedroom feels like it's about half of what it is in the master bedroom right next door. Since the guest room also has twice the number of original 60+ year old windows as the master, I'm glad that my mother-in-law was here over Christmas instead of the past week.We had our HVAC system completely replaced several years ago (new condenser, compressor, gas furnace, mostly new ductwork and insulation) after I got tired of repairing the previous near-antique system every year. Plumbing's a different story, as there are at least some original pipes under the crawlspace. I was concerned that we might have some problems this weekend, but fortunately nothing happened despite the subfreezing temps for extended periods of time. It did make me realize that I was lacking a meter key if I needed to shut off the water at the meter, something I've since rectified after a trip to Home Despot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtticaFlinch Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Kerosene! Kerosene! Christ! There's no reason to be cold... other than you secretly like it... but other than that... http://www.northernt...16420_200316420 23,000 BTU. $119. I guarantee, you put this thing in the middle of a 1/1, an efficiency, or any small apartment - built in any decade, drafts and all - you'll be toasty in no time. Those little fans with electric heating elements are no better than cheap hair dryers. Real heaters burn fuel... I'd actually gone to the Target on San Felipe on Friday night to pick something up (and yes, I looked through the camping supplies too), and they had been picked clean. I could have built a fire, but considering I don't have a fireplace, the smoke probably would have made the living room more unbearable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 Kerosene! Kerosene! Christ! There's no reason to be cold... other than you secretly like it... but other than that... http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200316420_200316420 23,000 BTU. $119. I guarantee, you put this thing in the middle of a 1/1, an efficiency, or any small apartment - built in any decade, drafts and all - you'll be toasty in no time. Those little fans with electric heating elements are no better than cheap hair dryers. Real heaters burn fuel... That's a pretty wimpy little getup at only 23,000 Btus. How about a REAL heater? Mr. Heater. 175,000 Btus of toasty goodness! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highway6 Posted January 11, 2010 Share Posted January 11, 2010 (edited) i have really dumb cats.. not sure if i'd be comfortable with them running around an open flame.Plus.. i read some of the reviews.. looks like you're still talking about $100-150 in fuel per month to run the thing.I may just duct tape those foam eggcrates into all my windows and enjoy ghetto cave living for the next month. Edited January 11, 2010 by Highway6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travelguy_73 Posted January 12, 2010 Share Posted January 12, 2010 After reading y'alls tales of woe with inadeate heat, I'm feeling a lot better about the POS units we have in our 70 y/o house (package unit for the first floor, split system for the second). We usually keep the heat around 69-70 during the day, and at 67 at night, and the units didn't seem to have to work hard to maintain those temps. I did curse the out-of-square front door framing for letting in frigid air, but then blessed the eastern and southern windows for letting in so much of the warm sun (open the shades while the sun was out, then close them to trap the warm air in the house). At times I actually had to turn the heat down! We just installed a Rinai tankless water heater, mounted on a wall outside, and worried about it getting too cold for the unit to operate properly, but it did just fine. The pipes did fine (dripped the front and rear spigots and kitchen sink), though the first night we forgot to drip the front and it was frozen the next morning. Now I won't get into all the plants we probably lost...gingers, cannas, and heathers galore. My spring annuals money is going to replacement plants for sure. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtticaFlinch Posted January 12, 2010 Share Posted January 12, 2010 That's a pretty wimpy little getup at only 23,000 Btus. How about a REAL heater? Mr. Heater. 175,000 Btus of toasty goodness!To be fair, those are British Thermal Units. Had they been American Thermal Units, 23,000 would feel like the surface of Mercury during the day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.