I had a miracle heater. It was called a wood stove. Wood can heat you up 3 times. 1: when you cut and split it. 2: when you carry it in. 3: when you burn it. 🤣🤣🤣🔥🤭
After the freeze in Texas, we invested in a small wood stove. Our two storied home has a fireplace, but it never really heated our home. The new wood stove is awesome. It is vented out the back, through the fireplace. That little wood stove heats the entire first floor in no time, and I can cook on it. A total win, win.
@@charlottewalker6490 yes. Look at the big buddy heater and buy a carbon monoxide alarm for safety. I bought a big buddy heater, the hose adapter where I can hook it up to a 20 pound tank
When one of my Amish friends rebuilt the house he lives in now, he had under-floor radiant heat installed throughout the entire house. The heat is generated with a propane boiler. This is one of the most comfortably warm houses I have ever been in.
I did that in my old house. I will definitely do it again if I build a new one. It's amazing. I would love to be able to hook it up to solar and/or wood.
@@janchampine1899 you can, I believe they make a 12 v water heater element, drill a hole in the tank, insert element, and hook up your panel. or charge battery with solar, use inverter to make 110, use conventional water heater element.
One of the VERY best heating systems in my opinion!! As far as their fireplaces, if they'd just add a glass front to it, they'd have the same effect as a wood stove but have the added bonus of some light.
I see them in the same corner as boy scouts or certain kinds of preppers, as bad as that might sound. But there is a lot to be said for self-reliance, as an individual or as a small community. And not relying on complex tech goes a long way towards that. I love technology... but my dad taught me to know how to go without.
I am very religious, but i agree they have good ideas on family, and a slower way of life. The amish and I would disagree on many things in the bible but not on the way they live. I like my cowboy hats with a little curve in them... lol
Amish really aren't religious either. It's more like a club, they agree to live primitive and that's about it. They not too nice or have morals as high as you would expect
If the rest of the world would start working to live like the Amish we would be a bulletproof society. Most people these days don’t even know how to start a wood stove. Our youth will not be able fend for themselves
I grew up in a 1910 Farm Victorian home. The home has no exterior decoration. The heat was base board hot water but only on the first floor. The 2nd floor was heated by the stairway and vents in the floor that let the hot air rise from the 1st floor. The bedrooms stayed comfortable during the cold Northern Missouri winters.
This home is so simple and beautiful !! I once saw a stove that ran on dry corn in an Amish store. It was awesome. America for the most part has forsaken the old ways.
There are over 300 million people in this country. Wood stoves are fine for country folk, but the masses have to do with fuel other than wood and corn. In my day, coal was the fuel we used in the city. At 95, I have a wood stove that I love dearly. Also a fuel oil furnace, used when I'm not able to carry in the wood.
There is a reason most of us of a band, and these approaches to heating. In my home I press a button to set my temperature and I never think about it or spend any effort on it. You can keep your corn stove.
@@patty109109 I have a button too but what happens when the button doesn't work that night or the next or the next ? Then the cell phone doesn't work. Buttons are great as long as you are ready for the day they're not. Nothing is a sure thing in this world now. Just be safe and sure you and your family will be ok. God Speed and safety to you and yours.
@patty109109 some.of us can't afford gas all the time and if your like me with 4 kids who they shut the gas off on the night before school you'd be fed up too, they wait til it's cold to shut off gas
Back in the 60s , I remember having a wood stove in our living room, kitchen area and i use to sit in front of the Wood Stove after i came home from sledding. The Upstairs of our house we used are winter coats to cover the bedroom windows ,i slepted in the hallway by the stairs and i could feel the heat coming from downstairs,I miss being a kid back then, we were poor,but felt Safe and loved my parents.
As a Mennonite we use wood stove and electric heater and coal to heat up our homes. In the winter time my dad would use the wood stove to cook breakfast and lunch and dinner and hot up to tea pot for his coffee in the morning.
@adamcoe do a Google search on the difference between Amish and Mennonite. They have some similarities but are different in ways as well. Google is your friend 👍
@@adamcoe Actually yes, I was puzzled by the battery lights there in the picture. I thought they were not supposed to use electricity. But maybe they warm up to electricty, using PV to generate electricity is definitely way more environmental friendly than burning gas, while I do not know the mennonite religion very well (I hope I can change that, my aunt in Pennsylvania has mennonite neighbours and I want to fly over and visit her in sujmmer), I guess PVs would be right along their angle especially for things like light which combined with batteries would make sense!
Their home architecture also helps with heat dispersal. The large central room, wide doorways, even the stair placement helps heat move about the house. Our friends also have an airlock entryway front and back to knock down outside air and heat loss. The back door one also has an open bathroom/mudroom design that allows the hot water to humidify the house and disperse the water heat. Pretty ingenious actually.
Our seperate summer cook kitchen has the old heat stove as it was converted into a guest room. The family is long gone now. Ive spent many years in a trailer on Blue Mountain in Pennsylvania with no water, heat or electric in the winter. On the coldest nights...I would just sleep in my car. I'm not paying 500.00 plus dollars a month to heat this old farmhouse with the new HVAC system It's been a good winter outside of the Christmas freeze. It's 42° on the porch tonight Just the way I like it Johnny in Coopersburg PA
I lived in the free state of Bavaria as a child, near Switzerland. The common space like the living room, with the bathroom being in a close proximity, was heated by a wood stove, we also wore pajamas and warm slippers or socks . Our bedrooms had no heat, and the windows were actually left slightly open!
@@jameslong1644No, to allow fresh air in. If you sleep with your bedroom door and window fully closed, by the morning the air will be stale and have a high c02 level, making you wake up feeling groggy. Try sleeping with your window cracked open a bit, you genuinely wake up fresher.
I live in a similar climate and I've always slept with the window open in winter. Usually it's better but frankly sometimes the air outside is not so good either. In summer I need air conditioning to sleep (60°F) most nights. And other nights the pollen or smoke gets too much (specially in recent years).
Yes that was the old central european rural way of surviving the winter, there was one central stove in the living room and also one in the kitchen for cooking or sometimes kitchen alone which was close to the living room, the heat distribution was that it went basically from the living room upwards and usually the bedrooms were not heated. This was enough to get through the winter while minimizing the need for firewood. We do not have that system anymore of course and have abandoned it for a long time, but really old houses sometimes still have it. Btw. better houses had heating vents just like displayed in the video to distribute the heat, city homes in the 19th centuries had several smaller stoves distributed over the house!
We heat our home with a fireplace equipped with a boiler. A low power circulation pump circulates water throughout the lower level of the home to radiators. The upper two levels use in floor radiant heat. In order to control water temperature to the upper levels there are several heat exchangers that isolate the 90°C water used in the radiators from the 40°C max temperature needed for the radiant heat. This fireplace / boiler is made in Italy and does have an electronic brain to regulate air flow into the closed burn chamber. This system draws cold dense outside air into the burn chamber instead of pulling heated air out of the home. To heat a 200sq meter home it can use up to 10 metric tons of wood in a very cold damp winter. The system also heats water for the home as well but the water heater also is solar powered, on sunny winter days it provides enough hot water for evening showers and doing dishes. It’s an equivalent size to your homes 40 gallon water heater.
@@mikezisk5009 we utilize a line interactive UPS from EATON Industries as backup power. With the 9 amp hour battery that comes with it we get about 110minutes of backup. However I use instead two 12 volt 100 amp hour batteries in it that gives me at least six hours time. This is enough to fire up the generator and charge the batteries by supplying line voltage back to the UPS. The only thing the UPS runs is a circulation pomp that draws about 110 watts as well as the logic controller on the fireplace that draws only a few amps in standby and around 6amps max when it operates the air damper to the supply air.
In my " Dawdy Haus" i have a fireplace woodstove insert that is mounted on a freestanding stone and cement block pedestal and the exhaust fan mounted underneath blows the heated air from the double walled stove down thru the floor into the ductwork to distribute heated air to all of the rooms, I Heat, cook meals and heat water and dry clothes with the stove. And i have a heat pump that runs off of solar panels that heats mostly down to 40 degrees. My lights are either solar powered string lights or wall mounted crane type oil lanterns. (8) and natural window light in daytime.
How did you get your stove situated that way? I'd like to have something like that in my house. I have a wood stove in my basement, but it isn't attached to any ductwork or anything. My house is heated by a traditional gas furnace. When we burn wood in the basement stove, it makes the basement nice and toasty and it does help to heat the rest of the house, and it warms the water coming from the bathroom sink because it's right under the pipe, but that's it. We also have a second larger stove upstairs, but we only use it on particularly cold nights.
@@Melissa0774 Where i placed the stove in the middle of the big room just happened to sit over the main ductwork under the floor and i just bought sheet metal duct angle pieces to direct the heat from the front of the stove down into the main duct and the blower forces it thru the lines to the rooms. You can connect any ductwork to a stove or wood furnace with a blower setup like a fireplace insert. The woodstove has a double steel liner inside.
@@Melissa0774 Where i placed the stove in the middle of the big room just happened to sit over the main ductwork under the floor and i just bought sheet metal duct angle pieces to direct the heat from the front of the stove down into the main duct and the blower forces it thru the lines to the rooms. You can connect any ductwork to a stove or wood furnace with a blower setup like a fireplace insert. The woodstove has a double steel liner inside.
The company That I work for had a contract to make cabinet parts for the "Amish heater". When we had seen the ad for the heater, it was the biggest laugh of the day!!!
We went to an Amish Christmas party one year and they were using their cookstove as a heater and omg it really worked well! That whole house was HOT! I learned fast that if you visit the Amish in winter dress light lol.
Excellent video Erik.. When i was a kid, i used to haul split wood in the basement and feed the wood stove. I would wash my clothes and hang them up in the basement, and they would dry very fast. An old Amish trick i learned as a kid. Brings back a lot of memories. Keep the cool video coming!
Here in Seattle, I let clothing hang on the clothesline until it dries. Sometimes that can take 2-3 days, and I may wait longer than that to find a suitable period of days where it doesn't rain and where such a technique will work. Hanging clothing indoors as you describe will indeed allow them to dry, but you are consuming firewood to accomplish that. Still, what works in Seattle may not work in the severer climate of Amish country. But since it can work in Seattle, I try to use that method to dry my clothes. I prefer that to using the gas dryer I have, which maybe gets used once a year, and has been used zero times so far this winter! Managing to dry clothing outdoors in the winter makes life just a bit of an adventure, and I also call it a hobby. Any moron can dry clothes in a gas dryer. It takes a small measure of skill and planning to dry your clothes outdoors during the winter time. (No insult intended to my friends who are morons...)
@@SeattlePioneer I agree and also have a clothes dryer, but if the Amish get caught drying clothes with a clothes dryer, they'll be whipped by the bearded elders wearing funny hats. They take that sht serious. I used to date a girl whose Mom was Amish. They caught her sneaking off the farm to watch a movie, and she was banished from her family for life. She had to pack up and leave the cult the next day, and never saw her family again. They're a bunch of hypocrites. On one hand they say driving a car is a sin, but they're allowed to drive tractors. The cult says no phones in their homes, but many of them used to have a pay phone booth installed just outside their fence. This was back around 30 years ago when they still had pay phones.
I grew up in the rural midwest and our home had radiant ceiling heat (which was completely useless) but we also had two stoves. My dad would get them so hot at night that they would glow a deep orange/red. By morning all that was left was warm coals. I remember sitting on the small stove while I ate my cereal in the morning. It was the perfect temperature by then! And while our rooms could get chilly since they didn't have direct access to the radiant heat of the fire places...the house was toasty.
While I was looking for a house a few years ago, I lived in an unelectrified cabin from April to August. Outside of candles, battery-operated lanterns, flashlights and headlamp, there were three propane-fed ceiling lamps. I hardly ever used them after May because they did give off a lot of heat! But the oil-drum wood-burning stove was perfect for when the weather was still cold. Because I worry about fires, I have no hearths, wood stoves, space heaters or candles in the house I finally found and bought.
My Mom bought me one of those Amish heaters when they first came out. It broke fairly quickly and since it was under warranty, we got another one for free. But the new one also broke after a year or two of use. The woodwork was nice, but the heating element was a piece of junk, imo.
Not certain but the internal heating mechanism might've been infrared technology. And you had to frequently check the venting areas for dust build-up & wipe them clean, otherwise the heater quickly burned out. Many customers learned this too late, unfortunately.
You would have saved yourselves a lot of money by buying a 20 dollar electric heater. The secret to making electric heaters last a long time is to never ever run them on high. A low or medium heat setting is better for the heater and for your wallet.
All electric heaters are maxed at 1500 watts. Basically all the same. I’ve been in quite a few Amish homes and they are some of the most beautiful homes I’ve seen.
That coal stove you showed a picture of at the 28 second mark looks like a DS Anthra-Max which is made in Lancaster County by Amish. They have a reputation as being the best brand coal stove company in the industry.
The electric "Amish Heater" was based on a particular law. The electric heater would have to pass UL regulatory inspection if it was sold in the USA. But...if you bought the wooden cabinet, and the company threw in a free electric heater, they didn't have to pass inspection
They also advertised the heater used the moisture in the air to spread the heat (?). I asked what happens if the humidity in the house was low and just got blank stares.
It's ironic that the Amish were making electric heaters, because they think electricity is a sin. If they catch anyone in their cult flicking a light switch, it's banishment for life. If they're caught with a phone, its probably a good caning with 50 lashes by the bearded elders wearing funny hats.
Wood stove for out in country is the best. Only if you have wood, fire starters, and a clear vent pipe. You can keep a pot of water for moisture, and you can heat up canned soup. Fry eggs or scrambled. Bacon, and meat.
I used to have a forced air buck wood stove. That thing was really amazing, of course it had fans so it did require some electricity, but it was the most effective heat source I've used.
I remember the Amish heaters, we never had one though I remember my sister wanting one for our house, we had a fireplace but never used it as a heat source, in fact we almost never used it, LOL. When I lived back East we had an oil heater, it worked fine for our smaller home, but of course we had to keep up with oil deliveries and now on the West coast we have gas heat, it works great in our little home, but it's expensive. I don't know what the best way to heat is, but I'd think that for the Amish they wouldn't try to fix something that for them isn't broken and has served them well for a very long time. Thanks for more great information Erik.
Right, good point, and unlike us they are accounting for not only cost and effectiveness and availability, but also tradition and church rules. Glad you liked the vid!
the man in the ad for the amish heaters is actually amish..he is from holmes county ohio. he and his wife worked at a popular hotel in berlin ohio. i have known him for 25+ years, very sweet man..thx marie from 🇨🇦
That's great, yea I remember hearing that at least someone in those ads was actually Amish. The two women in the photos are wearing what looks like accurate Amish clothing as well for that area
I actually have 2 of those Amish fireplace heaters. I have one on right now. We like our bedrooms cool but our dining/livingroom open floor area stays nice and warm. When temperatures are in the 30's at night this heater keeps all 5 rooms warm.
Yoders are tricky when it comes to tech and business. One of the coolest lumber yards I was ever in was Keim lumber in Ohio. The pilgrims would ride their buggies to work. Pasture the horses and then go inside. There they would put on a bluetooth earpiece and sit down at a computer to fill orders all day.😂
I feel like this company took advantage of the Amish in their advertising. My Dad and brothers would build fireplace inserts, it became quite a side hustle. Thanks for another great video Erik. 👍
That was sort of my response way back then when this came out. At the same time Amish did cooperate with them in the manufacturing, which makes it more gray area in my view. Either way it was interesting to revisit this topic. Glad you liked the vid!
I bought two of those heat surge heaters years ago. I gave one away to one of the kids when I downsized but, I still have one and they work great for smaller spaces such as a single room. The mantle is Amish made, I was told and it is still beautiful, mine is cherry.
I'm not Amish but I have used all of these methods to heat my home, garage, or shop. I had a chimney built on to my house when I bought it and put in a wood stove. Later I installed a heat pump and duct work for AC and heat as the house was all electric baseboard. Propane infrared heaters are a good source for emergency or spot heating. Don't believe the marketing hype on all the electric heaters although a small heater can be used to spot heat for short times when it gets very cold. Premium heat is radiant hydronic any way you can get it.
Great video once again. How wonderful you get to stay with Amish friends. You certainly are dear to them. I am thankful there are not many (hope not) house fires with all these different types of heating sources. Maybe that isn’t even something of a worry but I don’t truly know. Can’t wait for your next video.
It's a good point you raise. I don't have statistics on Amish house (& building) fires, but they seem to happen often enough. I wouldn't be surprised if it was at a higher rate than non-Amish ones. And yes I am very grateful for my friendships with them!
The question of house fires is the very first thing that crossed my mind when the topic of gas lights was mentioned. It would be interesting to compare the incidence of house fires involving Amish homes as compared to State and National averages. There has to be a safer alternative. Some homes must be virtually “uninsurable” .
When your born & raised with these, all your life you learn about them, take them seriously. Have respect. I think here, not Amish, are not smart enough. Sorry, I mean not careful enough. How your brought up is what makes the difference. Like guns. Guns aren't dangerous, people are. Teach your children all about guns. They are not toys.
Those little fans have become a lot more available. We bought one years ago at Lehman's and have twice replaced the little heat-activated motor. We love it on our wood-burning stove. Cool video as always, Erik! Keep 'em comin'!
I have made a couple of payments on Lehman's Hardware, but they will not send me a key. I absolutely love that store, met Mr Lehman and his son Galen , never met Glenda yet, she always seems to be some where else. what really sold them to me was how they treat the customers, and back what they sell.
Does it run on a Sterling engine? That's quite neat. Those small fans do a lot to distribute the heat better. These days many people fit them to their radiators here, but those are of course electrical, activated by a mechanical thermostat switch.
We had a coal burning potbelly stove in a childhood home when I was a kid. To heat upstairs, there was a floor vent in each bedroom. I never noticed much difference, especially when it got really cold out. We all had a couple heavy quilts to sleep under, which kept us warm. Getting out of bed in the morning was no fun because we had to put on freezing cold clothes and our shoes were frozen and hard to put on. I dreaded getting out of bed!!
i am buying an Amish made home, Not sure why they have battery lights but I am going to have to deal with no A/C power for a little while. It is going to be a great time I am sure. Gas stove, Gas frig, and wood stove sound fun to me.
Great video Erik. If you get a chance to be in the Gordonville PA area you should check out DS stoves and talk with those folks. Amish made wood and coal stoves. In this video you showed several shots of DS stoves in homes.
I looked at a Amish made wood stove, and did not buy it cause they could not or did not care to try to get a UL listing, my house insurance is void if some thing happened because of a non ul listed appliance.
I know that those Amish Heaters that were on sale years ago. As far as I remember the Amish just built the wooden box, and my parents had bought 1 because of the sale they had of buy one get one for free. They really do work great, and I know that this part is kinda off topic, but I’ve gotten to know a few Amish folks from when I was doing some Union Boilermaker work in Ohio and Kentucky. They had an Amish store/shop that a few families were all partners in. They sold everything from Quilts, Ice Cream, Jams & Jelly and a lot of Amish made furniture. The ones I’d gotten to know were New Order Amish, and their bishop was pretty progressive. They still didn’t drive and the kids dolls were faceless, but on the other hand they were allowed to use power tools that was ran on a Propane Generator, and also allowed them to use solar power because the Bishop believed that the Sun was a gift to them from god. The sons who were close to my age at that time told me that the old order Amish had some bad problems that new order Amish didn’t believe was right. The store they owned I would stop there 1 time a week to buy something’s they sold an I probably spent a few thousand dollars in the store. I was telling them about my Cajun side of the family that I felt they would get along with. Because some of my Cajun family members lived a lot like them except on house boats they built, and made their money from hunting, trapping, fishing, and shrimping. An on a whole just wanted to be left alone by the government, and felt that living the same way our ancestors did hundreds of years ago. Also all of them are practicing Catholics. The Amish respected them for how they lived. I told them how my youngest brother and sister in-law would be having a kid in 3 months. They surprised me with a gift for them. It was a hand crafted rocking chair made using Mahogany wood, and gave it to them for free no matter how many times I tried to pay them for it the refused any money for it. That was back right after hurricane Katrina had hit us in New Orleans, and it’s still in use and will be handed down when my nephew gets married. I don’t know how much it would have cost but I was willing to give them 400 bucks for it
It is work, but so gratifying! Cooking on a woodstove and drying clothes and wet boots and gloves is a bonus. No better way to heat! That heat just "soaks" into everything.
I still have two Amish heaters. The first original large one. Which I need a lightbulb for. And the smaller version. We use them every winter. Cuts our bill by half compared to our neighbors. And with the new increased energy cost right now in 2023. Our bill is less than their bill by more than half right now. So when you say so-called Amish heater. I don’t care who made them they work and they’re saving us a ton of money right now.
No vid but I have done a couple of articles/posts, including one with an interview of an Amish bird feeder maker in Indiana: amishamerica.com/amish-bird-houses-feeders-indiana/
Butte Montana in a mobile home, wood stove cooking and heat first one up in morning gets the fire going. Door handle would be frozen solid, icicles on the inside of the wall from condensation. Fun stuff.
That lil fan that spins when placed on a firebox is actually electric , it uses a thermocouple called a pleiter effect plate that generates electricity when it has heat applied to 1 side and a heat sink to another .
I was born in southern Victoria Australia and I still live there now , I don't use house heating nor air conditioning and the winter temps are anywhere from -1 -2 deg C to 12-16deg C in winter and 12deg to 36deg C in the summer , average would be 18-25deg most of the time . But I believe if you can't live comfortably where you were born just by putting on more clothes or taking them off then there is something wrong with you and artificially controlling temperatures is making you weak and sickly .
I live in Northern Michigan, and grew up in a home that only had a space heater, too. Now in my 70's, I shut off the bedroom heat vent, because I still can't sleep well in a warm room.
@@kibblenbits I''m with you. I like a cool bedroom. In the summer, as a kid, I would sleep on our front porch in the cool. Small town, no crime to speak of. Miss it.
I used to have a wood stove. It didnt seem to heat very good. I love the spicy smell of fruit wood. My dad used to burn black cherry and that wood screamed. I had a hard time with that when i was little. I got divorced from my abusive hubby and had to abandon the wood stove. I was the one who split, carried, stacked and fed the stove ...that ole orge that was never satisfied. the wood husband cut. I do miss it. There is nothing like the work out of cutting wood and with a different wood stove....no better and satisfying heat as the wood stove. Id love to go back to one but im 63.. disabled and have no man. Been my choice but i miss the wood heat!
Awesome video buddy! I plan on going to an Mennonite community in Floyd Virginia This Weekend! I’m very excited I’m not sure what type of Mennonites they are but I know they are Mennonite! I’m gonna visit a store called “Bread Basket” it’s a bulk foods store and I’ve heard its great
So happy to hear you say: Fire places are NOT the most efficient ways to heat a home (THANK YOU) they are not! the heat stoves are the best option so far however, there is the concern on "fumes" such as Carbon Monoxide so careful with theat
I bought a similar electric fireplace 12 years ago for our sunroom we made into a temporary bedroom for an adult child that briefly needed a place. Ran the heater 8-10 hours every evening. Our first month electric bill once using it was $175 above our normal bill. Never use it any longer.
yup that's about right...a big money suck...just running the regular central heat, costs way too much as well, really, all electric heaters, no matter what the source, are designed to be a money pit just like most things we "own" (cars, appliances, etc.) whether it's from usage, repairs, or some kind of insurance that is required to allegedly own it, it's really more like they OWN US
What about insulation in floors, walls and ceilings? These are very effective ways to reduce heating needs. Thermopane windows too, but they are far less economical since they are much less effective at reducing heat losses, and far more expensive per square inch.
I still have one of those Amish heaters my dad bought two at a discount and gave me one still works but I really don’t use it built a cabinet around it more lime a furniture piece than heater.
My husband put a wood stove in the basement and makes the vents in the floor 3 vents and the fan this work good we not using oils this winter happy have A ranch house
Check out mason stoves / heaters. Long internal exhausts burn the smoke; preventing smoke (once up to temp), keeping the heat inside and yielding more work from the wood. (A bit less ash too if I remember correctly.)
Fireplaces are inefficient because the draft that keeps the fire burning pulls the heat up the chimney. It will be warm near the fire, and near the chimney, but the heat won't spread as far into the room as it does with a freestanding heater or stove. I live in the South. Heat downstairs will usually heat the upstairs to some extent, because hot air rises. I have Amish neighbors who keep their woodburning ranges lit all winter, but cook outside on a porch in hot weather. I never visited them at night (or, to be fair, in the winter, except to the woodlot where they sell bark slabs for home heating,) so idk if they use propane or other fuels to augment their heating. I do know they use old-timey kerosene/oil lamps, but I don't see why they wouldn't use LEDs. I don't think they're a vanity; I would think it would depend on whatever saves the most money and is the most practical. I'm an "English," so there's a lot idk. And our neighbors are Swartzentruber, so they may do things differently than other orders.
People don't understand how to heat their homes with a wood fireplace. You need fans to circulate the heat around your home... Plus, Add a little moisture and or crack open some windows.... We did it back in the days!
Propane heaters in doors can easily put dangerous amounts of Co2 in the air. That's not suppose to be a long term solution for indoor heat, and I doubt Amish use them for any long periods of time.
A fireplace will actually create a slight vacuum inside your house causing cold air to be pulled through every nook and cranny of every window and wall.
This goes for all heating systems that use the room's air for their combustion. You can avoid it by using a furnace/boiler/heater that uses not just a flue for the exhaust, but also an air channel for the air inlet. This has the additional benefit of being much safer, because no toxic gases can escape into the house as long as the inlet and exhaust channels are air tight. In the Netherlands, this has been the standard for about 2 decades. Hardly any central heating system that uses the air in the room for combustion are still in existence.
A compromise if you can't afford to get a modern, efficient system that uses the outside air, is to neatly seal up the boiler room, and feed air from outside straight into the boiler room via ducts. Ask a proper hvac engineer for the correct size and number. Too small and you choke the furnace, creating carbon monoxide! This is also the reason why you can't use "open" fuel burning devices in an air tight house.
![Safe Indoor DIY Heater [ Cheap, Effective ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kdq3_MOPNgs/mqdefault.jpg)
I had a miracle heater. It was called a wood stove. Wood can heat you up 3 times. 1: when you cut and split it. 2: when you carry it in. 3: when you burn it. 🤣🤣🤣🔥🤭
Don't forget #4 when you cook with it, and : #5 when you eat a nice, hot meal, cooked with/by the wood burning stove.
🤣🤣🗣FACTS!!🤣🤣
You forgot stacking it.
@@sandasturner9529 and when you compost the ashes
@@savannahsmiles1797 lol?
After the freeze in Texas, we invested in a small wood stove. Our two storied home has a fireplace, but it never really heated our home. The new wood stove is awesome. It is vented out the back, through the fireplace. That little wood stove heats the entire first floor in no time, and I can cook on it. A total win, win.
So you can use propane to light and heat your home??? Did I hear that right?
I’m curious, have you tried bowing up and farting into your wood stove and slamming it shut?
@@charlottewalker6490not from the person who's post or comment you commented on. They didn't mention anything about propane or natural gas.
@@meowmeow5052very funny, grasshopper.
@@charlottewalker6490 yes. Look at the big buddy heater and buy a carbon monoxide alarm for safety. I bought a big buddy heater, the hose adapter where I can hook it up to a 20 pound tank
When one of my Amish friends rebuilt the house he lives in now, he had under-floor radiant heat installed throughout the entire house. The heat is generated with a propane boiler. This is one of the most comfortably warm houses I have ever been in.
That does sound really cozy!
I did that in my old house. I will definitely do it again if I build a new one. It's amazing. I would love to be able to hook it up to solar and/or wood.
@@janchampine1899 you can, I believe they make a 12 v water heater element, drill a hole in the tank, insert element, and hook up your panel. or charge battery with solar, use inverter to make 110, use conventional water heater element.
One of the VERY best heating systems in my opinion!! As far as their fireplaces, if they'd just add a glass front to it, they'd have the same effect as a wood stove but have the added bonus of some light.
To think the roman in UK 2000 years ago used hypercaust underfloor heating
I am not religious at all but am starting to appreciate the Amish way of life more and more
I see them in the same corner as boy scouts or certain kinds of preppers, as bad as that might sound. But there is a lot to be said for self-reliance, as an individual or as a small community. And not relying on complex tech goes a long way towards that. I love technology... but my dad taught me to know how to go without.
I am very religious, but i agree they have good ideas on family, and a slower way of life. The amish and I would disagree on many things in the bible but not on the way they live. I like my cowboy hats with a little curve in them... lol
Amish really aren't religious either. It's more like a club, they agree to live primitive and that's about it. They not too nice or have morals as high as you would expect
If the rest of the world would start working to live like the Amish we would be a bulletproof society. Most people these days don’t even know how to start a wood stove. Our youth will not be able fend for themselves
Same here. I'll be glad to do it with community not religion.
I grew up in a 1910 Farm Victorian home. The home has no exterior decoration. The heat was base board hot water but only on the first floor. The 2nd floor was heated by the stairway and vents in the floor that let the hot air rise from the 1st floor. The bedrooms stayed comfortable during the cold Northern Missouri winters.
This home is so simple and beautiful !! I once saw a stove that ran on dry corn in an Amish store. It was awesome. America for the most part has forsaken the old ways.
Burning corn for heat is ridiculous in my book but some genius made a way to do it.
There are over 300 million people in this country. Wood stoves are fine for country folk, but the masses have to do with fuel other than wood and corn. In my day, coal was the fuel we used in the city. At 95, I have a wood stove that I love dearly. Also a fuel oil furnace, used when I'm not able to carry in the wood.
There is a reason most of us of a band, and these approaches to heating.
In my home I press a button to set my temperature and I never think about it or spend any effort on it. You can keep your corn stove.
@@patty109109 I have a button too but what happens when the button doesn't work that night or the next or the next ? Then the cell phone doesn't work. Buttons are great as long as you are ready for the day they're not. Nothing is a sure thing in this world now. Just be safe and sure you and your family will be ok. God Speed and safety to you and yours.
@patty109109 some.of us can't afford gas all the time and if your like me with 4 kids who they shut the gas off on the night before school you'd be fed up too, they wait til it's cold to shut off gas
Back in the 60s , I remember having a wood stove in our living room, kitchen area and i use to sit in front of the Wood Stove after i came home from sledding.
The Upstairs of our house we used are winter coats to cover the bedroom windows ,i slepted in the hallway by the stairs and i could feel the heat coming from downstairs,I miss being a kid back then, we were poor,but felt Safe and loved my parents.
The Chinese diesel heaters are really nice, along with the Big Buddy heater but nothing beats a wood stove!
As a Mennonite we use wood stove and electric heater and coal to heat up our homes. In the winter time my dad would use the wood stove to cook breakfast and lunch and dinner and hot up to tea pot for his coffee in the morning.
As a Mennonite how do you explain getting to use electricity? Or come to think of it...TH-cam?
@adamcoe do a Google search on the difference between Amish and Mennonite. They have some similarities but are different in ways as well.
Google is your friend 👍
@@adamcoe Actually yes, I was puzzled by the battery lights there in the picture. I thought they were not supposed to use electricity. But maybe they warm up to electricty, using PV to generate electricity is definitely way more environmental friendly than burning gas, while I do not know the mennonite religion very well (I hope I can change that, my aunt in Pennsylvania has mennonite neighbours and I want to fly over and visit her in sujmmer), I guess PVs would be right along their angle especially for things like light which combined with batteries would make sense!
Their home architecture also helps with heat dispersal. The large central room, wide doorways, even the stair placement helps heat move about the house. Our friends also have an airlock entryway front and back to knock down outside air and heat loss. The back door one also has an open bathroom/mudroom design that allows the hot water to humidify the house and disperse the water heat. Pretty ingenious actually.
Our seperate summer cook kitchen has the old heat stove as it was converted into a guest room.
The family is long gone now.
Ive spent many years in a trailer on Blue Mountain in Pennsylvania with no water, heat or electric in the winter.
On the coldest nights...I would just sleep in my car.
I'm not paying 500.00 plus dollars a month to heat this old farmhouse with the new HVAC system
It's been a good winter outside of the Christmas freeze.
It's 42° on the porch tonight
Just the way I like it
Johnny in Coopersburg PA
I lived in the free state of Bavaria as a child, near Switzerland. The common space like the living room, with the bathroom being in a close proximity, was heated by a wood stove, we also wore pajamas and warm slippers or socks . Our bedrooms had no heat, and the windows were actually left slightly open!
Oh but those big, heavy comforters for slipping under at night! The best!
Open to help pull in heat?
@@jameslong1644No, to allow fresh air in. If you sleep with your bedroom door and window fully closed, by the morning the air will be stale and have a high c02 level, making you wake up feeling groggy. Try sleeping with your window cracked open a bit, you genuinely wake up fresher.
I live in a similar climate and I've always slept with the window open in winter. Usually it's better but frankly sometimes the air outside is not so good either. In summer I need air conditioning to sleep (60°F) most nights. And other nights the pollen or smoke gets too much (specially in recent years).
Yes that was the old central european rural way of surviving the winter, there was one central stove in the living room and also one in the kitchen for cooking or sometimes kitchen alone which was close to the living room, the heat distribution was that it went basically from the living room upwards and usually the bedrooms were not heated.
This was enough to get through the winter while minimizing the need for firewood. We do not have that system anymore of course and have abandoned it for a long time, but really old houses sometimes still have it.
Btw. better houses had heating vents just like displayed in the video to distribute the heat, city homes in the 19th centuries had several smaller stoves distributed over the house!
We heat our home with a fireplace equipped with a boiler. A low power circulation pump circulates water throughout the lower level of the home to radiators. The upper two levels use in floor radiant heat. In order to control water temperature to the upper levels there are several heat exchangers that isolate the 90°C water used in the radiators from the 40°C max temperature needed for the radiant heat. This fireplace / boiler is made in Italy and does have an electronic brain to regulate air flow into the closed burn chamber. This system draws cold dense outside air into the burn chamber instead of pulling heated air out of the home. To heat a 200sq meter home it can use up to 10 metric tons of wood in a very cold damp winter. The system also heats water for the home as well but the water heater also is solar powered, on sunny winter days it provides enough hot water for evening showers and doing dishes. It’s an equivalent size to your homes 40 gallon water heater.
How does it run when u lose power
@@mikezisk5009 we utilize a line interactive UPS from EATON Industries as backup power. With the 9 amp hour battery that comes with it we get about 110minutes of backup. However I use instead two 12 volt 100 amp hour batteries in it that gives me at least six hours time. This is enough to fire up the generator and charge the batteries by supplying line voltage back to the UPS. The only thing the UPS runs is a circulation pomp that draws about 110 watts as well as the logic controller on the fireplace that draws only a few amps in standby and around 6amps max when it operates the air damper to the supply air.
In my " Dawdy Haus" i have a fireplace woodstove insert that is mounted on a freestanding stone and cement block pedestal and the exhaust fan mounted underneath blows the heated air from the double walled stove down thru the floor into the ductwork to distribute heated air to all of the rooms, I Heat, cook meals and heat water and dry clothes with the stove. And i have a heat pump that runs off of solar panels that heats mostly down to 40 degrees. My lights are either solar powered string lights or wall mounted crane type oil lanterns. (8) and natural window light in daytime.
How did you get your stove situated that way? I'd like to have something like that in my house. I have a wood stove in my basement, but it isn't attached to any ductwork or anything. My house is heated by a traditional gas furnace. When we burn wood in the basement stove, it makes the basement nice and toasty and it does help to heat the rest of the house, and it warms the water coming from the bathroom sink because it's right under the pipe, but that's it. We also have a second larger stove upstairs, but we only use it on particularly cold nights.
@@Melissa0774 Where i placed the stove in the middle of the big room just happened to sit over the main ductwork under the floor and i just bought sheet metal duct angle pieces to direct the heat from the front of the stove down into the main duct and the blower forces it thru the lines to the rooms. You can connect any ductwork to a stove or wood furnace with a blower setup like a fireplace insert. The woodstove has a double steel liner inside.
@@Melissa0774 Where i placed the stove in the middle of the big room just happened to sit over the main ductwork under the floor and i just bought sheet metal duct angle pieces to direct the heat from the front of the stove down into the main duct and the blower forces it thru the lines to the rooms. You can connect any ductwork to a stove or wood furnace with a blower setup like a fireplace insert. The woodstove has a double steel liner inside.
Wie bischt ?
The company That I work for had a contract to make cabinet parts for the "Amish heater". When we had seen the ad for the heater, it was the biggest laugh of the day!!!
We went to an Amish Christmas party one year and they were using their cookstove as a heater and omg it really worked well! That whole house was HOT! I learned fast that if you visit the Amish in winter dress light lol.
😅
Excellent video Erik.. When i was a kid, i used to haul split wood in the basement and feed the wood stove. I would wash my clothes and hang them up in the basement, and they would dry very fast. An old Amish trick i learned as a kid. Brings back a lot of memories. Keep the cool video coming!
Thanks! "Wood heats twice" right
Here in Seattle, I let clothing hang on the clothesline until it dries. Sometimes that can take 2-3 days, and I may wait longer than that to find a suitable period of days where it doesn't rain and where such a technique will work.
Hanging clothing indoors as you describe will indeed allow them to dry, but you are consuming firewood to accomplish that.
Still, what works in Seattle may not work in the severer climate of Amish country.
But since it can work in Seattle, I try to use that method to dry my clothes.
I prefer that to using the gas dryer I have, which maybe gets used once a year, and has been used zero times so far this winter! Managing to dry clothing outdoors in the winter makes life just a bit of an adventure, and I also call it a hobby.
Any moron can dry clothes in a gas dryer. It takes a small measure of skill and planning to dry your clothes outdoors during the winter time. (No insult intended to my friends who are morons...)
@@SeattlePioneer I agree and also have a clothes dryer, but if the Amish get caught drying clothes with a clothes dryer, they'll be whipped by the bearded elders wearing funny hats. They take that sht serious. I used to date a girl whose Mom was Amish. They caught her sneaking off the farm to watch a movie, and she was banished from her family for life. She had to pack up and leave the cult the next day, and never saw her family again. They're a bunch of hypocrites. On one hand they say driving a car is a sin, but they're allowed to drive tractors. The cult says no phones in their homes, but many of them used to have a pay phone booth installed just outside their fence. This was back around 30 years ago when they still had pay phones.
I grew up in the rural midwest and our home had radiant ceiling heat (which was completely useless) but we also had two stoves. My dad would get them so hot at night that they would glow a deep orange/red. By morning all that was left was warm coals. I remember sitting on the small stove while I ate my cereal in the morning. It was the perfect temperature by then! And while our rooms could get chilly since they didn't have direct access to the radiant heat of the fire places...the house was toasty.
While I was looking for a house a few years ago, I lived in an unelectrified cabin from April to August. Outside of candles, battery-operated lanterns, flashlights and headlamp, there were three propane-fed ceiling lamps. I hardly ever used them after May because they did give off a lot of heat! But the oil-drum wood-burning stove was perfect for when the weather was still cold. Because I worry about fires, I have no hearths, wood stoves, space heaters or candles in the house I finally found and bought.
Central heat and air conditioners can cause house fires too.
Most house fires happen at the kitchen stove or in the electrical within the walls. Your fear of flame is not keeping you any safer.
My Mom bought me one of those Amish heaters when they first came out. It broke fairly quickly and since it was under warranty, we got another one for free. But the new one also broke after a year or two of use. The woodwork was nice, but the heating element was a piece of junk, imo.
Not certain but the internal heating mechanism might've been infrared technology. And you had to frequently check the venting areas for dust build-up & wipe them clean, otherwise the heater quickly burned out. Many customers learned this too late, unfortunately.
The Armish are junk. Bunch a drunk crooks
Junk heater , burn wood
I got one, too, back in the day. Total waste of money. Didn't do anything it was said to do.
You would have saved yourselves a lot of money by buying a 20 dollar electric heater. The secret to making electric heaters last a long time is to never ever run them on high. A low or medium heat setting is better for the heater and for your wallet.
All electric heaters are maxed at 1500 watts. Basically all the same. I’ve been in quite a few Amish homes and they are some of the most beautiful homes I’ve seen.
I was gifted a Amish heater and I like it very much. got me through the bombastic Winter blast.
That coal stove you showed a picture of at the 28 second mark looks like a DS Anthra-Max which is made in Lancaster County by Amish. They have a reputation as being the best brand coal stove company in the industry.
The electric "Amish Heater" was based on a particular law. The electric heater would have to pass UL regulatory inspection if it was sold in the USA. But...if you bought the wooden cabinet, and the company threw in a free electric heater, they didn't have to pass inspection
They also advertised the heater used the moisture in the air to spread the heat (?). I asked what happens if the humidity in the house was low and just got blank stares.
It's ironic that the Amish were making electric heaters, because they think electricity is a sin. If they catch anyone in their cult flicking a light switch, it's banishment for life. If they're caught with a phone, its probably a good caning with 50 lashes by the bearded elders wearing funny hats.
My mother-in-law purchased three of those fireplaces. She loved them.
Yea , eletric bill go crazy best wishez
Wood stove for out in country is the best. Only if you have wood, fire starters, and a clear vent pipe. You can keep a pot of water for moisture, and you can heat up canned soup. Fry eggs or scrambled. Bacon, and meat.
I used to have a forced air buck wood stove. That thing was really amazing, of course it had fans so it did require some electricity, but it was the most effective heat source I've used.
I remember the Amish heaters, we never had one though I remember my sister wanting one for our house, we had a fireplace but never used it as a heat source, in fact we almost never used it, LOL. When I lived back East we had an oil heater, it worked fine for our smaller home, but of course we had to keep up with oil deliveries and now on the West coast we have gas heat, it works great in our little home, but it's expensive. I don't know what the best way to heat is, but I'd think that for the Amish they wouldn't try to fix something that for them isn't broken and has served them well for a very long time. Thanks for more great information Erik.
Right, good point, and unlike us they are accounting for not only cost and effectiveness and availability, but also tradition and church rules. Glad you liked the vid!
My grandparents used cast iron, pot belly heaters, my Grand Mother cooked on a wood fired stove/oven!
My Grandmother as Well..until 1961.
the man in the ad for the amish heaters is actually amish..he is from holmes county ohio. he and his wife worked at a popular hotel in berlin ohio. i have known him for 25+ years, very sweet man..thx marie from 🇨🇦
That's great, yea I remember hearing that at least someone in those ads was actually Amish. The two women in the photos are wearing what looks like accurate Amish clothing as well for that area
Those miracle heaters are in a lot of R.V. s as fireplaces. Guess who builds most of the R.V. s in Elkhart Indiana ?
I actually have 2 of those Amish fireplace heaters. I have one on right now. We like our bedrooms cool but our dining/livingroom open floor area stays nice and warm. When temperatures are in the 30's at night this heater keeps all 5 rooms warm.
Always a pleasure to be educated by your videos. Grateful.
I got two of the Amish heaters many years ago they still look good and they work perfect
0:15 This advert always got up my nose. A guy using a hand plane like he’s doing fine touch ups on already stained wood.
Yoders are tricky when it comes to tech and business. One of the coolest lumber yards I was ever in was Keim lumber in Ohio. The pilgrims would ride their buggies to work. Pasture the horses and then go inside. There they would put on a bluetooth earpiece and sit down at a computer to fill orders all day.😂
With fire and fire and the last one yes it is fire...
Thank you, appreciate this info,best wishes from a UK pensioner.
Those are the cleanest floors I've ever seen !
Must not have Mexican friends
I feel like this company took advantage of the Amish in their advertising. My Dad and brothers would build fireplace inserts, it became quite a side hustle. Thanks for another great video Erik. 👍
That was sort of my response way back then when this came out. At the same time Amish did cooperate with them in the manufacturing, which makes it more gray area in my view. Either way it was interesting to revisit this topic. Glad you liked the vid!
I bought two of those heat surge heaters years ago. I gave one away to one of the kids when I downsized but, I still have one and they work great for smaller spaces such as a single room. The mantle is Amish made, I was told and it is still beautiful, mine is cherry.
As always you continue to build my knowledge and understanding of the Amish and I appreciate it!
My pleasure!
Wow....yes, I remember the Amish miracle heater rave!
I'm not Amish but I have used all of these methods to heat my home, garage, or shop. I had a chimney built on to my house when I bought it and put in a wood stove. Later I installed a heat pump and duct work for AC and heat as the house was all electric baseboard. Propane infrared heaters are a good source for emergency or spot heating. Don't believe the marketing hype on all the electric heaters although a small
heater can be used to spot heat for short times when it gets very cold. Premium heat is radiant hydronic any way you can get it.
1:13 That's a six gallon brewing bottle with some overflow in the value. I bet that wine tastes delicious!
We bought one of the heaters 10 years ago it’s still working.
I still have the Amish Miracle heater :)
Great video once again. How wonderful you get to stay with Amish friends. You certainly are dear to them. I am thankful there are not many (hope not) house fires with all these different types of heating sources. Maybe that isn’t even something of a worry but I don’t truly know. Can’t wait for your next video.
It's a good point you raise. I don't have statistics on Amish house (& building) fires, but they seem to happen often enough. I wouldn't be surprised if it was at a higher rate than non-Amish ones. And yes I am very grateful for my friendships with them!
The question of house fires is the very first thing that crossed my mind when the topic of gas lights was mentioned. It would be interesting to compare the incidence of house fires involving Amish homes as compared to State and National averages. There has to be a safer alternative. Some homes must be virtually “uninsurable” .
When your born & raised with these, all your life you learn about them, take them seriously. Have respect. I think here, not Amish, are not smart enough. Sorry, I mean not careful enough. How your brought up is what makes the difference. Like guns. Guns aren't dangerous, people are. Teach your children all about guns. They are not toys.
Those little fans have become a lot more available. We bought one years ago at Lehman's and have twice replaced the little heat-activated motor. We love it on our wood-burning stove.
Cool video as always, Erik! Keep 'em comin'!
Thanks Mark, glad you liked it!
I have made a couple of payments on Lehman's Hardware, but they will not send me a key. I absolutely love that store, met Mr Lehman and his son Galen , never met Glenda yet, she always seems to be some where else. what really sold them to me was how they treat the customers, and back what they sell.
Does it run on a Sterling engine? That's quite neat. Those small fans do a lot to distribute the heat better. These days many people fit them to their radiators here, but those are of course electrical, activated by a mechanical thermostat switch.
Most are electric, using a Peltier -type thermo electric generator.
They can also be made with a Stirling motor but those are much rarer.
We had a coal burning potbelly stove in a childhood home when I was a kid. To heat upstairs, there was a floor vent in each bedroom. I never noticed much difference, especially when it got really cold out. We all had a couple heavy quilts to sleep under, which kept us warm. Getting out of bed in the morning was no fun because we had to put on freezing cold clothes and our shoes were frozen and hard to put on. I dreaded getting out of bed!!
Ive never seen a winter like this, 65 yrs age, these heating ideas help
I grew up with both in the house. The fireplace was barely used while the woodstove was kept perpetually burning...save the hottest days.
i am buying an Amish made home, Not sure why they have battery lights but I am going to have to deal with no A/C power for a little while. It is going to be a great time I am sure. Gas stove, Gas frig, and wood stove sound fun to me.
Another great video Mr. Wesner. Thanks for sharing!
My Aunt & uncle have 2 of those “Amish” heaters they like them
Great video Erik. If you get a chance to be in the Gordonville PA area you should check out DS stoves and talk with those folks. Amish made wood and coal stoves. In this video you showed several shots of DS stoves in homes.
Thanks Pete - yes I think that would be an interesting visit. You must know them well to be able to recognize them
I looked at a Amish made wood stove, and did not buy it cause they could not or did not care to try to get a UL listing, my house insurance is void if some thing happened because of a non ul listed appliance.
Chinese diesel heater from Amazon .. it’s a wonderful thing
I know that those Amish Heaters that were on sale years ago. As far as I remember the Amish just built the wooden box, and my parents had bought 1 because of the sale they had of buy one get one for free. They really do work great, and I know that this part is kinda off topic, but I’ve gotten to know a few Amish folks from when I was doing some Union Boilermaker work in Ohio and Kentucky. They had an Amish store/shop that a few families were all partners in. They sold everything from Quilts, Ice Cream, Jams & Jelly and a lot of Amish made furniture. The ones I’d gotten to know were New Order Amish, and their bishop was pretty progressive. They still didn’t drive and the kids dolls were faceless, but on the other hand they were allowed to use power tools that was ran on a Propane Generator, and also allowed them to use solar power because the Bishop believed that the Sun was a gift to them from god. The sons who were close to my age at that time told me that the old order Amish had some bad problems that new order Amish didn’t believe was right. The store they owned I would stop there 1 time a week to buy something’s they sold an I probably spent a few thousand dollars in the store. I was telling them about my Cajun side of the family that I felt they would get along with. Because some of my Cajun family members lived a lot like them except on house boats they built, and made their money from hunting, trapping, fishing, and shrimping.
An on a whole just wanted to be left alone by the government, and felt that living the same way our ancestors did hundreds of years ago. Also all of them are practicing Catholics. The Amish respected them for how they lived. I told them how my youngest brother and sister in-law would be having a kid in 3 months. They surprised me with a gift for them. It was a hand crafted rocking chair made using Mahogany wood, and gave it to them for free no matter how many times I tried to pay them for it the refused any money for it. That was back right after hurricane Katrina had hit us in New Orleans, and it’s still in use and will be handed down when my nephew gets married. I don’t know how much it would have cost but I was willing to give them 400 bucks for it
Always entertaining, informative and interesting thank you Eric
Thank you!
I have been heating my house with a wood stove for over 40 years it works just fine but it is a lot of work.
It is work, but so gratifying! Cooking on a woodstove and drying clothes and wet boots and gloves is a bonus. No better way to heat! That heat just "soaks" into everything.
That's why I still do it,boots and clothes drying by the fire now.@@marksavage1744
A very plain Amish friend of mine has a wood fired boiler in the basement and hot water is piped to radiators around the house. Circulates by itself!
I still have two Amish heaters. The first original large one. Which I need a lightbulb for. And the smaller version. We use them every winter. Cuts our bill by half compared to our neighbors. And with the new increased energy cost right now in 2023. Our bill is less than their bill by more than half right now. So when you say so-called Amish heater. I don’t care who made them they work and they’re saving us a ton of money right now.
A bit off topic but have you done an episode on bird feeders? It appears the Amish have the most glorious bird feeders.
No vid but I have done a couple of articles/posts, including one with an interview of an Amish bird feeder maker in Indiana: amishamerica.com/amish-bird-houses-feeders-indiana/
Butte Montana in a mobile home, wood stove cooking and heat first one up in morning gets the fire going.
Door handle would be frozen solid, icicles on the inside of the wall from condensation.
Fun stuff.
That lil fan that spins when placed on a firebox is actually electric , it uses a thermocouple called a pleiter effect plate that generates electricity when it has heat applied to 1 side and a heat sink to another .
I was born in southern Victoria Australia and I still live there now , I don't use house heating nor air conditioning and the winter temps are anywhere from -1 -2 deg C to 12-16deg C in winter and 12deg to 36deg C in the summer , average would be 18-25deg most of the time . But I believe if you can't live comfortably where you were born just by putting on more clothes or taking them off then there is something wrong with you and artificially controlling temperatures is making you weak and sickly .
I don't have heating or AC where I live but it's a moderate climate IMO
I am not Amish but I did not have a bedroom with heat until I was 25, living in Northern Ohio.
I live in Northern Michigan, and grew up in a home that only had a space heater, too. Now in my 70's, I shut off the bedroom heat vent, because I still can't sleep well in a warm room.
@@kibblenbits I''m with you. I like a cool bedroom. In the summer, as a kid, I would sleep on our front porch in the cool. Small town, no crime to speak of. Miss it.
Nothing like making your own system of laws to live by and then finding all the loopholes. Batteries are stored electricity ⚡️. Genius.
I used to have a wood stove. It didnt seem to heat very good.
I love the spicy smell of fruit wood. My dad used to burn black cherry and that wood screamed. I had a hard time with that when i was little.
I got divorced from my abusive hubby and had to abandon the wood stove. I was the one who split, carried, stacked and fed the stove ...that ole orge that was never satisfied. the wood husband cut.
I do miss it.
There is nothing like the work out of cutting wood and with a different wood stove....no better and satisfying heat as the wood stove.
Id love to go back to one but im 63.. disabled and have no man. Been my choice but i miss the wood heat!
Awesome video buddy! I plan on going to an Mennonite community in Floyd Virginia This Weekend! I’m very excited I’m not sure what type of Mennonites they are but I know they are Mennonite! I’m gonna visit a store called “Bread Basket” it’s a bulk foods store and I’ve heard its great
Awesome have a great visit, sounds like it might be a plain group
Pretty beautiful homes.
I'm using the heat surge in my bathroom now, I had one in my living room that I used for years until it died.
So happy to hear you say: Fire places are NOT the most efficient ways to heat a home (THANK YOU) they are not!
the heat stoves are the best option so far however, there is the concern on "fumes" such as Carbon Monoxide so careful with theat
"I really do envy the Amish lifestyle ,away from all the degeneracy ...greetings from Ulster
U gotta respect some of the genius behind how they do things.
Thought they do not use wordly goods
I bought a similar electric fireplace 12 years ago for our sunroom we made into a temporary bedroom for an adult child that briefly needed a place. Ran the heater 8-10 hours every evening. Our first month electric bill once using it was $175 above our normal bill. Never use it any longer.
yup that's about right...a big money suck...just running the regular central heat, costs way too much as well, really, all electric heaters, no matter what the source, are designed to be a money pit just like most things we "own" (cars, appliances, etc.) whether it's from usage, repairs, or some kind of insurance that is required to allegedly own it, it's really more like they OWN US
What about insulation in floors, walls and ceilings? These are very effective ways to reduce heating needs. Thermopane windows too, but they are far less economical since they are much less effective at reducing heat losses, and far more expensive per square inch.
If you've ever looked at an Amish built home, they all have very small windows for that reason.
Great topic and well done. Thank you.
I still have one of those Amish heaters my dad bought two at a discount and gave me one still works but I really don’t use it built a cabinet around it more lime a furniture piece than heater.
My husband put a wood stove in the basement and makes the vents in the floor 3 vents and the fan this work good we not using oils this winter happy have A ranch house
Check out mason stoves / heaters. Long internal exhausts burn the smoke; preventing smoke (once up to temp), keeping the heat inside and yielding more work from the wood. (A bit less ash too if I remember correctly.)
Nur für den Fall, dass der Winter etwas zu kalt wird; Schauen Sie sich eine thermische Sandbatterie an. Gruss aus Connecticut, bzw West New Jersey. 😎
Very good information
That's fascinating, thank you for sharing
In gauge county Ohio, some Amish have natural or propane furnaces. I don't know how it works, without electricity.
The "O" sound. Funny.
Like Christmas story regular steam heat boiler , radiators etc but coal or wood fired boiler just as hundred years ago just no oil or gas.
1930s warm morning coal stove burning wood oaks, cherry maples... great heat... ash used in gaden....
Shout out to PA WE N HERE!
Fireplaces are inefficient because the draft that keeps the fire burning pulls the heat up the chimney. It will be warm near the fire, and near the chimney, but the heat won't spread as far into the room as it does with a freestanding heater or stove.
I live in the South. Heat downstairs will usually heat the upstairs to some extent, because hot air rises. I have Amish neighbors who keep their woodburning ranges lit all winter, but cook outside on a porch in hot weather.
I never visited them at night (or, to be fair, in the winter, except to the woodlot where they sell bark slabs for home heating,) so idk if they use propane or other fuels to augment their heating.
I do know they use old-timey kerosene/oil lamps, but I don't see why they wouldn't use LEDs. I don't think they're a vanity; I would think it would depend on whatever saves the most money and is the most practical. I'm an "English," so there's a lot idk. And our neighbors are Swartzentruber, so they may do things differently than other orders.
I live in Ohio. I thought that the Amish Miracle Heater was powered by Deuterium, and I was so disappointed to find out otherwise.
People don't understand how to heat their homes with a wood fireplace. You need fans to circulate the heat around your home... Plus, Add a little moisture and or crack open some windows.... We did it back in the days!
I always just had a small pot with water in it on top of the stove to keep things from getting too dry. Made things cozy!
01:03 You might want to check the specs on this propane heater before using it indoors. I'm pretty sure that's an outdoors only model.
Great video
For Christmas I have all the family members in the house everybody spent the time in the basement
Propane heaters in doors can easily put dangerous amounts of Co2 in the air. That's not suppose to be a long term solution for indoor heat, and I doubt Amish use them for any long periods of time.
A fireplace will actually create a slight vacuum inside your house causing cold air to be pulled through every nook and cranny of every window and wall.
This goes for all heating systems that use the room's air for their combustion.
You can avoid it by using a furnace/boiler/heater that uses not just a flue for the exhaust, but also an air channel for the air inlet. This has the additional benefit of being much safer, because no toxic gases can escape into the house as long as the inlet and exhaust channels are air tight.
In the Netherlands, this has been the standard for about 2 decades. Hardly any central heating system that uses the air in the room for combustion are still in existence.
A compromise if you can't afford to get a modern, efficient system that uses the outside air, is to neatly seal up the boiler room, and feed air from outside straight into the boiler room via ducts. Ask a proper hvac engineer for the correct size and number. Too small and you choke the furnace, creating carbon monoxide! This is also the reason why you can't use "open" fuel burning devices in an air tight house.
are we really so far in society that we forgot wood heat exists? most people i know still rely on wood heat as a primary heat source
I used kerosene in the past but it is around 38.00a gallon now for kero you can use safely indoors.