Fulltiming in Alaska in the Winter

[rvwandering]

&nbsp;This young guy is planning on living in his little Toyota RV through an Alaska winter - <a href="http://www.timmystoyota.blogspot.com/">http://www.timmystoyota.blogspot.com/</a>&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /><br />&nbsp;He has a neat wood burning stove. I think that it should have a flue but I can't see one in the pictures. It's also really expensive around $3,500!

 

[Guest]

Very nice....oh to be 20 something again...lol<br />Bri

 

[yesican]

I checked into that little stove since the guy&nbsp;who's advertising it is&nbsp;on&nbsp;Anchorage Craigslist frequently.&nbsp; It'd work great in my cabin but $3,500....OMG...it is expensive.&nbsp; I'm hoping the price comes down with time...There's not much material to it.&nbsp; The flue goes out the back and straight up.&nbsp; I like the idea it'll go for 6-8 hrs before need to reload.&nbsp; &nbsp; <br /><br />My neighbor lives in a camper next door. (He must really go through the LP to have kept that thing warm last winter.&nbsp; It was rough here!)&nbsp; Met a kid who liked his drugs and lived in the back of a pick up with no topper.&nbsp; He used tarps and put a wood stove in it and stayed at the Soldotna Park where his truck died.&nbsp; Eventually the cops made him move but he was there a couple months.<br /><br />I don't think I'd want to be young again...my body yes...my mind, intelligence, experiences, etc...naw...I like where I'm at in that department.&nbsp; My kids are grown, almost out of debt, there is no reason I'm not free like those kids other than my own mental restraints...These kids make you think though...Like all the other vandwellers....you can&nbsp;be free if you want it bad enough!<br />Rae

 

[Guest]

I hear you Rae...I am talking about the body and ability to do that kind of stuff again...68 here, you ARE still young. I think youth is totally wasted on the young!<img src="/images/boards/smilies/wink.gif" alt="" align="absmiddle" border="0" /><br />Bri

 

[highdesertranger]

o to be young again.&nbsp; those are cool stoves but i cant find much info on them other than you tube videos.&nbsp; on another note i do not believe toyota made a 1 ton 4x4 motor home.&nbsp; this looks like its pieced together.&nbsp; a 1 ton rear end on a 1/2 ton front end, &nbsp;not the best choice imho.&nbsp; those 1 ton toy rear ends have thier own issues.&nbsp; those front struts need shocks on them unless they are trying to hold up the overhead bed,&nbsp;&nbsp;if that is the case then&nbsp;they have other issues.&nbsp; boy have i been too negative with my post tonight. i do not mean to offend anybody just add my 2 cents from years of&nbsp; modifing vehicles for heavy duty use.&nbsp; highdesertranger

 

[OverTheTopCargoTrailer]

I always like to track down some unmitigated BS, some of these people says the stove puts out up to 40,000 btu and goes to 1,600 deg F<br><br>100% bull hockey , one pound of the very best wood does about 5,800 Btu , if burned over 1 hour.<br>so if you shove in a 5lb log - over 5 -10 hour burn time its still only max &nbsp;2,900 to 5,800 Btu per hour,<br>this does not even consider any heat lost up the flue<br><br>For $3,500 you would need to be NUTS to make that investment.<br><br>Come on people use a little math. 1 gallon of propane = 90,000 Btu&nbsp;

 

[bk2valve]

Hi HDR and OTTCT, <br><br>I'm loving this young lad and his adventurous life. I am reading some sour grapes I think aren't I? How are you guys doing and are you living the life in Alaska???<br><br>I know when we lived in our bus conversion in the interior one winter, I would have paid twice that if I had it to have a fire all&nbsp; night long. Our little old crappy cast iron wood stove burned low so quickly I had to get up about three times a night to stoke it...and still the ice was 2" thick on the back windows of the bus....as it was we were both on UIB and waiting for spring when work started so every day we would take the little chain saw and go off on our crosscountry skis to poach another dead tree from Indian land...it was fun. we were young and dumb and living life to the fullest. I don't regret one second of it.<br><br> I guess what he is doing is working well and he picked a spot in Alaska's banana belt to do it...not so bad there right on Turnagain Arm in Girdwood...right at and just above sea level and the same temps and weather as Anchorage and not far from Anchorage so he can get anything he needs. Lots of young folks there and the skiing is great...<br><br>The stove seems a tad high but I will stick with my willingness to pay a man a living wage to make something here in the USA and especially if it is as high a quality as it looks to me...<br><br>We groan and complain about paying for a quality, well made product made in the USA and then complain about how all the jobs are gone and we have to work 3 part-time crappy service jobs just to stay off welfare....ahhh, America. A true nest of contradictions.<br><br>People in Alaska regularly live on boats year-round and use stoves like that and smaller (diesel, wood and coal fired) and they are all high priced...and damn well made.<br><br>I think arguing BTU numbers is a lot like arguing horsepower. It really doesn't mean much or is measurable by anyone but a scientist or a tech with expensive, specialized equipment....I wonder if you have priced good airtight wood stoves or pellet stoves lately.<br><br>And why would someone living the close to the bone mobile life want to pay for high priced propane in Alaska where there is wood, free, everywhere?????<br><br>How about a kudos to him and his willingness to live his dreams....he has them from me...<br><br>Peace,<br>Bri<br><br><br><br>

 

[c_hasbeen]

I made a stove out of an old steel oil well casing and some other steel and a lid off of a casserole dish for the door and it would heat a space like that quite well, and it only uses small amounts of wood. and I also made a nifty little cooker that I can bake with the whole thing if a cat was to go and buy all the new steel about 300 clams.<br>got it in the garage now<br>it is built like a rocket stove, has a heat riser tube that butns the smoke and gases before pushing the remaining what ever is left over down and out the smoke stack<br><br>

 

[akrvbob]

An Olympian catalytic heater is about $200 and will work far, far better. No smoke, no running out of fire/heat in the middle of the night, much, much safer. Propane is cheap and available everywhere and most of all easy to carry. Wood is fine when you have a backyard to store it in but not much room in a van for a cord of wood. Digging through 6 feet of snow to find a few sticks will get old fast. <br>Bob

 

[c_hasbeen]

There is a cat in the UK that lived in a van, had him self a family and needed to add heat to keep warm, this is his solution<br>http://www.hotpod.co.uk/the-story-of-hotpod-multifuel-stoves.asp<br><br>pretty cool looking

 

[bk2valve]

The Hotpod is very cool looking and a good stove I imagine...thanks for the link...<br>Bri

 

[bee]

So I did a little digging. &nbsp;1 presto manufactured log (which they recommend) is 42,000 btu&lt;br&gt;I am guessing that the stove can&nbsp;basically&nbsp;fit 1 log. &nbsp;If I am right then that is where they are coming up with the&nbsp;ridiculous&nbsp;40k btu number. &nbsp;You can cram 40k btu worth of fuel inside.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;Assuming you can fit a whole log in a kimberly and it lasts 6-8 hrs then 5000btu an hr should be&nbsp;reasonable. &nbsp;Basically I came to the same conclusion as OverTheTop from a slightly different standpoint.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;If I did the math right I am paying around $2.50 for 40k btu of propane when I do a bottle exchange at lowes.&nbsp;1 pressed log (equivalent BTU) costs about $1 at lowes.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;Have to say I think I will stick with an Olympian, but maybe a build your own or cheaper kimberly alternative would make sense in the right situations.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;What happens to the fire if you have to drive down the road? &nbsp;does your camper fill with smoke or anything exciting like that? &nbsp;I don't know much about wood stoves, can they handle gale force winds?

 

[bk2valve]

<span id="post_message_1276937723">What happens to the fire if you have to drive down the road? &nbsp;does your camper fill with smoke or anything exciting like that? &nbsp;I don't know much about wood stoves, can they handle gale force winds?</span>

<br><br>Well first off the prudent person would not drive with a fire in the stove and especially when they are fueling the rig...<img src="/images/boards/smilies/eek.gif" class="emoticon bbc_img"> Pretty obvious. There are severl kinds of stove pipe caps you can buy that either follow the wind like a wind vane or you can point away from the wind.<br><br>I had/have a wood stove in both buses I converted. I loved them and they make huge sense when you are fulltiming in a place like Alaska. Especially where I was in the interior and propane would have been hard to find and expensive...way too expensive for a rig as drafty and big as the bus.<br><br>The only trouble finding wood for my first bus stove was when I drove the bus down to America and had to scrounge for it in Oregon. It was so hard to find wood in the Willamette valley that I went in with a brother-in-law on a load of purchased wood to fill my wood box and his basement woodbin. I could have driven either way west or east and found plenty but I was way to busy being social and chasing the fairer sex.<br><br>Cheers,<br>Bri<br><br>

 

[bee]

Lets say I have to travel, I have an all day trip planned. &nbsp;I wake up cold in the morning because the fire is out from overnight. &nbsp;I quickly throw a log on to warm myself up while I have breakfast. &nbsp;Once breakfast is done I need to start heading down the road for my trip. The stove is still burning the last bit of the log. &nbsp;Will this be ok? &nbsp;Or how would you handle it?

 

[bk2valve]

I wouldn't do that myself...I would put on some warmer clothes. <br><br>What I found was I planned things differently...say I was driving down or up the Alcan in the winter which is what I did....I would refuel before I stopped for the night if possible and I would not start a fire in the morning if I was traveling....I would close the damper and the draft and since all that were left were some embers and a little fire it would burn out before the next fuel stop....<br><br>You find that you live your life around things like your stove...you can't live as though you can turn a thermostat on for heat. I remember one trip down the Alcan where I passed into an old burn area that had tons and tons of what we called pecker-poles, standing dead trees anywhere from an inch or two to about 6" in diameter....I stopped and filled up the floor of the bus about a foot high with logs that I could later cut to stove length and it lasted me all the way down the Alcan into Washington. Mostly 2 or 3 inches in diameter....all dead spruce that burned hot but would not hold a fire all night.<br><br>I had a good sleeping bag and plenty of clothes. I kept a fire in the evening as I read and ate, etc. and then after loading the stove and damping it down I would go to bed...it was burned out by midnight and if it was REALLY cold I would reload it and by morning it would be out....<br><br>With a stove like this guy has, it would be perfect....you could load and bank and go to bed and wake up in the AM with a fire still in the stove...if you like to sleep in a warm place...<br><br>Personally I sleep best in a cold or cool room or place and can't sleep well in the heat. <br><br>When my wife and I were living in the bus in the interior of Alaska we used beaucoup wood and had to cut it all by hand due to the fact we were poaching it from Indian land and had to go get it on x-country skis....the snow was 2'-3' deep....<br><br>It was -20 F or thereabout and I would get up in the middle of the night and reload and bank the stove....<br><br>I don't know, if you haven't lived with a woodburning stove I suppose it would be a learning experience but when I turned 14 we moved to Vermont and until I left and joined the Navy I got real used to cutting hauling and splitting as well as burning wood....I also lived with it about a third of my adult life so it is just what you learn to do....<br><br>I still enjoy a wood fire but live where I don't need one...lol.<br><br>Bri

 

[bee]

I appreciate the response Bri. &nbsp;It is a good reality check since I don't have personal experience with a wood stove. &nbsp;I remember my parents had one, but they stopped using it when I was real young so I don't remember the details.<br><br>I am going to be building a small true 4 season camper soon and I wanted to have two sources of heat for&nbsp;redundancy.&nbsp; &nbsp;I really don't want frozen pipes if a heater quits. &nbsp;It was going to be a diesel heater like a webasto and a propane backup like an olympian cat heater. &nbsp;But if I can come up with an affordable compact wood stove I might use that instead of the olympian. that way I would have the safety factor of 2 stoves and reduce the heating costs by burning wood when it is&nbsp;feasible.<br><br>Both the wood stove and an olympian are great because they will both work even if your camper has complete electric failure.

 

[bk2valve]

Glad to help bee.....I like them a lot, esp. if you go for a really good quality higher tech stove...usually called an "airtight" stove....folks on boats have been using them forever. They will usually burn anything solid and flammable....I used coal in my bus stove in two different places in Alaska, instead of wood...because it was available for free just by going and picking it up...it was a soft coal and not super good but ok.<br><br>That along with another stove, propane or diesel, would be a good way to go....<br><br>If a guy had a diesel rig I think a Wallas stove/heater is pretty good way to go...<br><br>http://www.scanmarineusa.com/<br><br>Luck,<br>Bri

 

[Seraphim]

Seriously enjoyed this thread.

 

[bk2valve]

I re-read and see I got a little redundant...oh well, it's age I say, age!!!!<br>Bri