TR Forums

just brew it! wrote:

Hate to break it to you, but January/February are normally the coldest months in the Chicago area.

Yeah January always seemed the absolute coldest to me. February you're likely to get a bit more mild weather. I'm not looking forward to the next months.

My office is always super warm (really too warm), I can't imagine how massive their heating bill is in a 12 story building.

Hawkwing74 wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

Hate to break it to you, but January/February are normally the coldest months in the Chicago area.

Yeah January always seemed the absolute coldest to me. February you're likely to get a bit more mild weather. I'm not looking forward to the next months.

I figured it would. Just hoping for the best while preparing for the worst.

My office is always super warm (really too warm), I can't imagine how massive their heating bill is in a 12 story building.

Depends on how well its sealed, really. Our complex is spread out, so there are lots of doors where heat can escape. A taller building would at least be able to control how much heat gets lost on the upper floors.

They just lowered the temp to 65F yesterday. It's surprisingly cold if I'm sitting at my desk for any extended period. Not an issue if I have reasons to move around, but if all I'm doing is typing/CAD work for hours I get cold fingers and toes.

superjawes wrote:

They just lowered the temp to 65F yesterday. It's surprisingly cold if I'm sitting at my desk for any extended period. Not an issue if I have reasons to move around, but if all I'm doing is typing/CAD work for hours I get cold fingers and toes.

That's all I ever hear my house (Vermont) to unless guests are coming. Upper floor and bedrooms are lucky to be 60F.

Captain Ned wrote:

superjawes wrote:

They just lowered the temp to 65F yesterday. It's surprisingly cold if I'm sitting at my desk for any extended period. Not an issue if I have reasons to move around, but if all I'm doing is typing/CAD work for hours I get cold fingers and toes.

That's all I ever hear my house (Vermont) to unless guests are coming. Upper floor and bedrooms are lucky to be 60F.

lol
Don't like it warm or just trying to save money? My wife keeps the thermostat about 70F most of the time. I'm glad the house is well insulated and natural gas isn't too expensive.

anotherengineer wrote:

Don't like it warm or just trying to save money? My wife keeps the thermostat about 70F most of the time. I'm glad the house is well insulated and natural gas isn't too expensive.

Built around 1875 and is insulated by mouse carcasses and whatever else has fallen in the walls since then. Finally have enough equity and income to do something about that next year. There are some windows that have down conforters shoved in them to provide some small measure of protection.

We've got plastic and blankets in our windows, too. Seems to help some, but we've got the thermostat at 65 and if someone gets really cold there's a space heater.

What the hell, man? I thought people Wisconsin "knew how to drive in the snow" or something:

http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/2013 ... ighway.php

Also: WHY IN THE HELL ARE YOU STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE HIGHWAY? YOU WANT TO GET RUN OVER BY CAR?

Captain Ned wrote:

anotherengineer wrote:

Don't like it warm or just trying to save money? My wife keeps the thermostat about 70F most of the time. I'm glad the house is well insulated and natural gas isn't too expensive.

Built around 1875 and is insulated by mouse carcasses and whatever else has fallen in the walls since then. Finally have enough equity and income to do something about that next year. There are some windows that have down conforters shoved in them to provide some small measure of protection.

In my last year of University, me and a couple of guys rented a house that probably should have been torn down (but I won't get into THOSE details...aluminum wire, sink hole in the basement), but the rent was cheap. For winter time though, it was a little different. Single paned windows (and some of them didn't even seal that good) and MASSIVE drafts. Rather than trying to heat the whole house, my roommates and I decided to just spray foam insulation around our windows and heat just our rooms. Going out to the kitchen required wearing shoes and a winter jacket.

derFunkenstein wrote:

What the hell, man? I thought people Wisconsin "knew how to drive in the snow" or something:

http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/2013 ... ighway.php

Also: WHY IN THE HELL ARE YOU STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE HIGHWAY? YOU WANT TO GET RUN OVER BY CAR?

...as a midwesterner, I tend to blame it on tires. Having worked on cars for well, way too long now, there's only a handful that understand the importance of tires, and switch to winter tires for the winter. Then you have the majority that buy all season tires, because well, they're all season, surely they're great for the snow! And of that group, half of them have been ignoring the guy that services their vehicle that's been telling them all summer to buy tires before winter. So they're taking their car out with tires that are marginal for moderate rainfall and driving in snow. Ending up in the ditch while I cruise by at full expressway speeds with my winter tires wondering what their problem is.

Since it snows here on the gulf coast maybe once every five years and torrential rainstorms are frequent, all-season grand touring tires are pretty much ideal.

jss21382 wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

What the hell, man? I thought people Wisconsin "knew how to drive in the snow" or something:

http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/2013 ... ighway.php

Also: WHY IN THE HELL ARE YOU STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE HIGHWAY? YOU WANT TO GET RUN OVER BY CAR?

...as a midwesterner, I tend to blame it on tires. Having worked on cars for well, way too long now, there's only a handful that understand the importance of tires, and switch to winter tires for the winter. Then you have the majority that buy all season tires, because well, they're all season, surely they're great for the snow! And of that group, half of them have been ignoring the guy that services their vehicle that's been telling them all summer to buy tires before winter. So they're taking their car out with tires that are marginal for moderate rainfall and driving in snow. Ending up in the ditch while I cruise by at full expressway speeds with my winter tires wondering what their problem is.

For the past 4 years I had been using a mid-range set of winter tires, but decided to this year go out and get some Michelin X-ice 3's. What a difference. Unbelievable. Even my sister (who had previously driven with all-seasons) got some decent winters on (Goodyear Nordic's) and she's like "I don't slide anymore". Lol.

JustAnEngineer wrote:

Since it snows here on the gulf coast maybe once every five years and torrential rainstorms are frequent, all-season grand touring tires are pretty much ideal.

Whereas here in New England we all swear by Finnish snow tires that sound like your cat horking up a hairball, a/k/a Hakkapelliita.

Captain Ned wrote:

JustAnEngineer wrote:

Since it snows here on the gulf coast maybe once every five years and torrential rainstorms are frequent, all-season grand touring tires are pretty much ideal.

Whereas here in New England we all swear by Finnish snow tires that sound like your cat horking up a hairball, a/k/a Hakkapelliita.

Roger that, I have a set of studded Hakka 2's on the minivan and a set of Hakka R SUV's on the pontiac torrent. I try to support NellyCam's home country once in awhile

And Cpt. Ned LOL at the mouse carcasses, true enough though, I have seen older home 1930's with rags, crumpled up paper, sawdust, air, and who knows what else for insulation, I guess with free wood in those days (if you cut/chopped it yourself) people didn't care about heating then.

I am fortunate when it comes to good insulation, I bought my parents house, my dad built it in 1984 to the R-2000 spec.

Firestone Winterforce here, at least on anything they'll fit. They're cheap, and since heavy snowfall is a way bigger issue here than ice, they usually outperform all of the "better" winter tires.

anotherengineer wrote:

And Cpt. Ned LOL at the mouse carcasses, true enough though, I have seen older home 1930's with rags, crumpled up paper, sawdust, air, and who knows what else for insulation, I guess with free wood in those days (if you cut/chopped it yourself) people didn't care about heating then.

I can tell by the butchered framing in the cellar that the house was originally built with the usual (for New England) massive brick fireplace that probably had openings on both floors (and possibly the cellar as well). Once that mass of brick was warm and was kept warm, insulation was no longer an issue. Plenty of woods behind the house and most of it is black locust. It would have been a bitch to chop and split (you should see what 3/4" twigs do to lawnmower blades), but it's so dense that it would have burned forever with good heat.

Down to -17C! And were're down here in the "south" compared to you Canucks!

Some of you keep the house at 70? That is nuts. I would be burning up.

I never let the thermo go above 62 in the winter, and I live in a really old, drafty apartment.

chuckula wrote:

Down to -17C! And were're down here in the "south" compared to you Canucks!

We refer to your location as the "tropics".

DancinJack wrote:

Some of you keep the house at 70? That is nuts. I would be burning up.

I never let the thermo go above 62 in the winter, and I live in a really old, drafty apartment.

!?!!?!?! 70F is about 19-20C which is typical room temp. I guess you wouldn't do well in Hawaii or some place warm. Family went there last Christmas, and I think we all enjoyed shorts and t-shirts everyday. I think the coldest day there was 24C, but felt closer to 28C with the humidity.

DancinJack wrote:

Some of you keep the house at 70? That is nuts. I would be burning up.

I never let the thermo go above 62 in the winter, and I live in a really old, drafty apartment.

You either REALLY love the cold, or you just don't want to spend too much on heating a drafty apartment. I pulled our apartment down to 68 this week since we forgot to change when we switched from AC to heat. Our heating bill makde a lot more sense when I realized we were keeping our apartment at 73

superjawes wrote:

DancinJack wrote:

Some of you keep the house at 70? That is nuts. I would be burning up.

I never let the thermo go above 62 in the winter, and I live in a really old, drafty apartment.

You either REALLY love the cold, or you just don't want to spend too much on heating a drafty apartment. I pulled our apartment down to 68 this week since we forgot to change when we switched from AC to heat. Our heating bill makde a lot more sense when I realized we were keeping our apartment at 73

When I first moved into my first house, for my first winter I was super cheap so kept the house around 15C during the day, 17C in the evenings when I was home and 13C at night. That was cold and kinda miserable. Next winter I decided being cheap wasn't worth it and keep it at a much nicer 20C.

I mean, it's expensive to keep it a lot warmer, but honestly I just like it that cool. How my parents had it set growing up and I guess I just got used to it. I'd rather wear a sweatshirt for a few hours than pay a whole lot more at the end of the month.

When I first moved into my first house, for my first winter I was super cheap so kept the house around 15C during the day, 17C in the evenings when I was home and 13C at night. That was cold and kinda miserable. Next winter I decided being cheap wasn't worth it and keep it at a much nicer 20C.[/quote]

Ya especially in Ottawa, the winters aren't too bad there, for the extra 25 bucks a month I think I would keep it at 20C also.

During the winter, I prefer to keep it around 68F (20C) inside. That's probably a tad cooler than what most folks would consider comfortable, but when I'm moving around doing things, I don't notice it at all. When I'm sitting still (watching TV, etc), I'll just pull a light blanket over me, and I'm golden.

I could probably survive at 62F were I capable of keeping my toes warm. I normally wear a robe at home anyway, but sitting at a computer, a blanket doesn't really help me, and my slippers can only do so much.

Captain Ned wrote:

Built around 1875 and is insulated by mouse carcasses and whatever else has fallen in the walls since then. Finally have enough equity and income to do something about that next year.

Oh, yuck, I hope you're going to be blow-filling from the exterior and/or attic. I tore down some wood lathe and plaster, once. I hope not to do that again for, oh, life.

ludi wrote:

Captain Ned wrote:

Built around 1875 and is insulated by mouse carcasses and whatever else has fallen in the walls since then. Finally have enough equity and income to do something about that next year.

Oh, yuck, I hope you're going to be blow-filling from the exterior and/or attic. I tore down some wood lathe and plaster, once. I hope not to do that again for, oh, life.

Blown-in all the way. Spent too much time and $$ painting those walls to rip them out now. The delicate problem is that 2 sides of the house still have the old asbestos shingles which clearly have to go before the insulation company shows up. It's probably the safest form of asbestos around, so I plan to take them off myself and if the town shows up just play the dumb homeowner who doesn't know any better.

We are up to 30 today. We have been -18 to +10 F the past week. Glad the buildup under our cars will melt.

It's warmed up to -15C here today, or 2F. Also I had no idea DeanJo lived near-ish to me. ( I used to be axeman, but then I got perm-banned by accident, I hope, for replying to a spam post...trying to be funny)

Fun times!

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/weather/wcstates.htm

The real question is, what temperature do you go camping at? I've been in the teens F a few times, but nothing colder.