New here - furnace vs stove for house in CT

mfglickman · Jan 17, 2012

Hi,

I am in NW CT, purchased a 1758 cape style house in November. It has a 2010 Armstrong forced hot air oil furnace in the crawlspace (accessed from outside and ceiling is about 5 feet high. On a cold day (25 or less) it's hard to get the first floor up tp 65, and the second floor bedrooms are in the low-mid 50's I'd guess. We have the thermostat set at 65/60 but there's no way the second floor gets 60. There are vents up there, FWIW, and we had them cleaned a month ago.

We have one working fireplace, in the addition, which is a 35 X 19 room. This fireplace does not heat the room, only the space in front of it. And we have a hearth in the "old" part of the house that could potentially be rehabbed for a pellet stove, depending on what would need to be done. I want to keep its old charm as much as possible.

So I am trying to decide whether a stove /2 stoves or a pellet furnace would be right for our house. Two stoves would roughly be the same price or more than the furnace, I think. My goal is to be less reliant on non renewable fossil fuels and to be comfortably warm in the whole house as needed. There is generally someone home most of the day.

Here's a pic. The old part of the house is closest to you; the addition is to the far left, with a chimney on the far left wall (e.g. there is no "ell", it just stretches across with the same roofline). Bedrooms are on either end of the second floor.

Any advice/suggestions from BTDT folks greatly appreciated!

Mary

jtakeman · Jan 17, 2012

Welcome Mary,

Will need some more info to help you. The actual sqft of the house and Some details like the how well its insulated. If you could also post the BTU's of the furnace that might help.

Fireplaces only heat a small area, As most of the actual heat goes up the chimney. A stove should warm the room you discribed , But you might not have an easy time getting any of the heat to other parts of the house.

mfglickman · Jan 17, 2012

Hi there, sorry. The house is about 2100 square feet. I don't know the BTUs of the furnace but it was installed a year ago by the previous owners; I'd like to think it should heat the whole house but I guess you never know.

Insulation, what's that? LOL. Well really I think there is some, there are definitely pink batts in the attic crawlspaces, but there's not a lot and the original structure is from 1758.

Thanks!
Mary

Bkins · Jan 17, 2012

Sounds to me that you are trying to heat the outside. If a one year old new furnace will not get the house up t

bill3rail · Jan 17, 2012

mfglickman said:
Hi there, sorry. The house is about 2100 square feet. I don't know the BTUs of the furnace but it was installed a year ago by the previous owners; I'd like to think it should heat the whole house but I guess you never know.

Insulation, what's that? LOL. Well really I think there is some, there are definitely pink batts in the attic crawlspaces, but there's not a lot and the original structure is from 1758.

Thanks!
Mary

With a house of that age, if you want to reduce dependency on fossil fuels, INSULATION will be the first step!
Then you can decide what stoves to go with.
In my uneducated guess, I would say the old world charm will be lost minimally with a pellet stove.

Bill

Please try to get the picture of the house loaded.

silverfox103 · Jan 18, 2012

Hi Mary, Welcome!

You have the right idea to reduce the oilman visits. As others have said, the first thing that you have to have done, is improve the insulation. Without doing that, the pellet stoves wouldn't make a bit of difference. Having owned an old home before, I know insulating is a priority. It might be a good idea to have an energy audit. Sometimes utility companies offer that for free or reduced rates. There are also programs by the utility companies or state programs that offer "deals" on insulating. Having a new furnace is also a good thing as you will need it at some time, even if you a couple of pellet stoves.

Tom C.

CtPaul · Jan 18, 2012

Hi Mary,

I can relate...I have an old lake house just outside Waterbury area. My house had no insulation I have added some and it helped. I just recently had Wesson do and energy audit. (like Silverfox recommended) It only cost me $75 because it is part of a co-op program with the state and the power company (I think). They sealed up some air leaks and identified/prioritized areas that need attention. I only have R19 between the 2nd floor and the attic. No insulation in the roof. My plan over the next few weeks is to caulk , foam and insulate to reduce the air infiltration in the house. Also depending on your situation you may qualify for rebates on improvements (i.e. insulation)

http://www.cl-p.com/home/saveenergy/rebates/homeenergysolutions.aspx

SmokeyTheBear · Jan 18, 2012

x2 on an energy audit, likely between the insulation situation and air leakage in your house just about anything is fighting an uphill struggle.

I don't do recommendations on what to buy usually there is not enough information provided.

Whatever you do get needs to be able the satisfy the btu loss figure for your house on the normal coldest day at the middle firing rate setting of the stove/furnace this allows the stove or furnace a chance to rest and if needed to recover the house's temperature in a reasonable amount of time when it has to be down for cleaning or you have handle record cold.

If your current system could handle the job we could somewhat back into the heat loss figure that was used in figuring out what size furnace to install.

76brian · Jan 18, 2012

There is no doubt in my mind a pellet stove will make your house warmer. It might not work as your only heat source but anything that helps cut down on oil usage is a good thing IMO, and a pellet stove (or even 2!) will definitely do that.

My place is smaller but it has no insulation in the walls or the crawlspace. When I was heating with a propane furnace (installed 2004, now useless. long story), the place always felt cold no matter what I set the thermostat to. Now with the pellet stove, it's warm all over and will cost me about half as much to heat for the winter.

mfglickman · Jan 18, 2012

Thanks all - I have a home energy audit set up for late February (ugh!) but in the meantime I have 3 insulation contractors coming to look in the next week. There are currently no incentives for insulation through CT Energy Savers so there's no sense in freezing till the audit.

I have coupons from a couple of the mfr sites that expire end of January - Harman and Quadra, I think...do they run these often?

Thanks again,
Mary

P.S. The picture is correct but the board software is translating the spaces in the album name to different characters when I inspect the img element. Here's the link, though the image won't display unless you copy/paste it.

Code:

http://s290.photobucket.com/albums/ll243/superdog_photos/foundations and beams/?action=view&current=1323131180.jpg

ETA - OK I am stumped, I used the <code> tag to keep the spaces as 'percenttwenty' and it still pulled them out. Grrrr.

76brian · Jan 18, 2012

mfglickman said:
Thanks all - I have a home energy audit set up for late February (ugh!) but in the meantime I have 3 insulation contractors coming to look in the next week. There are currently no incentives for insulation through CT Energy Savers so there's no sense in freezing till the audit.

I have coupons from a couple of the mfr sites that expire end of January - Harman and Quadra, I think...do they run these often?

Thanks again,
Mary

P.S. The picture is correct but the board software is translating the spaces in the album name to different characters when I inspect the img element. Here's the link, though the image won't display unless you copy/paste it.

Code:

http://s290.photobucket.com/albums/ll243/superdog_photos/foundations and beams/?action=view&current=1323131180.jpg

ETA - OK I am stumped, I used the <code> tag to keep the spaces as 'percenttwenty' and it still pulled them out. Grrrr.

That's a URL for a page, not an image. You can embed an image but not a page. Also, a URL shortener, like http://goo.gl will remove all the funny characters. http://goo.gl/om226

edit: I love the stone and the beams, that's a very cool place.

mfglickman · Jan 18, 2012

76brian said:
That's a URL for a page, not an image. You can embed an image but not a page. Also, a URL shortener, like http://goo.gl will remove all the funny characters. http://goo.gl/om226

edit: I love the stone and the beams, that's a very cool place.

Beg to differ - ends in .jpg is a URL for the image - ETA nevermind, guess it's a page with an action VIEW. But even if you copy the board img tag it doesn't work here, though it does work on other forums I frequent.

Glad you were able to see it, though! Board software seems a little wonky stripping out the chars even if I use the code tag!

silverfox103 · Jan 18, 2012

mfglickman said:
Thanks all - I have a home energy audit set up for late February (ugh!) but in the meantime I have 3 insulation contractors coming to look in the next week. There are currently no incentives for insulation through CT Energy Savers so there's no sense in freezing till the audit.

Mary

Mary, you're moving in the right direction. I looked at your pictures, looks like your foundation is fieldstone/rock. I would think about having that sprayed with foam insulation. It would seal everything. I am sure cold air, dampness and maybe even water are coming in. That would make a big difference, but you would loose the "rustic" look. I was in charge of a project on our Church hall. It is a 100 years old, the foundation was built with very large granite blocks and field stone. Air, dampness and water found many paths until we had it spray sealed/insulated. It made a big difference in heating also.

Keep us updated.

Tom C.

epehubb · Jan 18, 2012

Mary,

The energy audit will give you a good idea of where you have "leaks" and "losses" in the house i.e. where you need to insulate because of heat losses (such as uninsulated or poorly insualted walls/attic/crawl spaces), which is not the same as places where there are open leaks (such as around widows/doors). When you know what you have in the walls and attic, you should be able do a complete heat loss calculation. A heat loss calculator can be found for free in the web. Any decent contractor would do this before selling you and new HVAC system. It will take you some time but it's free for you to do. You will then have a heat loss figure you can work with, starting with whether the furnace you have is adequate or not. If the furnace IS adequate based on it's rating, then there is probably a problem with its installation or operational functioning.

I would do all that before I buy any new equipment or stove, and as stated previously in this thread, I would address the "loss" and "leak" recommendations of the energy audit first.

rwthomas1 · Jan 18, 2012

Insulate! Insulate! Insulate! I'm a contractor and work on many old homes, the best money you can spend is on insulation. I would shoot for a minimum R30 in the attic, R38 is now code in RI for new builds. A blown in cap of fiberglass would be my choice. Have the walls blown in as well, shoot the inside of the fieldstone foundation and sill plates with foam. If its a dirt floor crawlspace it should be sealed off with heavy taped plastic sheeting if possible. The difference will be quite noticeable. Doesn't matter what you are heating with if the heat just flows out and away. Get some bids and if there are differences in what they recommend ask them why? Insulation is cheap compared to paying for btu's. If your house is as bad as some I've seen the payoff may be just a few seasons with the added benefit of a much more comfortable home. RT

mfglickman · Jan 18, 2012

Hi all,

So this is a house built in 1758 by someone who fought in the Revolutionary War. It's a historic property and while it's not on the national register I do need to maintain its integrity. I own it...for now. But it's more like stewardship. So my gut says that spraying foam over dry laid foundation stones is not going to happen.

Blowing insulation into the walls and increasing it in the attic crawlspaces, even laying batts out along the joists between floorboards from underneath the house are all possibilities.

Hate to jump the gun but I am curious whether furnace or stove/s might work best when we do add a biomass heat source. Or do I need all the calculations to figure that out? Bear with me, it's coooold in here!

Attaching a rough floorplan. The furnace is located approximately underneath the stair/sitting in the old part of the house...the crawlspace under the addition is very shallow - like you should weigh less than 150 lbs and be at least 5'8 to get under there, and even then, you should not be claustrophobic!

Eta the MBR on the plan is actually the guestroom. One bedroom
is above the family room and the other bedroom is at the opposite end above the l-shaped room.

CtPaul · Jan 18, 2012

Make sure you do your research about insulating a field stone foundation. I am looking into it now. I encapsulated my crawlspace and insulated between the crawl and first floor. However some accounts i have read say if you insulate a rubble/fieldstone foundation then is could affect the mortar. So I'm holding off until I can do more research..Gotta love old houses always something!!

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New here - furnace vs stove for house in CT

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