BK Ashford 30 questions

Hi all,

I'm new here and I was hoping you could help with a few questions.

I currently have a Newmac forced air wood/oil furnace in the basement which is very inefficient, old and has to go. My wife and I bought our house about a year ago and we knew we would have to replace the furnace.

I've decided as we're going to buy something new now is the best time to change our heating system if want to. Forced air is nice but we've decided we would prefer a wood stove in the living room. I've been doing some reading and research and I think the BK Ashford 30 is what I'm heading towards.

I got a quote for the stove + stovepipe + install which was around $5500. Do you think this is a fair quote or a bit high? I'm fine with it but I wonder what others paid? I could install it myself and save $1000 but when it comes to heating and things that could burn your house down I think it's worth it to pay a little more for a professional.

So another question I have is clearance. I'm planning on having the stove in the corner of the room diagonally across the corner "kitty-corner". I looked at the clearances on the manual which I'll link :

http://blazeking.com/PDF/manuals/en/wood/OM-AF30 E V1.02.pdf

The side clearance "E" from the back of the stove to the wall seems to be four inches. Isn't that not very much clearance? I was expecting more like 10-12 inches? Anyone who does have this stove in the same setup, what is your clearance? Is it because the part of the stove "E" is measured from doesn't get hot and the actual part of the stove which does get hot is another 8ish inches in front of that which would mean a clearance from that point to the wall would be more like 10 inches? I hope this makes sense.

One of the main reasons I'm going for the Ashford 30 is the long burn time. Are there any other stoves any of you would recommend which have high burn times? The idea of not touching the stove for possibly 30 hours and having a nice warm house is very appealing to me.

Thanks for any help, Shane.

Dave, I've thought about it a lot and talked with my wife a lot about it and one main reason we're going for a wood stove which I forgot to mention was power outages. We seem to get them somewhat frequently in the winter. This year we had a big ice storm which I know isn't usual but the power was out at one point for four days. Then it was on for a day then a few more days out etc. I feel pretty certain that we'll get a couple of power outages throughout the winter and when that happens the wood stove will work just the same. I was thinking of replacing the furnace for the same thing just newer and more efficient but I decided on getting a wood stove for the times when the power is out. Then I stumbled on the 30 hour burn times of the Blaze king. I know it wont heat the whole house as evenly as the furnace but our kitchin/dining room/living room is pretty open so those areas will be perfectly warm and the bedrooms will be cooler but I like that. I don't know how well it will work and it is a bit of a risk but I know if I just switch the furnace which will cost a lot more I'll probably not get a wood stove for a while if at all. So if I get the wood stove first and it doesn't work out then in a year or two I'll get the furnace and have the stove as a backup. It's a risk but from what I see here most people seem very happy with their BK Ashford.

Badger, the quote does include the flue/stove pipe. unfortunately where the pipe would come through the roof it's quite low down and next to a dormer which means I'll have to have a pretty long stove pipe and braces to follow the 10-2 rule which bumps the price up a fair bit. I was quoted 3400 for the stove 1000 for install and about 1000 for the pipe and materials.

Does anyone have any information on the clearance?

Yep I went with the BK Ashford. I have the hearth ready and as BrotherBart said it's being installed on friday. The wife and I cannot wait. The temps are supposed to drop pretty low so we should get to test it out. I'll be sure to let everyone know how it works out.

The house is about 2600 square feet. It's about 25 years old. Not too sure on the insulation, it has fiberglass in the walls but I haven't really had time to check how thick it is. I do have to get some of those foam gaskets to put over the electrical sockets on the exterior walls. Could feel drafts from them last winter. Also I'm trying to figure out the best way to seal my windows a little tighter. They are double hung double glazed aluminum clad wooden windows but a couple are a little drafty.

In the end I couldn't have it kitty-cornered. If I did I would have had to have had it at an awkward angle and the hearth sticking out past the doorway. The wife and I really wanted the hearth to be flush with the doorway. Even though it's going to be flush with the wood flooring that eventually goes down it just looks nicer to not protrude past the doorway. I tiled the floor for the stove about three weeks ago. I used a ceramic tile on top of 1/4" durock. It's slightly over 3/4 of an inch thick in total which is just about perfect. I'm also in the middle of re doing all the wood work in the house. So ignore the ugly stop in the baseboard where it meets the register. I had to install the baseboard around the stove or I wouldn't get another chance. I'm pretty happy with how it came out.

bcphillips said:

Sounds great. I'm jealous. My cracked VC Encore is being replaced in full under warranty. VC really does provide good customer/warranty service, or at least has for me 4 times in the last 4 years. I just think the Blaze King technology is better suited for my little house... hopefully my local dealer will get in contact with Blaze King and deal for them in the future.

Let us know how it turns out for you. Can I ask why such a delay? I see you were looking back in February? Is the wait for an Ashford 30 long?

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No real reason for the delay. We didn't want to do something back then as we were nearing the end of winter I just wanted to do a good solid bit of research before I made the switch. As the current forced air furnace needs replacing it was the perfect time to do a switch. I'll keep it down there and have it serviced in case we need the extra heat or for some horrible reason need to use the oil.

So I got the quote and did a lot of research and now as winter is coming it was time to finally get it sorted. I also tend to over think things as I did with the hearth. I'm still paranoid about it. BK is still pretty new around here I guess? or atleast the lack of needing the hearth to have thermal protection. The dealer I got my Ashford from had never heard of only needing ember protection - unless he misunderstood me?

The wait wasn't long for the Ashford. I believe I placed the order 4-5 weeks ago. Most of the delay was the installers being backlogged so I had to wait a few weeks for an install date.

I thought it was strange too. Maybe it was my English accent and they misunderstood me.

And she's in. We're really pleased with how it looks.... but we want fire! The installers told us we had to wait 24 hours for whatever sealant/caulk they had to use to fully dry. So tomorrow we could light it around 3pm but I think I'll wait til sunday morning so I can open the windows and let all the smoke/smells go outside when the paint is curing. Really can't wait to light it. I've already built a fire, all I need is to put a lit match in!

webby3650 said:

I also thought it looked like single wall pipe. How far is it from the wall?

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It is single wall pipe and it's 16.5 inches from the wall. Is that ok? Where it enters the ceiling it changes to double walled insulated pipe. I followed your advice and had a fire today and I love the new stove. I'll upload some photos.

Here are pictures. Loaded the stove with about 8 splits, some newspaper, quarter of a super cedar and a little kindling. Lit the fire top down and it caught very fast. Once it was going nicely I closed the door fully. Let it burn on high until the thermometer was in the active zone (about thirty minutes). Then I closed the bypass. I wanted to get the stove hot to cure the paint so i left it on high for quite a while. I kept checking the temps with an infrared thermometer I got (stupidly realizing it only goes upto 300 degrees) Once it got to a temp above what the thermometer could read I turned the thermostat down to 2.5 and left it there. There was some smoke coming off and smells but it really wasn't too bad. I had all the windows open. After about 4 hours I added a couple more splits and got it really hot again. Then I turned it down to 2 and closed all the windows and doors as no smoke seemed to be coming off and it hardly smelled. And my wife was cold. After 4 hours of splitting and stacking I came in to a nice bed of embers and a very warm house. I put 4 splits on and got her going again. After about 30 minutes I turned it down to 2.5 and left it there. The last picture was taken as I wrote this. You can see my dogs new favourite spot.

A couple of questions. The thermostat goes up to 3 but after 3 I see another dot which would be 3.5 and I can turn it even more to where 4 would be. Is this normal and is it actually letting in more air at "4" is that "really high" ??

My wife was worried when I was out that the fire was out as it was hardly glowing but still in the active zone and putting out heat. I told her it was fine. Is there any indication other than the thermometer being in the active zone that the fire is still going? Should the catalytic combuster be glowing all the time?

Think that's the only two questions I had as of now. It's currently 38 outside and we have a frost advisory. Right now it's 70 in the living room (where the stove is)

Oh and also - in total we put in about 15 medium/smallish splits today. We burned from 9am to now which is 10pm, mostly on high (3). And there are still quite a lot of embers and a couple of decent size pieces in the firebox.