Our pediatrician asked if we burned wood ...

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My wife is very ocd when it comes to cleaning and just about anything else,if our stove was making alot of mess or smoke i would hear about it.i do get a bit of smoke on reload but nothing to about
Likewise. We were just commenting on how much more dust we see in the summer. Suspect this is mostly tree pollens and dust from the driveway.
 
One apparent problem with the article is that it focuses on families who are having respiratory problems, and identifies wood stoves as the reason. This indicates wood stoves can be a problem but does not provide any way to evaluate what percentage of wood stove owners have problems. It also doesn't address the question of whether one can have a wood stove and not have a problem.
 
Quite aside from combustion products, wood heat can increase the mould load in the house, depending upon wood dryness and storage.
Mould products are major triggers for asthma, even in people without the intrinsic genetic susceptibility. Exposure to some mould products triggers the same pathways that are genetically activated in susceptible people.
I heard a seminar last week from the guy who helped prove this.
 
I think everybody should save themselves and their families from the dangers of heating with wood by sending their wood supplies to me at 567 sycamore lane, somerville nj 08876

thank you
 
Perhaps even beyond the Middle Ages in Britain and western Europe, but in Russia and Finland the idea was to get every last BTU from their fires to stay inside the channels of their masonry heaters. That would mean little if any smoke in the dwelling. A hot and quick fire yielded very little in the way of particulate matter, but plenty of heat that was retained by the masonry.

It's a sad reality that such great technology was not incorporated into the homes built during the early settlement of the northernmost states here. I imagine that if the original central heating of my 1700s cape was a well-built and well-designed masonry heater rather than a three-fireplace center chimney system, I could still heat my entire house with wood, in that original heater, about as cleanly and efficiently and cheaply as I do now with a modern EPA stove.

Agreed - as the book progresses, they talk about the "little ice age" as the one thing that propelled development of high-efficiency wood furnaces, tile stoves and the like... the first "patent" appearing some 7 years after what we generally consider the "beginning" of that period. Mentions of european cities where significant percentages of the population died of cold over a winter, firewood shortages, the expansive exploration of coppicing & pollarding to address the "fuel crisis" brought on by the extended cold + snowy period, etc.

I can't recall how the timeline went in Russia, but I believe they had this sort of tech long before the europeans got the kick in the butt...

It's just bad timing that the "new world" was discovered just before then.
 
The research is solid and one of the reasons why the EPA is/was pushing for stricter emission limits. Nevertheless, the article is written pretty sloppy. Take this one:

Of course, because they burned pressure-treated wood in their old smokedragon. Here is the study: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=wisconsin wood stove arsenic
However, the article let's it appear as that could be a potential side effect of woodburning.

Any research paper that states "8 family's" instead of "8 families" is very suspect to me. I have not looked at the article at this point but if it uses only 8 families as a sample that is not representative of anything.
 
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My old VC used to leave a slight smoke smell in the room but my Hearthstone leaves no smell at all. Mostly, I attribute it to a much better draft with a new chimney and making sure I burn drier wood. I think the health risk is very dependant upon the stove, the installation and the operator.

I would counter the wood stove study with the ones that are showing a remarkable difference in children's allergies between city kids and farm kids. A new study I saw on PBS 2 nights ago showed that Amish farm kids have almost no allergies at all. About 1/100th of the normal! Their environments were clean but not overly sanitized. The theory is that dust and dirt exposure at an early age substantially reduced allergies in children. It seems counter intuitive but the stats are very clear. Kids suffer from far more allergies when raised in an overly clean environment. You'll find a wood stove in the Amish farm homes too.

The point: IMHO using a wood stove that is installed and operated correctly may lessen health problems if other conditions in the home also expose the child to a wide variety of dirt and dust. I reached the point many years ago that I question every study and statistic I hear about. Almost everything is done for a purpose and most of them benefit big pharma.
 
Would it help to get one of those electric fans the pulls air up the flu. One could turn it on during reloads to prevent wood from being released into the home.

Of late, I'm starting to smell a bit of wood smoke off the top of my stove again. Major bummer; I thought we were done with that problem. Really frustrating. Blaze King tested it and found it tight. I don't know what the problem is this time.
I've been burning one of my Ashfords for two weeks now, and noticing the same. The Jotul Firelights never let an ounce of smoke smell into the house, but just a week into lighting the Ashford, the house smells like smoke. Not enough to completely bother us... yet, but a very noticeable difference over my old stoves. I remember you and two others having the same problem, last year.

We are all asthmatics in my house, myself being the one with the most accute symptoms. We'll have to see how this winter goes, but I'm hoping these stoves let off less smoke smell, once the real cold weather hits.
 
I've been burning one of my Ashfords for two weeks now, and noticing the same. The Jotul Firelights never let an ounce of smoke smell into the house, but just a week into lighting the Ashford, the house smells like smoke. Not enough to completely bother us... yet, but a very noticeable difference over my old stoves. I remember you and two others having the same problem, last year.

We are all asthmatics in my house, myself being the one with the most accute symptoms. We'll have to see how this winter goes, but I'm hoping these stoves let off less smoke smell, once the real cold weather hits.
I'm sorry to hear that. I've left a message for BKVP to call me. I'm hoping maybe he or someone from Blaze King can swing by when they're in the area to assess what's going on. If it's user error or a faulty gasket or a leak in the box, maybe it can be fixed. If the stove is releasing smoke through the cat probe hole, I might have to go with a different stove (which would suck because I love this stove).
 
Another point to consider I thought of while reading.... I just upgraded my thermostat to an Ecobee3. One main selling point was you can independently control the fan to set a minimum run time for an hour. I wanted this to circulate the air in the house when burning. An added benefit would seem to be pulling any particles out of the air because I have aa hepa filter on the furnace. I wander what particle size smoke is. I never smell any smoke in the house with my Enviro cabello insert.
 
Having traveled the 3rd world extensively and having been in shanties/homes with open fires and stoves, I've seen the horrific affects of smoke and particulate matter on children. We have four children and have a Progress Hybrid woodstove. One concern when we installed the woodstove 2 years ago was how it would affect our family's health. Thankfully we have had no health or lung related issues due to the woodstove. I would definitely speak with your pediatrician about potential affects of the woodstove. I would also look at the particulate matter that your stove produces. Sometimes we make a bigger deal than necessary in that seasonal allergies can cause lung problems at various times throughout the year but it is better to proceed on the side of caution than to potential cause harm to your child. Hope you figure out your situation.....
 
I have a husky and two cats and trust me the dust and pollution in my house from them is worse than anything else including my wood burners. I don't like non EPA stoves and units being called smoke dragons. Completely up to the operator and all of us cannot afford the best newest highest efficiency stoves.
 
For those burning and for those that have forced hot air, it would be curious to run the fan on circulation (with clean white paper element) for a week (using the stove) and see what ends up on the filter.
 
My circulation fan with filter runs almost 24/7. Like i said for me personally house is always a bit dusty with all these animals. If you got a good 3m filter and ran it it would help to cut airborne pollutans down for sure
 
My circulation fan with filter runs almost 24/7. Like i said for me personally house is always a bit dusty with all these animals. If you got a good 3m filter and ran it it would help to cut airborne pollutans down for sure
...that's what I'm thinking...
 
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My circulation fan with filter runs almost 24/7. Like i said for me personally house is always a bit dusty with all these animals. If you got a good 3m filter and ran it it would help to cut airborne pollutans down for sure
larger particles, the size of which like pollen you can see.
It's smaller particles that are often more troublesome.
Even people who believe they are allergic to ragweed or tree pollen in the Spring because they can see it and develop symptoms are victim of erroneous cause and causation correlations when they find out they are actually allergic to mold spores or mold mycotoxins or simple bacterial blooms that just happen to happen at the same time.
Not that anyone should be suggesting an attempt at visual cleanliness is for naught.


One of those city/country kid studies determined it was a bacteria growing on breaking down mold on dairy farms and the reason they were able to dup[licate some of the findings in in some european settings was because of the number of kids who got outside when they are young and smelled the fresh country air.
 
The better the filter the smaller the particulate it will filter
 
I have asthma and have an epa wood stove. Doesn't bother me
 
I have asthma and have an epa wood stove. Doesn't bother me

Curious to know if your asthma played a role in the stove you ended up with. In other words, did you buy your Napoleon knowing it would be ok for your health, or did it happen to come with the house when you purchased it?
 
Curious to know if your asthma played a role in the stove you ended up with. In other words, did you buy your Napoleon knowing it would be ok for your health, or did it happen to come with the house when you purchased it?
I had asthma before burning wood. Pick Napoleon because I got a good deal on it, otherwise it would have been a different brand
 
I dont see how an epa vs. Non epa stove would affect the indoor air quality. I would think bad draft/chimney setup and carelessness on reloading causing smoke spillage and things of that nature would be legitimate factors.
 
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