Wanted: A larger replacement for a VC Aspen

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BrianMat

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Jan 11, 2016
10
Gwinn, MI
We used a Vermont Castings Aspen for ten years and were quite happy with it. While we chose it based partly upon its good looking appearance, we came to value it even more for its unique combination of features.

I like the end-loading feature, as it makes loading easier & safer (if added wood disturbs the burning logs, they roll to either side, rather than head for a wide front door). I also like the long stove dimension heading into the room, rather than being parallel to the wall behind it (like a Jotul F118). This configuration radiates most of the heat to either side, rather than heating the wall behind the stove. Note that such stoves do not have, or require, rear heat plenum/shields and blowers.

The thermostatic control of the primary air is very simple and very effective. Just load up the stove, set the control for the heat desired, and leave it alone. I really don't understand why most wood stoves don't have this feature...

The internal ash drawer, located just below the fire grate, is a real joy. Most importantly, any ash dust is contained behind the gasketed front door.

The chimney outlet can be either vertical, or out the back. We use a straight vertical, double-walled SS chimney, with no elbows. Cleaning the chimney makes the creasote fall directly into the stove. Simply remove the back cover (2 screws) and vacuum it out! I've never had an easier chimney cleanout.

So, if we liked this stove so much, why am I writing? Basically, it's TOO SMALL. 16" log capability is listed, but 14" is about right. As I cut my own, this isn't a show-stopper. However, one hard winter when my seasoned wood ran out, I had to buy a few face cords. Bottom line, I had to chainsaw the ends off most of the pieces....The small firebox does not allow all night burns....The small ash drawer doesn't hold enough....And last, the loading door is so low that it's easiest to use on your knees; as a retiree, this becomes more of a problem....

So my question is: What larger stove is out there that has most of the good features? A welded plate steel stove is entirely acceptable & would help keep the cost down.

Thanks,

BrianMat,

Gwinn, MI
 
Welcome. Before talking about larger stoves, how large an area are you heating?

If looking for a larger stove, have you considered the F118CB? Jotul redid the secondary rack assembly several years back. It is supposed to be much improved. The Morso 2110, Jotul F400 and
In larger steel stoves at 1.8-2 cu ft there are the True North TN19 or TN20, the Englander 13NC, and a little larger is the Englander (aka Summer's Heat brand) Madison sold as the model 50ssw01.

Then there are several, attractive steel stoves clad in castiron that are very nice heaters. There are the Quadrafire Explorer II or Yosemite, Pacific Energy Alderlea T4, Envrio Boston 1200, Jotul F45, Napoleon 1400c, and others.
 
Thanks for the quick reply!

I've looked up all the models you've listed, but most are not end loaders that are perpendicular to the wall, which is what I'm looking for. The Jotul F118CB is perhaps the closest, but thanks for bringing my attention to the True North models as I wasn't aware of them. The only additional one I've found is the Vogelzang Durango (TR008). None of these, however, have ash drawers or thermostatic control as the Aspen does. It appears that the larger Aspen equivalent doesn't exist.

I'm puzzled by how many preset day stoves have the same concept, with lots of competitors, while there are very few end loaders like the Jotul F118CB.

BrianMat
 
Box stoves are not too common. There is a steel box stove made by Buck, the 261, but it may be too large. Tell use more about the space you are heating.
 
Ours is a well insulated, 1300 square foot, single level residence located in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Lake Superior is about 20 miles away, so we get cold. The Buck stove looks interesting also, thanks.

BrianMat
 
I would forget about the box stove configuration and consider a Blaze King Sirocco or Ashford if the goal is 24/7 heating with thermostatic regulation. Or perhaps a Woodstock Keystone?
 
I think the primary purpose of the cigar design is to be used in tight spaces where there isn't room for a normal shaped and sized stove. It's interesting that you prefer this design since most people talk about the disadvantages; i.e. uneven burn, lack of space for wood, short burn times etc. But I'm certainly not trying to tell you to change your mind. If you like what you like then go with it. The problem is that once a stove gets bigger it is generally assumed that the user has more space for the stove so they design it the normal way. Incidentally, I'm pretty sure the standard stove design is at least partly a result of the way fireplaces are shaped.
 
Thanks for the comments gentlemen,

The problem is not that I don't wish to modify my hearth or chimney, but that I consider the box/cigar design to be much better. I didn't mean to convey that we are woodstove "newbies", as we have been heating with wood for over 40 years. In that time we have had many different stove configurations (including a catalytic Elm). I really am not interested in owning another catalytic, by the way. I am looking for simpler/less expensive stove. The following are reasons I prefer the box/cigar configuration:

1. With "normal" stoves, the main heat radiating directions are front & rear. Heating the rear wall is a waste, so most of the "normal" stoves have heat plenums & blowers to deal with this. The front radiation, as you'd expect, heats very well in front, perhaps too well. The side ends of the room are much cooler (less hot). With the box/cigar, the rear wall is not toasted, nor is the area in front of the stove overheated. Instead the heat is distributed more evenly throughout the room. And, I don't have to listen to an annoying blower....

2. Most of the recommended stoves list 16" or 18" log length maximum. Contrast this to 24" for the Jotul F118, or 26" for the Vogelzang Durango, which, by the way, lists a 12 hour burn!

3. Ease of loading/safety. Go ahead, open the wide front door of a "normal" stove, with several burning logs inside. Then toss in a few pieces of wood, say to load up for the night, and see what happens. If you're not real careful, the burning logs will roll towards the wide open door! With a cigar stove, the disturbed logs will roll towards either side, not towards the door.....inherently much safer...

My original query was to find out if there was a larger version of the VC Aspen design, retaining most, or all, it's features. Apparently not....

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
 
I forgot to respond to your comment revdocjim,

Your comment about standard stove design being the result of fireplace shapes is right, I suspect. Think back to the classic fireplaces in days of old, where a large stone/masonry chimney was located on an outside wall (with no insulation from the outside). Trying to heat up the masonry was a lost cause, so the fireboxes were tall & wide, and shallow in depth. This allowed as much radiant energy to go into the room as possible. We've all seen such classic fireplaces in ski lodges or pub/restaurants. They look very impressive and you bask in front of them admiringly. However, if you step just a few feet to either side of the opening, almost all heat is gone! I suspect modern stoves, now with glass picture windows, are trying to recreate the direct frontal view of those lodge classics. Now, however, with the stand-alone metal wood stoves, the desired design is different, as I discussed previously.

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
 
BrianMat said:
Thanks for the comments gentlemen,

The problem is not that I don't wish to modify my hearth or chimney, but that I consider the box/cigar design to be much better. I didn't mean to convey that we are woodstove "newbies", as we have been heating with wood for over 40 years. In that time we have had many different stove configurations (including a catalytic Elm). I really am not interested in owning another catalytic, by the way. I am looking for simpler/less expensive stove. The following are reasons I prefer the box/cigar configuration:

1. With "normal" stoves, the main heat radiating directions are front & rear. Heating the rear wall is a waste, so most of the "normal" stoves have heat plenums & blowers to deal with this. The front radiation, as you'd expect, heats very well in front, perhaps too well. The side ends of the room are much cooler (less hot). With the box/cigar, the rear wall is not toasted, nor is the area in front of the stove overheated. Instead the heat is distributed more evenly throughout the room. And, I don't have to listen to an annoying blower....

2. Most of the recommended stoves list 16" or 18" log length maximum. Contrast this to 24" for the Jotul F118, or 26" for the Vogelzang Durango, which, by the way, lists a 12 hour burn!

3. Ease of loading/safety. Go ahead, open the wide front door of a "normal" stove, with several burning logs inside. Then toss in a few pieces of wood, say to load up for the night, and see what happens. If you're not real careful, the burning logs will roll towards the wide open door! With a cigar stove, the disturbed logs will roll towards either side, not towards the door.....inherently much safer...

My original query was to find out if there was a larger version of the VC Aspen design, retaining most, or all, it's features. Apparently not....

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
Click to expand...
Surface area is surface area. The rear wall is rarely toasted because most stoves have a rear shield that convect the heat upward. Some stoves like side loaders (ie: Jotul F500, Woodstock Fireview) are essentially a box stove turned around 90º. I've had both and the heating is near equal. Firebox size has greater bearing. One major downside of box stoves is they have a lousy fireview in comparison to other designs. That is worth the ticket of admission IMO. Log length is not a big deal. Most delivered and cut wood is 16-18". It's what we cut to also. Box stoves also need greater side clearances due to the side radiance.

Ignore the Durango burn time stat, it's marketing. Blaze King is one of the few stoves to publish actual burn times and continuous btu output.
 
You're quite correct, most stoves have a rear shield that convects heat upwards. The long rear dimension of the stove puts out a lot of radiant energy. When this hits the rear shield, it converts to convection heat that heads up to the ceiling (usually aided by a fan). I far prefer to have both long sides of the stove radiating outward to room contents, like people and far walls. And I don't have to listen to the fan....You're right in that most people go for the "big screen" view, even though it's sooted over shortly. I'll take the more even heat. The Aspen, even for a small stove, actually has a pretty nice fireview. I just wish that some manufacturers would design a box with a bigger glass, although the Buck 261 looks pretty good.

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
 
The notions seem to apply to older stoves. Many woodstoves don't have the fan standard. Whether it is needed or not depends more on how well heat convects naturally in the area and throughout the house. We use ours only infrequently because our stove and stove location are central. Most modern stove's glass don't soot up very much at all unless one is burning green wood. Ours gets cleaned about once a month and that is just to remove a thin grey haze.
 
Whether a fan is used or not, a significant portion of the stoves radiant energy, which we all love, ends up heating the ceiling by convection (heat rises)....I'd much rather have that radiation actually heating the room & its' occupants directly....And yes, the windows can stay clean when the stove is run hot. Most, however, when throttled down for the night, stay less so, but I don't wish this thread to descend into a windows comparison....

BrianMat
 
BrianMat said:
Whether a fan is used or not, a significant portion of the stoves radiant energy, which we all love, ends up heating the ceiling by convection (heat rises)....I'd much rather have that radiation actually heating the room & its' occupants directly....And yes, the windows can stay clean when the stove is run hot. Most, however, when throttled down for the night, stay less so, but I don't wish this thread to descend into a windows comparison.
Click to expand...
More assumptions. A non-cat stove goes through burn cycles. This is the same as for the Aspen as it is for our large T6. Wood should be dry and should not smolder. Follow those simple guidelines for either stove and the glass stays clean. Convection is our friend, it's how our second story also gets nicely heated. Remarkably it also keeps our whole first floor at a relatively even temp. Open floor plans are great for convection. Our stove is in a corner in a modest sized living room. This ruled out highly radiant stoves due to clearance issues for a corner install. Our last stove was a radiant stove. We had much greater temperature swing with it than the current stove.

Enjoy the Buck, it's a decent heater.
 
EPA rules and other reasons have created newer stove designs and manufactures of stoves. If it was me, I would use what you have for a stove and see if summer or fall of 2016 will expose newer (previously not available) appliances.
 
As I stated, our house is a single story, open design. Working with our builder, we planned for a central great room, and placed the hearth for the best even radiant heat. It couldn't have worked out better. Of course, all radiant heat gets converted to convection once it strikes some object. My point is that I'd rather have the radiant heat reach people, walls, and furniture rather than a piece of metal behind the stove....However, if you've stuck the stove in a corner, I guess you have to live with that.....

And Blowingsmoke, I think that's very timely advice & will definitely take it!

And to Mellow, I looked at the Smart Stove site...What can I say? I spent my whole working career as an electrical engineer working on power & control systems. Have you seen the thermostatic control on an Aspen, or perhaps a classic Ashley or one of its' many clones? The thermostatic control is nothing more than a simple bimetallic strip wound in a coil, like all automatic chokes in cars used to have. Believe me, I'm not mocking them; to the contrary, they are beautifully elegant in their bare-bones simplicity! I'm seriously thinking about adding one to my next stove, if it doesn't come with one. No batteries or electronics required....and I've never heard of one failing on a stove.

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
 
BrianMat said:
The thermostatic control is nothing more than a simple bimetallic strip wound in a coil
Click to expand...

I am well aware of bimetallic thermostats, I love them as well, just the only major brand using them right now is Blaze King, they are simple in design but really the stove needs to be built around using it, not an afterthought like you are proposing.
 
Actually, there are a number of other stoves that use thermostatic controllers, i.e., Ashley & a number its' variants, plus the VC Aspen that started this discussion. I didn't mean to imply that adding thermostatic control is a trivial afterthought, but if you've studied thermodynamics, heat transfer, feedback theory, and control loop stability, it shouldn't be too difficult. The real variable is the design of a stoves' primary air system, which I would use in making my choice.

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
 
Gee, that's unfortunate....

I guess that means we'll have to replace the one that's been heating our deer camp faithfully for years now. The beauty of it is, you load up the firebox early in the morning, set the thermostat, and go hunting. The thermostat controls the stove temperature while the load of wood goes through its' normal burn cycle. You then come back later in the day to a nicely heated camp, I guess it's unfortunate this doesn't qualify as a wood stove....semantics...

BrianMat

Gwinn, MI
 
When run right those circulators can be decent stoves. But unless it is an old one they are built very cheaply and wont last to long.

BrianMat said:
and I've never heard of one failing on a stove.
Click to expand...
I have seen quite a few fail but yes they are pretty reliable. I get that you like your stove they are good little stoves but the way you are dismissing just about all stoves on the market just because they are different is pretty unfair. If the box stove layout was the best way to design a stove that is what they would all look like. But i have used many stoves some with the same basic layout as yours and some like all the new stoves and i greatly prefer loading the new ones. I have never had a log roll out on me. If you like your stove that is fine but don't bash every other stove out there with out ever using one. And btw you would be very disappointed in the durango they simply are not designed or built very well at all.
 
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