wood furnace or wood insert?

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blakesavage20

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Oct 22, 2009
14
Illinois
I am currently looking for a way to supplement my propane gas furnace. I have a brand new efficient propane furnace, and a well insulated house, but propane costs are causing me to look for different forms of alternate heating. I currently have a 0% efficiency masonry fireplace (when I burn with it, it literally can't be felt unless you are within 6 feet of the fire).

The way my house is set up, I figure I have two options, I could install a wood burning insert into my existing fireplace, or I can install a wood burning furnace into my basement to supplement the existing furnace. I was hoping that anybody with experience could help me make the best decision for me.

I have a 1.5 level house, approximately 1600 square foot. I am not totally excited about putting an insert into my current fireplace because of two reasons (one I like the way it looks, and two it would take more work then putting in the wood burning furnace). Just a couple of extra facts, I will not plan on starting the fire until I get home from work each day around 4pm, so it will strictly be suplemental heat. By the way, I have a solid amount of wood, and access to more for free or very cheap. So I guess my question is wood burning furnace or wood burning insert. I guess I am hoping that the furnaces work well because that is the route I was hoping for, but any suggestions would be very appreciated.

Thanks
 
Welcome to the forum blake. If you have good access to get wood in the basement and a way to get the second flue in, I would lean towards a furnace. It could completely eliminate your propane bill and some models have the option of heating your water as well. With the money you save, you can improve the fireplace so that it both retains its appearance as well as contributes some heat. There are a number of good furnaces out there and I believe some of them qualify for the tax credit. You can post in the boiler room and get a lot more input on furnaces.
 
a good wood furnace can eliminate the propane altogether and could be loaded up before work and have a nice toasty house with some glowing coals left so you dont have to play boy scout after a hard days work...same goes for a modern epa woodstove for that matter but the heat wont be quite as even
 
http://www.yukon-eagle.com/ <- Check those out. I just got my info in the mail and it's a bit more expensive than a high end dinosaur furnace. Shipping is TERRIBLE and they don't have a model that does radiators, but for someone who doesn't have radiators it might just scratch the itch.
 
I think you could go either way and be happy . . . but based on the fact you mention you would like to keep the fireplace the way it is and it would be more work I would suggest you go with the wood furance . . . especially since you have the ductwork already in place . . . the only issue you would have is making sure you have a way/place to vent the wood furnace.

Growing up my parents heated with a wood furnace tied into the oil boiler. It worked very well . . . while not as efficient (this was 1980s vintage) as today's woodstoves, it kept the whole house toasty warm and with the built in thermostat and blower fan was wicked simple to operate. For folks with existing ductwork going with a wood furnace to me is something many should give some consideration to . . . not as pretty as looking at an insert or woodstove, but the trade off is a central heating system.
 
You can get off propane. Withdrawal from gas and oil is hard at first, but once it is out of your system, you will not even miss it. You will even be able to socialize with others who are still "using", with out worry about relapsing.
 
The furnace tied into your duct work will provide a good distribution of heat to all your rooms in your house. I would think that the insert would keep one room a lot warmer than the others.

I like my furnace in the basement. The mess is mostly contained and the basement stays warm just from the radiant heat off of the wood furnace. My floors in the upstairs stay nice and warm also.

Now, if you spend a lot of time in the room that your insert would be, then I would maybe consider going that route. I kind of like sitting by the fire.
 
Outdoor furnace is what I wanted but was pricey. Also would have kept the house cleaner without having to drag wood into the house!
 
Wacky1 said:
Outdoor furnace is what I wanted but was pricey. Also would have kept the house cleaner without having to drag wood into the house!
Click to expand...

I don't get the outdoor furnaces. They smoke up the neighborhood and you have to go tromping out in the snow to load the thing up. Plus you lose a large percentage of heat because you have your heating plant out where it's the coldest. The list goes on.

As far as furnace or insert, that depends upon how much you enjoy sitting in front of the fire. I could install a furnace and stop using my insert, but I don't think I'd ever see my family again, sitting down there watching the fire in the basement. I'm sure a furnace is a lot easier being in the basement and all, just make sure you find one that burns clean. Many of them don't seem to be big on contemporary combustion tech.
 
I guess it depends on what you want. We have an old victorian home that has 11 large rooms, and 10' ceilings. We couldn't do it with an insert, or stove in the home. We upgraded from a basic furnace to a EPA certified model. It burns clean, and produces a ton of heat. Its something that would run you out of your home. I can load it at before work and come home to plenty of coals to restart the fire. We wanted something with the same technology as the new stoves and thats what we got. I love our furnace, and wouldn't trade it for the world. And yes you would eliminate heating bills completely. There are alot of furnace guys like me that love them, but do your homework. It will make a difference.
 
Thank you all for your input. I think after reading all of your posts I am currently leaning towards a wood burning furnace for several reasons.

One, I have a basement access door, that would make it really easy, and clean to get my wood to the furnace. Second, my dad is a plumbing and heating specialist who could help me tie in the duct work into the furnace that he installed under a year ago. Third, by the suggestions offered, it would offer a more even heating solution for my house then an insert. Finally, I would be able to retain my current fireplace so I could burn it every once in a while and still enjoy the current setup (I may eventually purchase a fireback for it to at least reflect some of the heat into my room).

A couple extra questions for everybody. I know asking this question could bring some bias opinions, but does anybody have any suggestions for affordable furnaces that could heat my 1600 square foot house? I really don't want to spend thousands of dollars, I just want a solid, effective, affordable furnace.

Second, any of you know whether or not firebacks are effective in at least reflecting some of the heat into the room, and at least raising the efficiency of the fireplace to over 0%? If not any other affordable solutions besides an insert?

Again, any help would be very appreciated.
 
If you want an affordable furnace, you could look at the one englander builds. There are alot of users here that have them, and they are very reasonable. They seem to heat well and have a glass viewing door, but don't have secondary burn like a few furnaces have. If you want a furnace thats more efficient you could look at the Caddy which is EPA certified, but comes in at close to twice the cost. Yukon also makes furnaces, but can't tell you much about them. I heated with a 1500 hotblast which is the same as the 1537 from tsc for 20 years. But a newer more efficient furnace will give you longer burns, more heat using less wood and a cleaner chimney. I have a 1950 hotblast (Caddy). I'm happy with it, but there are many to look from.
 
Spend the money and get an EPA certified model. Caddy, HotBlast, and Yukon are a couple to check out. I bought my Daka because it was cheap and I wanted to see if I liked burning wood. With an EPA model, you will get longer burns and more heat.
 
Both!

Well first I would put in the cheaper wood furnace from yukon which will heat the home fully and then put in the insert later. The inserts aren't ugly anymore and can really make the fireplace very nice to look at.

I wish I had ducts and a basement for a furnace. I would always have a hearth and stove in the living room though. It's not a "one or the other" type deal.
 
ControlFreak said:
Wacky1 said:
Outdoor furnace is what I wanted but was pricey. Also would have kept the house cleaner without having to drag wood into the house!
Click to expand...

I don't get the outdoor furnaces. They smoke up the neighborhood and you have to go tromping out in the snow to load the thing up. Plus you lose a large percentage of heat because you have your heating plant out where it's the coldest. The list goes on.
. . ..
Click to expand...

I think their selling points touch on the mess, perceived fire hazard and fact that you can throw a bunch of wood and let it go for several hours . . . of course, as you mentioned they fail to point out that they're quite expensive, tend to smolder and create lots of smoke since their chimneys typically are much lower to the ground compared to other wood burning appliances and they're pretty inefficient with a lot of heat loss.

I actually explored every option available to me when it came to burning wood before I "settled" on a woodstove . . . and now I'm quite glad I went this route.

I looked at an add-on wood boiler, but the main issues here were the expense and to be honest I had no room and would have had to add on to the house -- plus I didn't want to have to cut and split a ton of wood just to heat the home. I also looked at the high efficiency wood boilers (i.e. the Tarm and others), but again there was the expense of the units, lack of space and it seems that to be truly efficient they need a way to store the heat and again I didn't have the space or money to swing this.

I looked at the outdoor units and opted to not go this route due to the expense, lack of efficiency and because I had seen the sheer amount of wood my Dad would cut to feed this beast all year long . . . it didn't make sense to me to go that way . . . for me time is as important as saving money.
 
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