I hope everyone here understands this.

kinsmanstoves · Dec 27, 2009

I had a customer come in the store the other day and wanted a "bigger" stove than what he has. The customer has a 42,000 btu stove. I asked why he needed a bigger stove and he replied he wanted more heat from his current stove. I asked him what level he was running his stove at? He stated he always runs at level 2 and it keeps his house at 65 degrees. I asked him to turn it up to level 3 and see what happens. The customer said he would and called me back a few days later saying he was burning to many pellets at level 3 but the house was at 74 degrees. The customer still wanted a bigger stove such as a Harman P-68 so he can get the 68,000 btu instead of the 42,000 btus.

I explained to him that his stove at level 2 burns two lbs of pellets an hour so he uses about a bag a day and he said that was right. I told him two pounds of pellets an hour is approx 16,000 btu input and he was not getting 43,000 btus on level 2. to obtain 43,000 btu he needs to run the stove at level 5 and will still fall short of the 42,000 btus. The customer still said he would burn way to much pellets at level 5 and is still thinking of the P-68.

I am sorry but I do not want to miss a sale of a Harman but Some people do not understand that some stove companies misrepresent btu input and over blow square foot recommendations.

No matter what stove you have this is the way it works. There is no BTU fairy that I know of.

If you burn one pounds of pellets an hour in any stove you get 8,200 btu input.

If you burn two pounds of pellets an hour you get 16,400 btu input. (thanks Smokey)

If you burn three pounds of pellets an hour you get 24,600 btus input.

If you burn four pounds of pellets an hour you get 32,800 btus input.

If you burn five pounds of pellets an hour you get 41,000 btus input.

So if a stove manufacture says they have a 100,000 btu stove you will need to burn over 12 pounds of pellets an hour.

Eric

defield · Dec 27, 2009

Eric,

Your honesty, logical thinking, and knowledge is why so many people respect you.

I suspect that many sales places would have sold the new unit to the customer and happily fabricated reasons why pellet useage was much the same with the new stove.

There is no "magic" or as you stated, "There is no BTU fairy".

A good reminder!!

Regards,

Ranger

kinsmanstoves · Dec 27, 2009

the old ranger said:
Eric,

Your honesty, logical thinking, and knowledge is why so many people respect you.

I suspect that many sales places would have sold the new unit to the customer and happily fabricated reasons why pellet useage was much the same with the new stove.

There is no "magic" or as you stated, "There is no BTU fairy".

A good reminder!!

Regards,

Ranger

Thanks You,

Now make your way to the back room and grab a cold one from the fridge.

Eric

SmokeyTheBear · Dec 27, 2009

Damn it Eric, you are going to get expelled from the stove salespersons association.

kinsmanstoves · Dec 27, 2009

SmokeyTheBear said:
Damn it Eric, you are going to get expelled from the stove salespersons association.

I have been kicked out of better organizations for less.

Eric

newf lover · Dec 27, 2009

Sounds like he's just looking for an excuse to buy a P68 and isn't interested in logic. Wait till he finds out he'll still be burning 2 bags a day in all likelihood to keep his room in the low 70s, depending on outside temps etc.

SmokeyTheBear · Dec 27, 2009

kinsman stoves said:
SmokeyTheBear said:

Damn it Eric, you are going to get expelled from the stove salespersons association.

Click to expand...

I have been kicked out of better organizations for less.

Eric

I hear you on that one.

BTW, you might want to edit out that last zero in the two pound line of your post 16,400 I can believe, 16,4000 is magic pellet dust material.

kinsmanstoves · Dec 27, 2009

SmokeyTheBear said:
kinsman stoves said:

SmokeyTheBear said:

Damn it Eric, you are going to get expelled from the stove salespersons association.

Click to expand...

I have been kicked out of better organizations for less.

Eric

Click to expand...

I hear you on that one.

BTW, you might want to edit out that last zero in the two pound line of your post 16,400 I can believe, 16,4000 is magic pellet dust material.

Not only do you save the trees but you have a built in spell checker.

Eric

jtakeman · Dec 27, 2009

kinsman stoves said:
No matter what stove you have this is the way it works. There is no BTU fairy that I know of.

If you burn one pounds of pellets an hour in any stove you get 8,200 btu input.

If you burn two pounds of pellets an hour you get 16,400 btu input. (thanks Smokey)

If you burn three pounds of pellets an hour you get 24,600 btus input.

If you burn four pounds of pellets an hour you get 32,800 btus input.

If you burn five pounds of pellets an hour you get 41,000 btus input.

So if a stove manufacture says they have a 100,000 btu stove you will need to burn over 12 pounds of pellets an hour.

Eric

Don't forget that most stoves are no where near 100% efficient. More like 75% to 85%. So a 5 lbs./Hr stove really is only about 30K to 35K BTU's "I learned this the hard way".

CanadaClinker · Dec 27, 2009

.........we have to remember that the stove doesn't create the heat (Btu's), the fuel does..... more fuel burned, more heat produced....... the stove is just the safe place that this transformation is allowed to happen ... my words of wisdom......... cc :lol:

anka · Dec 27, 2009

I think most pellet stoves are around 85% efficient... way more than typical wood stoves though they are gaining ground...

I would imagine most harmans are equally efficient, give or take a percentage, of course the accentra is the best...

The best way to make heat more effective is to heat only the rooms you most use, humidify, and insulate... easier said than done. I agree, the P68 is a beast. My stove dealer uses it in his warehouse and sais its too much for the space...

anka

GVA · Dec 28, 2009

kinsman stoves said:
There is no BTU fairy that I know of.

Eric

WHAT

!! :bug:
Well I'm splitting pellets right now and stacking them cause the BTU fairy told me they were not seasoned enough..... :lol:

SmokeyTheBear · Dec 28, 2009

RETIRED GVA said:
kinsman stoves said:

There is no BTU fairy that I know of.

Eric

Click to expand...

WHAT!! :bug:
Well I'm splitting pellets right now and stacking them cause the BTU fairy told me they were not seasoned enough..... :lol:

Man, what was it good ole PT said ...... ?

hearthtools · Dec 28, 2009

I had a customer like that about 17 years ago they complained the stove did not heat and it was a Pellet master on a thermostat at they only have High med and Low setting but if you use a thermo you just need to set it on High and let the thermostat put the stove to low when it is not calling for heat.
here is how I fixed the NOT HEATING PROBLEM

I wired all three of switch spades to the High wire(no mater what setting they were still on high) without out telling them.
Never had a problem since and they are still using the stove

littlesmokey · Dec 28, 2009

Silliness aside, did you ask the "customer what he thought he would gain using a higher Btu stove? Maybe he does not understand the pellets determines the output, not the stove. Have him sit down and explain it to you, so you can explain it to the next customer. It's truly amazing when the logic collapses and the reality sets in. Can almost make you cry big, big, big tears to think they may not be as dumb as the wall.

hearthtools · Dec 28, 2009

jtakeman said:
Don't forget that most stoves are no where near 100% efficient. More like 75% to 85%. So a 5 lbs./Hr stove really is only about 30K to 35K BTU's "I learned this the hard way".

but most heaters are rated that way..... Gas stoves are rated by the BTU INPUT also and most of them are only about 80% also.
Most of us understand that when we say BTU it is the input amount or the amount of heat your fuel will give you per gallon or pound before heat loss.
the only thing that is going to give you close to 100% heat is electric baseboard or electric radiant heater

eric_s · Dec 28, 2009

I bought my Mt Vernon last year and from my research I can tell you a lot of people on the outside don't understand this.
I had everyone, including family members, telling to "get the bigger one". They just don't grasp the idea of the amount of pellets (and dollars) you'd be spending if you really did burn 3-4 bags a day.
Of course I did get the bigger one, but because of features and not capacity. I knew I could get away with a much smaller unit by looking at two things. 1) How much oil do a use in a year and 2) on the coldest of day, how much did the furnace run. Doing a little math it becomes pretty apparent.
And to this day, even though I tell the same people I run the stove 90% of the time on ML-L (<3lbs/hr) they still think I need a stove that burns 7lbs/hour.

Dougsey · Dec 28, 2009

I would be more concerned with how few pellets are used for a maintanence burn... they all burn plenty on high if you let them.

Xena · Dec 29, 2009

newf lover said:
Wait till he finds out he'll still be burning 2 bags a day in all
likelihood to keep his room in the low 70s, depending on outside temps etc.

My thoughts exactly. He's going to be pretty pissed at himself later
but he won't be able to blame the Dealer.

webbie · Dec 29, 2009

A good way to figure is 5000 BTU output for each pound.

But, yes, this is something I dealt with back in 1979...and ever since.

I promised myself I would write a book on it one day! It was to be called "YOU AND A BTU". Of course, I found out that this book was written many years ago by such giants as Jolue and others:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Prescott_Joule

Well, I started the book anyway...here it is:
https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/wiki/You_and_a_BTU

yknotcarpentry · Dec 29, 2009

great post, I actually was just thinking of this the other day. My question was more related to, how do the stoves get thier btu rating? for instance my englander holds "x" amt of pellets, and is rated for "x" amt of btu's (is this given btu rating based on how many pellets it can hold and thus burn?) my big E on the other hand holds a ton more pellets thus having a higher btu rating? etc etc.

hearthtools · Dec 29, 2009

yknotcarpentry said:
great post, I actually was just thinking of this the other day. My question was more related to, how do the stoves get thier btu rating? for instance my englander holds "x" amt of pellets, and is rated for "x" amt of btu's (is this given btu rating based on how many pellets it can hold and thus burn?) my big E on the other hand holds a ton more pellets thus having a higher btu rating? etc etc.

It is how many pounds of pellets the stove will feed in an hour on the MAX setting
so it is all feed rate.
the only reason the BIG E has a larger hopper is so it can hold more pellets because it will feed more pellets per hour
Most stoves are in the 40k btu range because that is all the heat exhange can handle that that is all most homes need.

mralias · Dec 29, 2009

OK OK I don't want a bigger stove anymore....do you have any smaller houses?

SmokeyTheBear · Dec 29, 2009

mralias said:
OK OK I don't want a bigger stove anymore....do you have any smaller houses?

I have a slightly used 6' x 8' chicken coop that the girls might be willing to sell.

They tend to ask for chicken feed (you should be warned some chicken feed isn't cheap though) and treats.

It is easy to heat provided you are fully feathered.

The only downside is it is only one room and the rear wall is only 4' high.

speedoboy31 · Dec 29, 2009

just did the math---25pdvc=42,000 btu rating(according to lowes)--so 42000x24hrs=1008000. that divided by 5000btu/lb=201.6-lbs per day divided by 40lb bags =5.04 bags per day on max. wow, i couldn't imagine my little stove being able to swallow that many pellets a day;how the hell would i be able to supply it with enough air? the most i've ever burnt was just over 2 bags in a day.guess my stove is more like <20k btu's. usually,it goes 1-1.5 per day depending on temp. by the way,@269/ton//5.38 per bag; and 5.04 bags per day, that would be $27.12 per day or $813.46 per month----holy crap !!!

!

I hope everyone here understands this.

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