Please Help Resolve a "Domestic Discussion"

Seasons Greetings, Pellet People!

Hello from Frozen Central Virginia! Hope everyone had a happy and healthy non-burn season, and that everyone is keeping warm in this our COLDEST DECEMBER ON RECORD. (We just heard this today at our stove store!)

OK, help The Husband and me settle a "Domestic Discussion."

We visited the stove store today to buy my Christmas Bling- a metal ash vac! And I am SO HAPPY! No seriously, I AM HAPPY, no more shutting the stove down for hours and hours before it's safe to vacuum it out with a Shop Vac. No more stressing about melting a Shop Vac or burning down the house!

While there we kicked the tires on an Avalon Astoria free standing pellet stove. Pretty stove, but what impressed us both was that it was really, really kicking out some heat. Both of us commented that it felt like it was pushing more heat than our 2008 Napoleon NPS-40 free standing stove.

We inquired with the sales staff to see if the Astoria was rated to push more BTU's. If I recall correctly, they said that the the Astoria was rated to put out up to 45,000 BTU's. Our Napoleon is rated to put out up to 42,500 BTU's, so that hardly seems like a difference we would note while standing in front of the stove.

One of the salepeople noted that they were running the stove on high, and that they were "going through pellets like water." At that point I chalked the notable difference in heat output to burning up a lot of pellets at a rapid rate.

My husband noted, however, that while they were venting the stove to the outside of the building (obviously) they didn't have an OAK hooked up. He became convinced that the difference in the stove output temperature was because the stove was heating warmer, interior air that was being recirculated through the stove from the showroom.

I explained to him that really, it wouldn't make that much difference: the stove is going to pull air from *somewhere.* It's either going to pull it in through an OAK, in which case the cold air goes directly into the combustion pot to be heated up quickly and with great authority, or that stove is gonna pull cold outside air in through every crack and crevice and flaw in the house, causing a noticeably drafty house.

My husband thinks that the draw through leaks without the OAK would not be noticeable, and that the stove's heat output would increase because the stove would be heating air that had been heated previously.

Personally, I think that, if anything, we were feeling BTU's rushing out at us in a building that's more tightly insulated than our 1950's brick and block wall bungalow, and that there was simply less heat dissipation because the showroom is kept warmer by numerous fireplaces (and probably an HVAC thermostat set higher as well.) Plus, they were running that Astoria on "high." Burning more pellets equals more BTU's. Also, who knows? The Astoria's max pellet feed setting may be throwing more pellets in the pot more quickly than the Napoleon's max feed setting, and certainly it's throwing more pellets in the pot than the Napoleon's optimal feed setting of 4. We may not be talking apples to apples comparisons here. That would make sense, because the Astoria's flame profile was bigger than anything I see in our Napoleon's firebox unless we are burning off the pellets that we allow to accumulate in the pot when we first crank the stove up. The flame was big in that Astoria's box for a good part of the burn cycle- clean, bright, white and sharp but big. I equate that with a lot of pellets burning in the pot.

We never run the Napoleon flat out per the instructions in the owner's manual. Once we get a flame in the pot we turn the feed down to 4.

Another sales person pointed out that the difference in BTU's could be attributed to the pellets being burned. They were burning Hamer's today. We are currently burning O'Malleys. I rather like O'Malleys; they seem to burn hot enough for our climate, and they are manufactured locally. I love supporting a local business, particularly a local pellet manufacturer. Although, come to think of it, Hamer's is pretty "local" as well, we are practically neighbors! I like both O'Malleys and Hamers and I wouldn't complain about burning either (in fact we will burn both this winter.) I don't think it's the pellet quality- I don't think we'd notice that much difference between O'Malleys and Hamers.

Anyway, my husband is itching to disconnect the OAK to see if it makes any difference in the heat output of the stove. I told him that I'd already picked everyone's brain to death about this topic LAST YEAR (see last year's Beca Sunshine) and that disconnecting the OAK wouldn't make a difference in heat output. Also I told him that if he disconnected the OAK I'd stick a fork in my eye. DO NOT BE MESSING WITH THE PELLET STOVE DURING THE COLDEST DECEMBER ON RECORD. THANK YOU.

What say you, Pellet People? Who is right- Beca Sunshine, who is cute and can cook? or The Husband, who is right about most things but NOT THIS ONE?

P.S. Per my candy thermometer, the stove is currently pushing air out of the far left heat exchange tube at a temp of about 270'F. I just stuck the candy thermometer in the port and left it there for a bit. Does that temp output sound about right? The stove was cleaned this afternoon and has been running at 4 feed, 3.5 room air blower and 2 damper for a few hours.

Bingo, Ms. Snowy, that's *exactly* what I said.

Per above, I stuck a candy thermometer in the far left heat exchange tube exterior port. It registered about 270'F. I wondered if my method of measuring was valid.

I told my husband that the heated air was being "recirculated" already and that the OAK air went straight to the burn pot.

Anyway, we are pushing this heat through about 1420 sq ft (no, my house didn't grow over this year, we had an assessment and an official measurement and we have more sq ft than I thought) and given our exterior wall construction, I think the BTU's are simply dissipating more quickly than at the showroom.

This crowd helped me get religion about the "magic BTU" thing last year: yes, you can get a pellet stove that puts out more heat, but it's not by magic: you're gonna burn more pellets to get that heat. Know that and plan accordingly: burning more pellets to get more heat costs more money in pellets. Nothing in life is free.

We're doing OK with the Napoleon. It heats the whole house comfortably until we hit teens overnight followed by below freezing or near freezing daytime highs. At those temps, the brick and block walls and the unsealed crawlspace start to take their toll. While I don't think we are particularly drafty, and we do have replacement windows, days and days of wind chill have an effect as well. On those days, the furnace usually comes on a couple of times.

Compared to what we could be paying to heat the house, we have no complaints.

Hi, J-Takeman!

At the time that we were in the store, no other stoves or fireplaces were burning. The Astoria was the only pellet stove they had hooked up to a vent in the showroom.

The showroom was warm, though, so it's possible that they'd had other appliances of various types burning earlier in the day.

Is this point helping to settle this discussion in my favor, J-Takeman? Just wondering...

Wow, that much difference between O'Malleys and Hamers? I guess that I'm not feeling it at home once it's moved across the house... but I'm not experienced enough nor educated enough to note differences in pellet burn temps yet. It would take a HUGE difference, apparently, for me to feel it at home. We do have some Hamer's here now in addition to the O'Malleys so we could give it a go, see if we can feel a difference standing in front of the stove.

"I’m with snowy as the heated air the OAK draws in is just sent out the flue, So you would notice the difference." J-Takemen, I'm not being a smart-butt here, but I'm assuming that you meant to type that we would NOT notice a difference. Just asking so I make sure that I am understanding you correctly.

Thank you, Everyone! You've helped us to sort out our thoughts.

The O'Malleys were plenty warm enough during the last half of October and November. (Correction: I originally said that the Hamer's were plenty warm enough during Oct and Nov. I meant to say that the O'Malleys were plenty warm enough then!)

We left Virginia on November 24th on a big loop down to coastal South Carolina and back in our camper. Our first few days out were in the 70's; I'd actually packed clothes that were too warm. By the time we returned on December 6th the east coast was in a deep freeze. We winterized the camper in sub-freezing weather. It seems that we went from a very pretty and temperate fall into a cold winter overnight.

We've been burning the pellet stove steady since we got home, using up some O'Malleys we have at the house. The pellet stove definitely helps; we keep our HVAC thermostat set at 65'F and the furnace doesn't cut in much at all. The temperature in the stove room is 70.5'F and the HVAC thermostat in the hallway is showing 67'F.

We picked up some Hamer's today out of our account at the stove store. We'll start burning those until daytime temps get back into the upper 30's. IF they do. Before March. Or April. Egad.

LOL, Franks- see, your approach saves so much more time and energy! Such efficiency!

Jafo, I don't know if it's our lack of wall insulation here or the Astoria's larger heat exchange surface (which one of the sales persons mentioned as well.) I suspect that our lack of wall insulation plays a big part in the equation. Ahh, well, we knew that when we bought this little house. An energy expert we consulted recommended that we "wrap" the house in this insulating stucco type exterior coating. Honestly, I don't know if we'd ever recoup the cost of a major project like that. The pellet stove seems to be the most economical way to address the problem at this moment.

We also need to redo the attic insulation. At some point in the past, a previous owner added to/replaced the attic insulation but it could be beefed up a bit.

Jafo, that Astoria was an impressive stove, though!

Hi, Everybody!

Doocrew, good points. I *actually* told The Husband about your idea, and he concured. Didn't happen today though, too many other projects going on.

Bkins, I have a bunch of O'Malleys on the books and some in house. We'll have to burn through them. *Most* of the time, Central VA is just not this cold; the past few of years have been exceptions to our rule. We do have the occasional cold winter, but two or three in a row is not typical. The O'Malleys will probably be OK for us.

It's 36'F here as I type, and the house is plenty warm. I really think our struggles have everything to do with our brick and block exterior walls.

Snowy, that's a good idea about having another stove. Unfortunately our little house is broken up into lots of rooms with windows, doors, etc. It was difficult to find a good spot for the pellet stove. We turned a bedroom into a den to accommodate the pellet stove. We didn't really need a third bedroom anyway, so that was OK with us. The floorplan has a center L-shaped hall and a circular flow, which does allow the heat to circulate through the house. When it's really cold I *wish* I could shoehorn another stove in here but that would be challenging. When it's too cold we just bump the HVAC thermostat and burn a little gas once or twice at either end of the day. =/

Funny thing about pellet stoves and our local Craigslist: there aren't that many pellet stoves for sale on our local Craigslist or in surrounding towns! There are, however, a handful of woodstoves and even some cut and split wood for sale by people who have upgraded to pellet stoves! There are also a handful of "Want to Buy" posts for pellet stoves.

I guess pellet stoves are coming into their own around here!