Enviro M55 multi fuel pellet stove steel or cast?

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26oday

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Enviro M55 multi fuel pellet stove steel or cast? I see they have the same specs. I have experience with cast wood burners and realize cast holds up better to heat and retains the heat longer.
Any owners of either stoves have any input of the differences beside cost and looks?
I would appreciate comments I’m very interested in the stove.
Thanks Al,
 
Pellet stoves work on convection not radiant type heating. On a pellet stove I am not sure if it really makes much difference what metals it made from because most of the heat is pushed out with a blower, convection heating. Some types of metals will transfer heat better than others.
Personally I like the strength and looks of cast iron and would rather have a stove made out of cast iron with a cast iron heat exchanger.
 
Had a stamped steel Whitfield advantage plus for 14 seasons with stainless steel heat exchange tubes, now have cast iron Harman xxv with cast iron accordian style exchanger since november, although I like the more maintenance free, more self sufficient, prettier XXV, I feel the Whitfield steel stove with thin wall transfer tubes did a better job of extracting more BTUs from a lb of pellets. Either will do the job. good luck with your search
 
We have the M55 cast - we went cast for the looks. I'm not sure there is a heating advantage due to reason stated above. The firebox, etc is steel with a cast case.

We have had the stove running since 12/23 and love it. It puts out great heat.

I believe the M55 FS has a larger hopper.
 
The engine on the M55's are the same. I have the Steel at home and the Cast FS in the shop. The Cast is beautiful. I prefer the Steel for Two reasons, 80 # hopper and easy to load, The cast has a flip top lid in front similar to an insert and barely takes 40lbs, and the ash pan is huge on the Steel, and doesn't over flow like the Cast. Both stoves put out amazing heat and the heat exchange tubes are both welded conduit. Extremely quiet. If you like the looks of the Cast go for it, the Vermont Castings on the stove are excellent.
 
I'm 5 days into my M55 steel FS stove. ZERO problems. The lining on the inside back of the stove is cast, so it has 'some' thermal mass, but not as much as say a Dutchwest cast iron stove. However- it is providing 100% of all the heating to my finished basement, including 2 bedrooms and I'd wager to guess 50% of upstairs heating.

It's 0 where I'm at in Montana right now and the basement is a nice toasty 75' and the upstairs in 69'. Basically 1.5 bags per day when it's really cold and the whole thing is set and forget. Just cool it down for about a 1/2 hour a day, sweep the ash into the pan, check the fire box and re-start.

Not a bad set-up. Thus far I'm impressed. Stopped at the local place and picked up a ton of Eureka premium pellets tonight, loaded and unloaded into my garage in less than 30 minutes. God it can't get this much easier unless you have a NG furnace and a dial.
 
You guys are great. this is the kind of info I was looking for. FordMastertech After being a wood burn for so many years and having a Vermont casting stove I didn’t consider the fact that pellet stoves are convection heaters not radiant heaters.That was a good point to conceder between cast or steel. Shorebilly I can understand going for the looks of the stove that’s a good point. pelletdude I’m liking what I here about your steel stove 80 # hopper and easy to load. Threerun your making me really like the M55 steel FS stove.
Al, :coolsmile:
 
Important point made above here in regards to the castings on the Enviro M55's. These are all North American made by Vermont Castings. The quality of the castings is excellent. Even better, the stoves are made in British Columbia by an outfit (Sherwood Industries) that has 30 years of experience in the pellet heating business. Seems like a pretty good combination to me.
 
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