On The Fence

Welcome to the forum jlord.

Good for you for thinking about the high price of oil. I'll make the suggestion though that you post this in the Pellet Mill part of this forum or else one of the moderators might move it for you. Either way, you'll get more and better answers about pellet stoves there. Good luck to you.

I can tell you that everytime I dump a bag of pellets in....or when I'm dreading going down to clean the big biomass furnace....I remember my propane bills and smile as I go about my cleaning and maintenance.

After spending far too much time doing research, I settled on a Mt. Vernon AE insert this past week which will be installed in December.

Good luck.

3 keys of pellet units, clean pellets( lack of fines), regular maintenance, and the biggie a UPS ( uninterruptable power supply) The ups also acts as a surge suppressor and line filter. The big thing is to have at least a surge suppressor, one that covers hot line, neutral, and ground( earth). Neutral line is more of a culprit than most people think. Most of the surge units out there do not cover neutral, few cover earth. A true Ground or earth line is not connected to the same bus as the neutral line in 120v ac, but a lot of places are wired that way.
In real life the same things that knock a stove for loop do the same to the new furnaces, about a wash there.
Cost of pellets/btu vs oil/btu in your area is another factor.
One more thing a stove, pellet or wood, is basically a space heater. careful planning of the installation can minimize the hot cold effect when used as a whole house unit.
It still sucks the wind out of the fossil fuel companies though.
I use a wood stove avg about $66-70 ( for gas and Electric combined) month Oct-April. 2000 sq ft ranch. ( wood stove ,no electric needed, no power, no problem, I am still toasty) good luck on your decision.

jlord1169 said:

Yeah i looked at the Castile. I liked what the Mt Vernon offered. Is there such thing as too much ?

Click to expand...

I remember reading that you can always turn down a bigger stove as opposed to turning up a smaller one...

I have a 2007 model and had the upgraded burnpot put in it. It's been almost 2 yrs with the same ignitor,and no problems. I also have a 2010 model without the upgraded burnpot,and have already put 1 new ignitor in it.Next time I'm gonna change out to the upgrade when I put the new ignitor in.

New to pellets myself. Had our 10-CPM installed 11/10. Just love it. Thus far heating our designated area just fine - Kitchen, Family room, living room, office, Master bdrm (2nd flr over family room). About 3000 sq ft with 10' ceilings. I use the central for an hour in a.m. to kick up the heat in house then just pellet stove to maintain.

I have a Castile in my basement under 1800 sq ft that does a really nice job heating the basement and it only has insulation board on two walls so far and concrete sucks the heat horribly. It does a pretty fair job of keeping the upstairs warm with a little help from the heat pump/air handler if it is really windy or really cold. I would go with something bigger and let it cruise along on medium in the worst of winter if I did it again.

blades said:

A true Ground or earth line is not connected to the same bus as the neutral line in 120v ac, but a lot of places are wired that way.

Click to expand...

Not so sure you are right in your statement, I would be concerned your house is not wired properly. Your ground bus should be connected to the neutral bus via the panel's 'bonding jumper'.


As far as my $0.02 for a pellet stove don't rule out the cheaper (price) stoves. I have an Englander 25-PDVC (American made) that I got for just over $600 with the tax credit and did the entire installation myself and saved a few bucks. It is more heat than I need on the coldest of winter days, keeps my 1000 sq ft home toasty even on the lowest setting.

Good luck

Actually, it's... "you don't get anything until you pay.."

oldmountvernon said:

Congrats nice hearth pad

Click to expand...

NC in 10,9,8,7 .......