change from energy king 480 ek to caddy wood furnace?

Hi all,i am new here so hopefully i am posting this right ? My question is that I was wondering if i change out my energy king 480 ek furn out to the psg wood furnace,would it be worth it? The reason that i ask is that I have a very bad back but love burning wood and if the caddy would really save that much wood , that would be a lot less stress on the back.The reason i bought the 480 is because I was going to add on to my home but now i am not going too and i think that the furnace might be to much for my home. I have 1650 sq ranch home and the same on the basement witch is not finished,I was wondering if any body had one of the energy knig's ,what kind of burn time did u get? another thing ,would it be worth to install a barometric damper in this furnace? would i be able to get comparable burn times compared to the caddy ?or am i wasting my time on the energy king? One of the reasons that I bought this unit a few years ago is that it was rated at 78 effiency and now when i look at the manual now it show's N/A. Any suggestions would be really great.thanx for this awesome site!

I would be willing to say yes you will save wood. Considering the 480 is grossly oversized for the home, it would be hard to control the heat into the home. With a much larger firebox, you could stuff the thing and possibly get a longer burn than the caddy, but it won't be efficient. No doubt the 480 will heat, but it will be too much. Trying to throttle the thing down more than likely will cause alot of creosote to build up. We heat with a Caddy, and I would say you are within the right size for the furnace. The firebox isn't that big, but the thing will produce long clean burns. One load in the 480 would equal 2 loads in the Caddy. How big is your chimney? I will say this, the Caddy will burn less than seasoned wood, but will give fits doing it. You need good dry seasoned wood for it to burn properly. If the 480 hasn't been used, I would sell it. You may be able to get your money from that furnace to buy the Caddy. Depending on the chimney height and draft, usually a barometric damper won't have to be used unless your draft exceeds .05"- .06" water column on a manometer.

Thank's for the info!My chimney is 8 in round clay,and is far as wood go's ,the last two years I have burned mainly white oak,red ,cherry ,maple ,pretty much a little bit of everything,but all of it was seasoned for just about 2 years. I have to say that I thought that this furnace burnt it up up pretty quickly.I had a old american energy systems master 4 wood furnace before this and did not see any difference in efishency,or at least that i could tell?that is one of the main reasons that i bought the king in the first place,but i was told that this was the way to go? Oh well,live and learn .any other reccomenddations for wood furnace's?

There is the Blaze King Apex, the 385ek Energy king, Kumma. They all are more efficient than what you currently have. The Caddy is the only one though thats currently EPA Certified. With the tax credits, it will be a bonus. Whats your burn times with your current furnace?

Apex is EPA certified, according to BK's site.

Thank's for all the info again,I think if I get a chance I will for sure go with one that is epa certified,and the reason i say that is because that way u have proof of what the unit will produce instead of some company saying that it is 78 or 90% without any backup ,at least that is my opinion.On my experience with the energy king the burn times aren't to bad but not with out flaws,and mean the flaw is CREOSOTE! I figured on a normal winter day i can get a 4 to 6 hour burn roughly,loaded half full,and 10 to 12 loaded to max,and when this thing is loaded it is a lot of wood compared to the rest of the known furnace's out there.I agree with laynes on the uncontrollable on the unit,it is very hard to tame.I have to at lest clean my chimney once a month through out the season,and when I talked to the chimney sweep I told him about it and he said with the right set up you should only have to clean once or twice the season with the caddy"Overall of the energy king that I have used".1. i think the unit is very well built.2.It will throw heat.It seems like if i go with the caddy I will take a lot of stress off myself,My dad is actual thinking about buying the king from me,he will just burn on the really cold day's,I am curious to see how it will do in his home witch is about 3100 sq roughly.I was hoping to here if anybody had this unit in a bigger home like that what there opinions were?

The Apex meets B415 standards, but not epa from what I could find. Either way its the clean air standards for Canada. I would say the Apex is more efficient than the Caddy as far as emissions, but the Caddy will put out more heat. When we had our old furnace, the house would go from 72 to 80 and always vary. With the new furnace, we can keep it at a steady temperature within 2 degrees. The old unit threw alot more heat, but along with that was a huge waste in wood. We cut a cord and a half with the new furnace. The wood wasn't fully seasoned, and the chimney was way too big, killing draft and causing a loss of efficiency. Now the chimney is lined with a rigid 5.5" liner thats insulated and the wood is good and dry so things will only improve. Someone from another site bought and installed a Caddy last year in Michigan. I'm not sure how much wood he burned, but out of a 40' chimney at the end of the season he pulled less than a coffee can of soot from the chimney. He was very happy. They operate completely different, but once you get it its nice.

Just going by a glance at BK's site, said it qualifies for $1500 tax credit. That puts the price at at least $5K, which is way to rich for me. I don't think it comes with a blower, either.

Less wood ,less soot ,sound's good to me! I checked out some of the other furnaces u listed but I still think the caddy is the way to go,seems like some of them might be a little cleaner but not by much and if they even really are ? The caddy seems to have real good support from this website,other sites ,and very informative from psg,and the big one "EPA".It defintly makes me feel more comfortable! Hopefully some of the owner's of the other furnaces listed will comment.

Wow! That is a hefty price for the blaze king.,are u sure Jeff on the tax credit ? I was told that if u spend 5,000 u get the 1500.00,but if u spend less u still qualify for tax credit just not as much. That caught me when i went to look at the caddy ,but i think i would still get something like 7 or 900.00 if the furnace is between 2500-3000.00. Any one know where the best price is on the caddy ?

I'm not sure where to get one for a good price. Mine is a 1950 hotblast, built by SBI marketed by Usstove its a Caddy with a different name. I bought mine last year it was one of two left. I paid 1999, got 600 back at tax time and with some problems from the store I got an additional 200 credit. In the end I paid about 1200 for mine. I lucked out, but went through alot of bull to get the parts needed for it. The blaze king is around 3,000 for the furnace I believe. Just because it qualifies doesn't mean it costs 5k. I think the blower is optional. There are 2 ways to purchase a caddy, one is with the blower built into the unit, or the other is an add-on thats meant to be installed in series. Our old furnace was installed in series, which is an excellent way, but also to install a unit in parallel that uses a blower will also work. Ours is installed parallel with the central furnace. You can try searching for a dealer on the PSG site.

The tax credit is 30% of purchase/.installation price up to a maximum of $1500

What about the new Energy King 385ek? It qualifies for the govt. tax incentive and is rated at 78% efficiency? These Energy Kings look like solidly-built units and they now have a glass viewing port on the door along with a secondary burn tube. I'm debating over the 385ek and the Caddy as well but there are no local dealers in my area for the Caddy. I would have to have one shipped from out of state.

I have thought of the 385,but the only thing for me to buy it would be that i would have to see the epa results and i don't think that they have had that unit tested?They also said when i bought my 480 ek from energy king that it was 78% efficiently and it states that in my manual but if you look at it online they list the model as N/a for efficiency now.I will say that there furnaces are built very heavy duty,and they have some nice features available such as automatic draft ,water coil or forced draft.When i first bought the unit i had the forced draft and then changed to auto and that made a huge difference in wood consumption,a lot longer burn time but overall I think i am going to stay with the caddy unless energy king shows some epa results, so please correct me if i am wrong.

Hey Squish is that your ek 480 on the Madison craigslist?

Well,for anybody that cares? I got the caddy 140 and fired it up for the first time,I have to say this thing is very nice , one of the easiest wood fired unit's i have ever fired,was kind of nervous not having a sliding smoke baffle, but no problem,no puff back.put a little load of soft maple in it,and left the damper open the whole time.burned for six hour's! truly amazing!Very happy with my decision and no regrets.IN my opinion for anybody looking for a forced air wood furnace this has to be one of the best unit's out there.SAFE,CLEAN,AND EASY TO OPERATE.The only con's I can think of would be the red little switch which would be called the summer switch,went to check connection and broke ,no big deal,will cost maybe a dollar at the hardware store.I am going to get a four way selector switch for the blower anyways.Then i wish the ash pit had ash door that would swing open and then had a ash pan that could slide in and out,but like i said that is getting very picky.overall,very very happy.I was hoping that some one could let me know about the servo motor?it sits a t 8 clock and then opens to 10 clock ,is that right ?when it opens it seems like the damper could open a lot more or is this just normal?seems like it only needs to be opened a little bit to get the fire going

I'm glad to hear you got it! I had the first impressions with the furnace just like you did. I have found it really doesn't matter what type of wood you have. I can get overnight burns on just about anything, and you don't need rounds to get you through the night. Our damper opens maybe less than a 1/2 inch. You can adjust the damper to be opened a crack when closed, or have it completely closed with good dry wood. I think the manual states that you can adjust based on quality of fuel. I don't have the summer switch, or a multi-speed blower switch. You find one thats reasonable and that works let me know. Any pics?

Well thank you ! I think i am going to be very happy ,It should no doubt work a lot better for me,I am glad that i got a stove that sizes my house better ,I know i will save more wood with the size stove and plus having a secondary burn and less work cleaning the chimney.Any idea laynes what the flue temp should read on the stove pipe? I also talked to my electrician and told me to call the company before adding a selector switch to the blower.I think I will just play around and see what speed works the best for my duct's .I will post some pics pretty soon,thanks a lot for all the info on everything!

any pics squish? Did you end up going with the guy in Ripon?

No pics yet ,been waiting for my heating guy to get over here and finish up the duct work and such and then i was planning on taking some pic's,I bought from sunburst sales they are located in ripon WI,I went with the caddy 140, electric option, fan and limit included,saved myself over 800.00 by going through them,way cheaper then any other dealer.FREEBURN did you get set up with a new unit yet? I thought you were looking at the caddy or energy king?

I don't think I'm going to do anything. I have the Englander add-on and just can't justify spending the extra on another new furnace. Although it's tempting the money could much better be spent elsewhere. Still interested in your pics and results though. I can live vicariously through you and others and still consider it for the future if need be. Although the tax credit will be gone then, oh well. Life goes on...

I know exactly what you mean.Believe me ,it was very hard to spend the money and to get a new furnace and replace a new furnace.If i had a better sized furnace to start with ,i know i wouldn't change then. I made the mistake by getting way to big of a wood furnace and like i said earlier i was planing on adding on but that has changed and i know if i add on now i will be just adding on the garage, which will not have to be that warm anyways.I am overall glad that i did change,will not miss cleaning that chimney out all the time and getting up there with a foot of snow constantly.I know with this new caddy that i will for sure save wood ,and be able to leave the house for 10 to 12 hours and be comfortable doing it.I will post a little later in the heating season and let u all know how this unit is doing and do some compares with the old one.