Hearthstone Craftsbury to heat my 450 sq. ft. living room

[cycloxer]

I have been looking at stoves and my latest is the Hearthstone Craftsbury. The reason I like this stove is that it has a decent 1.5 cu. ft. firebox, it is cast iron w/ four soapstone panels inside, and it will fit on my hearth legally with no modifications. Doe anyone have this stove? How does it compare to a Jotul F3CB or an F 400 Castine? Those were two of my other choices.

I had to fix this post as the smaller 1.5 cu. ft. stove is actually called the Craftsbury. The Shelburne is the larger 2.0 cu ft. stove.

 

[Highbeam]

1.5 CF is a tiny stove. That's fine if you can deal with frequent reloads and you don't plan on over night fires but for folks wishing to heat their homes with wood, nothing less than 2 CF will do and I wouldn't want anything less than the heritage in the hearthstone lineup.

Very little experience on the board with the cast iron hearthstones. Seems that the small cast iron market is dominated by jotul and morso.

Remember that it isn't the size of the room that you consider but the size of the house being heated when you look at the stove heating specs. My living room is much smaller than yours but it opens up to adjacent rooms and hallways so I need more power.

 

[Bigg_Redd]

I say go for it. At least they had the common decency to put that revolting soapstone inside the stove.

 

[cycloxer]

I'm not trying to heat my whole house as I already have natural gas heat which is cheaper than wood heat right now. The goal is to have a secondary heating unit to heat the living room area on some evenings and the weekend. Given that my entire floor is 1,100 sq. ft., do I really need a bigger stove? I burn firewood in that open fireplace right now which is 46" x 35" x 21". I spent the whole weekend cleaning my flue and TSP'ing the brick to get it all nice and clean. I think it came out pretty good. I just have to pick out a stove to put in there so I can actually get some meaningful heat out of my wood.

What is the firebox size of the Jotul F3CB and the Jotul F 400 Castine? Isn't the F 400 about 1.7 cu. ft. and the F3CB like 1.2 cu ft.?

The only reason I am considering the Craftsbury is that it clears my mantel without a shield. I'd need a shield w/ the Jotul stoves and I think the shields look terrible. I agree with you in that I would love a larger 2.0 cu. ft. firebox. Maybe if I can come up with a nice mantel shield.

 

[begreen]

I've only seen the Shelburne on the showroom floor and not burning, but it looked like a very well made stove. I like that they offer the durable, blue-black finish like Jotul. At 2.0 cu ft, it's roughly the same size as the F500. The F400 is ~1.5 cu ft.

 

[cycloxer]

Yeah I think that 1.5 cu. ft. will be fine. I can burn it hot and I will pull the stove right out to the minimum 16" clearance from the glass to get as much of the stove into the room and out of the fireplace as I can. I checked one out at a shop and they are solid stoves. The Shelburne is quite a bit larger. The Craftsbury weighs in at 313 lbs. which is a fair amount for a stove of its size. My only complaint is the 17" log size. Most of my splits are 16" or less, but you get some that are longer. That could get a bit annoying.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

I'm not trying to heat my whole house as I already have natural gas heat which is cheaper than wood heat right now. The goal is to have a secondary heating unit to heat the living room area on some evenings and the weekend.

With a woodstove, plan for the future. If you only want it for secondary heat that's ok, but if you think you may want to use it to heat the whole house when gas goes up it would be less expensive to buy the larger stove now. I'd hate to be short sighted on such a big purpose. It would be like buying a smart car knowing you'll need a truck next year.

Matt

 

[cycloxer]

Yeah I am going to look at mantel shields so that I can get the Jotul F 400 or the Shelburne. I really like the Shelburne's 2 cu ft. box that can take 20" logs. The Craftsbury is nice, but it does kinda look like a toy stove in comparison. This looks much better:

 

[cycloxer]

Since I am a complete toolbox w/ OCD I made some mock cardboard to scale of the Craftsbury. You can see that I have plenty of mantel clearance. I need 16" according to the Craftsbury manual and I have over 18". That cardboard stove is sitting exactly 16" from the front edge of my hearth. You can see that there are no side clearance issues and I have plenty of depth. I also have plenty of room to connect the flue pipe and access for cleaning with a straight shot up the flue.

Although this stove doesn't completely fill the firepalce, this will actually be good as it will allow the heat to circulate freely around the stove. Hearthstone also offers a blower kit.

 

[lexybird]

seems like a waste of a good fireplace being that you have the luxury of being able to add a large stove that would heat your home and give you overnight burns and yet you want to put a baby stove to only heat one room when you can heat the entire house makes no sense to me ,i would rethink that choice because on a zero degree windy night it will make all the difference and you can always add firebox to reduce the size if you desire .also natural gas is really not cheaper than wood unless they are offering it for free nowadays .you must realize its(gas) convenient sure but ~they control the price and can raise it just as easy as lower it ,plan for the future.

 

[thinkxingu]

Greetings,
I agree with lexy on two points: 1. that stove is going to look odd in such a big fireplace, and 2. as mentioned on another thread I was just looking at, it's always possible to build a small fire in a large stove, but just try to build a large fire in a small stove!

S

 

[cycloxer]

I dunno. I think the stove is the perfect size for my needs. I won't get blown out of the room and I can maintain all of the legal clearances. The large fireplace is actually a good thing in that it allows more air to freely flow around the stove and into the house. Every stove I have looked at that is larger requires a mantel shield. Personally I think those shields look like crap, so I am reluctant to go that route.

Natural gas is most definitely cheaper than the going rate for wood around here right now. I ran the numbers. I am paying $1.17 per therm which works out to $14.55 per mil Btu with my 80% efficient boiler. I paid $250 for my last cord of wood and that is a fair price for around here. If you run the math on a 70% efficient stove (a very generous # considering that stoves are not always running at max efficiency), that comes to $16.23 per mil Btu, a 12% premium. Now, you are correct in that we cannot predict the future price of NG, though if I were betting man I would say that the future price will be higher. Likewise, we cannot predict the price of cordwood, so I consider it a bit of a wash. Yes, there are ways to get wood, but there is no such thing as free wood. I get about 1/2 cord of hard maple off of my own land every year, but that requires, time, effort, and tools. By the time I factor in the wear and tear on my chainsaw and the gas required and the splitting, that isn't really free wood anymore ;^) Burning wood requires a lot of time and energy. Now, I enjoy all of this, so to me it is no big deal, but I don't always have the time. Sometimes I need to rely on my programmable thermostat to do the job.

My final thought is that I could start off with this stove and it won't break the bank. If this works out and I like it, I can always upgrade to a larger stove in the future. This will be my toy stove and I will call it Mini Me.

 

[thinkxingu]

Sounds like you made your decision--good luck!

S

 

[cycloxer]

...unless somebody can suggest a stove that fits better and/or a heat shield that looks nice ;^)

 

[begreen]

Did the title change radically on this thread today? I would take an F400 over the Craftsbury from what I have seen of each stove. But admittedly, I have more experience with the Castine.

 

[cycloxer]

Yes, I changed the title to a Craftsbury as that was the stove I was considering. I have looked at both and measured them. The F 400 is a more substantial stove for sure and it takes 20" logs. It is also more expensive. I thought about this project a little more and I have actually put it on hold for now. The price of NG is falling like a rock so I might as well use that to heat the house. I will be burning regular fires in the open fireplace as it really doesn't cost me much. Maybe in the spring I will see what I can find on sale.

I will probably do something eventually, but I am looking at something like a Morso 5660 insert:

 

[tbuff]

I heat my 1100sqft Ranch beautifully with the Craftsbury, 24x7.. We are in the midst of a cold snap now(mid-20's) and my backup oil heat hasnt fired once....

 

[natedawg3256]

i've got a crapsbury frankly i wouldn't reccomend it to anyone. I personally think i bought a 1500$, 300 Pound paper weight. i 've also been waiting on a part for over two weeks!! During the longest cold snap in my area in 50 years.