Needing advise on Small wood stove

[Mountaineer12]

Got a question for you guys. My and my wife just moved into our house back in June of 2012. Installed a pellet stove because I was not paying to run my heat pump all winter, my parents have had great luck with their pellet stove, and we sell wood burning pellets where I work, so I can get them at cost. The house is 2200 square feet. First floor is about 1300 square feet and upstairs about 900 square feet. The issue I'm having is that the pellet stove isn't really keeping the house as warm as we'd like. I've got a fairly big pellet stove and works great I just think the house is a little much for it especially when it gets down into the 20's. basically our family room is 21' x 21' and has 60" french doors going in to it. If i keep those doors closed and let the pellet stove heat the rest of the house it will keep it about 70 in the house. I'll have to run a small electric heater in the family room to keep it warm. If I keep those doors open, My temp in the house will usually be around 61-63. So what I'm looking for is a small to medium wood stove to heat my family room and let the pellet stove heat the rest of the house like it has been. Another reason I like the option of a wood stove is I can use it as a backup for heat in case the power goes out. I'm way back off the main road so if we were to get an ice storm and knock out the power, who knows how long we'd be out. Any suggestions on stoves or any other alternative ways to heat the house would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Mountaineer12]

May even consider a large wood stove to heat the whole house

 

[Highbeam]

You don't want a small woodstove with 2200 SF. It is fairly straight forward to size a woodstove for the home if we know your location (temperatures) and the age/insulation levels of the home. It is unacceptable to be so undergunned. I loaded my stove yesterday at 4pm and right now 21 hours later my 1700 SF home is at 75.

Why is your current pellet stove not keeping up? With a house that small, it should be able to do it.

 

[Mountaineer12]

The house was recently built in 1999 and seems very well insulated. Still very tight around all the windows also, not very many drafts. Reason I was looking at a smaller stove was because of putting it in the smaller room to take the chill off of that room while we were in there during the evenings after work. While the pellet stove heats the rest of the house. It does a great job at heating the rest of the house but the way the other room is positioned in the house, it's hard to keep it heated.

 

[Swedishchef]

I agree with Highbeam. Getting a small stove is a bad idea. You can always make a small fire in a big stove but not the other way around. In a power outage your pellet stove will limit you unless to have generator.

1300 sqft is a big house. Especially if you're trying to heat the upstairs. What is the layout (can you draw a plan?)? What kind of stove are you looking for: cast iron or steel? Price range? Where do you live?

Andrew

 

[Mountaineer12]

That's exactly why I was thinking larger stove, I guess you can never have too much. Not really sure on the style stove, price range really doesn't matter as I won't be installing it until fall of next year and will have plenty of time to save for it. I live in the eastern panhandle of WV. Just west of Martinsburg to be exact. I'll try to get a drawing up of the downstairs layout

 

[begreen]

Get a medium-sized stove of around 2 cu ft. That will get you enough capacity for overnight burns, which will be important in an extended outage. There are lots of choices here so we need a little guidance on what are the secondary priorities. Looks, burn time length, low burn operation, cost, simplicity, low maintenance, wood length, easy hearth requirements, etc. are some other considerations.

 

[Mountaineer12]

This is kind of what I'm going for, I found this picture and that's what brought me here. Burn time i'm looking for something that I can start up in the evening around 5:30-6:00 and then maybe put some more in before I go to bed then if I had to refill in the morning before I went to work at 6:30 to keep it going til I get back home again.

 

[BrowningBAR]

This is kind of what I'm going for, I found this picture and that's what brought me here. Burn time i'm looking for something that I can start up in the evening around 5:30-6:00 and then maybe put some more in before I go to bed then if I had to refill in the morning before I went to work at 6:30 to keep it going til I get back home again.

That's an Englander 30. It is not a small stove.

 

[Mountaineer12]

This is what my first floor looks like. And The red square is where I'm thinking of putting the wood stove.

 

[begreen]

The 30NC is a full sized 3 cu ft stove. It's affordable and will get the job done. You may even end up selling the pellet stove.

 

[Mountaineer12]

Well, when I load up that pellet stove once every evening with two 40 lb bags, I wouldn't mind getting rid of it, especially since I have plenty of wood that I could cut myself on our 800 acre property just down the road.

 

[rijim]

I would look into the Blaze King Sirocco; the 20 has been out for a while the 30 is just released and may work for you. The CAT technology will allow you to run it at lower output and still clean; when you need the heat, run it hotter. You should get between 12 and 30 hr burn times depending on how you are running it. This would allow you to keep the pellet run off a Tstat and the BK on low when not home then turn the BK up when home and the pellet will help when needed. The Sirocco looks a little more traditional than the bigger King but bigger would be better if your power is out.
Sounds like you have the wood supply; all new stoves require 2-3 year CSS seasoned wood so I would get started now and maybe buy a few cords of "seasoned" wood and get it stacked in a breezy area for use next winter (what you buy as seasoned, usually isn't dry enough).

 

[swagler85]

If your like many of us here the fun of cutting, splitting, and stacking will make you want to use the wood stove primarily. Especially if you have that big of a chunk of land to cut on.

And as many more will say, start cutting and splitting now! Also pay attention to split size as others said previously. Figure out how big the inside if the stove is that you will be buying and cut your splits that size.

 

[tim1]

Two forty pound bags a evening, are you kidding? You got to be. P.E. Summit and sell the pellet stove, with 800 acres, no brainer!! Tim

 

[tim1]

Wow, just went over to the pellet stove forum and I guess this is normal. Would the Pacific Energy pellet stove be better? Just curious. Tim

 

[Bub381]

Oh you can get too big of a stove,believe me.Creosote,creosote, creosote then chimney fire.

 

[jjs777_fzr]

Take it from those that run multiple stoves - it is NICE to have the option to go with one or the other or both at varying levels of output.
Sometimes - even for those addicted to wood burning - it is just nice to walk by the stove with it idling down and not worry about reloading since the pellet stove is maintaining nice temps and very easily I might add.
For my house anything at or above 32F the pellet stove actually does a good job at keeping the first floor and second floor comfortable.
Below 32F or with moderate wind the house starts to require both stoves going so as to not overheat anyone room.
Based on the floor plan you drew - I personally would not go for the big Englander or any other huge stove like that for that corner of the room. Its a corner after all.
Although I don't run one - I'd look at a nice soapstone/cat stove - something with decent burn times and the ability to throttle down.

Outside temp 35F - no wind.
Right now my wood stove is running on minimum output (room temp 76F)
Pellet stove running on heat range 3/10. (room temp 75).
I'm dying here...wife loves it.

 

[begreen]

The only thing I missed from the pellet stove was the digital thermostat that had the house warming up 15 minutes before the alarm went off. Now the heat pump does that if needed. Though with the T6 still warming the house it usually isn't necessary.

 

[ddahlgren]

I would look into the Blaze King Sirocco; the 20 has been out for a while the 30 is just released and may work for you. The CAT technology will allow you to run it at lower output and still clean; when you need the heat, run it hotter. You should get between 12 and 30 hr burn times depending on how you are running it. This would allow you to keep the pellet run off a Tstat and the BK on low when not home then turn the BK up when home and the pellet will help when needed. The Sirocco looks a little more traditional than the bigger King but bigger would be better if your power is out.
Sounds like you have the wood supply; all new stoves require 2-3 year CSS seasoned wood so I would get started now and maybe buy a few cords of "seasoned" wood and get it stacked in a breezy area for use next winter (what you buy as seasoned, usually isn't dry enough).

Seasoned wood from a dealer.. Lots of luck in SE CT is all I can say. They call cut 9 months ago and split last week seasoned and it does not burn easily.

 

[billb3]

+1 on being surprised the pellet stove isn't heating that space.
Even a new(er) house can have the smallest of errors that can leak quite a bit of air.

 

[Mountaineer12]

I can't remember the model but it's a Vulcan and about 4 years old but was only used for 1 1/2 seasons, I bought it used. Doesn't have a thermostat. I have two different settings that I can adjust, auger control 1, 2, 3, 4. With one the lowest amount of pellets and 4 the most. Then the blower can be set on Low, Med.-Low, Med., Med.-High, and High. I've always found it odd that If I keep the stove on 3 and Medium that it will keep it warmer that putting it on 4 and High or med.-high. On colder days in the 20's I run it on 3 and medium. then usually above 35 i'll put it on 2 med.-low. Now if I turn it up to 3 when the outside temp is above 35 it will heat my house above 70 and very comfortable but I can't let that stove run that high constantly, it's not worth the pellets. I guess I should have specified this earlier. I go through about 10-12 bags of pellets a week as it is. Basically wanting the wood stove to take more pressure off the pellet stove so I don't have to burn as much, but then again, if I can heat the whole house with a wood stove, I'll consider getting rid of the pellet stove even though it wouldn't hurt to keep it around. And as the poster said above, why wouldn't you go with the big stove in the corner?

 

[jeff_t]

My stove is kinda big, and in a corner. Put whatever you want there. If it was me, I'd put a 3 cu ft stove there and sell the pellet stove.

OTOH, if you get pellets cheap, putting a small stove there to supplement and keep the family room warm isn't a bad idea either.

Depends on how much wood you want to cut.