Hi everyone - great site with a ton of information. But I do have some questions being a first time pellet stove buyer...
Here goes - I live in Southeastern MA and I'm looking to heat my semi-finished basement that I use for a workshop - mostly woodworking and other home projects. I'm tired of being cold and all the fun that comes along with warming up glue and finishes!
My home is just about 2 years old modular home with 2 x6 outside walls and has an oil fired boiler(power vented out the side) with baseboard heating up for the first and only floor with live able space.
I have been looking around the BORGS and they have some good deals especially the orange BORG on the Englander 25 about 670.00 currently - but one the problem's I'm running into is venting... I have lots of windows that aren't the required 4 feet apart - this includes 4 basement windows and 7 windows on the gable and sides of the house. I spoke with my local building inspector today and he said that the town I live in doesn't have any specific bylaws for installing a pellet stove - he will basically just go buy the manufactures recommendations from the manual. So I went online and downloaded a few different manuals and looked at their venting requirements and some manuals are much more detailed than other's like Harmon and Heatilator (ECO-Choice), where i found the Englander to be a bit more vague no diagrams and such also some information that was not mentioned in the manual which is a concern for me because the building inspector usually goes "by the book" so this could cause me some issues if they are not specifically called out in the manual. I think I could get by as long as I followed common sense or paid to have it installed - I would like to do it myself but not the end of the world if I had to have someone come in and do it.
One thing I noticed about the Harman is that using the OAK I can get away with only having to stay 18" away from the windows which would allow me to vent it through the wall almost anywhere (staying in the guidelines for corners and such) - for me this could be a big advantage this would save me from either having to move some things around in the basement like the oil tank (where it currently is takes up a good portion of the rear gable wall which I could vent through the wall if it wasn’t there - ahh hindsight...) and save me on running some extra venting up to the roof (all my windows are 5' tall and 2.5' wide with 2 combos to make them 5' x5') or paying extra to have someone do it - I think I was quoted around 500+ materials, which seems to be the normal around here.
I did go down to a local stove shop today and took a look at the Harmon, US Stove and ECO-Choice along with the Englander at the BORG - they all have their own plus's and minus's. No ash pot in the Englander a bit more manual work is needed daily (at least it seems so from the reviews I read), the P38 (around 2200) and P43 (I think around 2500) are very nice the 43 has the advantage of the auto ignite which is a nice to have for not a lot of extra money. The ECO seems like a very nice unit as well similar to the P38 but a bit cheaper (like 1600) and the US Stove they have on display for about 1000.00 - again the trade of is the venting. If I was to go with any other stove than a Harman I would more than likely have to run full pipe out the basement and up to the roof and around the soffit (the wife would prefer not to have it running up the side of the house as it viewable from the street and isn't the most eye appealing) - I could live with it to get heat at this point if I had to but I do see the point and would prefer not to have to run a pipe all the up the house, the only other place would be in the back but I run into an issue with it being the gable end where the oil tank is and I don't think I would have enough room to sneak the stove in and run the pipe up and out staying away from the compostable and windows in the back of the house - there is also a 100# propane cylinder on the back gable corner.
Really to me it's in the basement it doesn't have to look pretty it just needs to get the job done so appearance isn't an issue - function yes - would like to hook it to a thermostat and auto ignite would be nice but needed - my plan is that if it doesn't have an auto ignite I could just fill the hopper and turn it to low during the day and then when I get home to work in the shop turn it up to heat up the area.
So I guess it comes down to do I spend the money on the more expensive stove with the bells and whistles and do a simple direct vent out the sidewall - get a cheaper model without all the features but spend more to get it installed (and maybe have some issues with the building inspector if he has to guess on some of the spec's; that's a big maybe but after just building a house I have had my fun with inspectors - not that I had a bad experience but some can be a bit more easier than others). So I leave it to you all with more experience than I and am open to your opinions - I may be completely off my rocker with my ideas on the venting and such if so please say so - my skin has thickened from working in my cold basement lol.
Whew that's a lot of info to digest and I think I confused myself so please forgive me if something isn’t clear, and I will do my best to answer any questions you may have and i do have some pictures if you all would like to see them of the house and my choices for installation.
Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post!
Doh all that and I forgot the square footage that I'm heating... about 1000...
-Dave
Here goes - I live in Southeastern MA and I'm looking to heat my semi-finished basement that I use for a workshop - mostly woodworking and other home projects. I'm tired of being cold and all the fun that comes along with warming up glue and finishes!
My home is just about 2 years old modular home with 2 x6 outside walls and has an oil fired boiler(power vented out the side) with baseboard heating up for the first and only floor with live able space.
I have been looking around the BORGS and they have some good deals especially the orange BORG on the Englander 25 about 670.00 currently - but one the problem's I'm running into is venting... I have lots of windows that aren't the required 4 feet apart - this includes 4 basement windows and 7 windows on the gable and sides of the house. I spoke with my local building inspector today and he said that the town I live in doesn't have any specific bylaws for installing a pellet stove - he will basically just go buy the manufactures recommendations from the manual. So I went online and downloaded a few different manuals and looked at their venting requirements and some manuals are much more detailed than other's like Harmon and Heatilator (ECO-Choice), where i found the Englander to be a bit more vague no diagrams and such also some information that was not mentioned in the manual which is a concern for me because the building inspector usually goes "by the book" so this could cause me some issues if they are not specifically called out in the manual. I think I could get by as long as I followed common sense or paid to have it installed - I would like to do it myself but not the end of the world if I had to have someone come in and do it.
One thing I noticed about the Harman is that using the OAK I can get away with only having to stay 18" away from the windows which would allow me to vent it through the wall almost anywhere (staying in the guidelines for corners and such) - for me this could be a big advantage this would save me from either having to move some things around in the basement like the oil tank (where it currently is takes up a good portion of the rear gable wall which I could vent through the wall if it wasn’t there - ahh hindsight...) and save me on running some extra venting up to the roof (all my windows are 5' tall and 2.5' wide with 2 combos to make them 5' x5') or paying extra to have someone do it - I think I was quoted around 500+ materials, which seems to be the normal around here.
I did go down to a local stove shop today and took a look at the Harmon, US Stove and ECO-Choice along with the Englander at the BORG - they all have their own plus's and minus's. No ash pot in the Englander a bit more manual work is needed daily (at least it seems so from the reviews I read), the P38 (around 2200) and P43 (I think around 2500) are very nice the 43 has the advantage of the auto ignite which is a nice to have for not a lot of extra money. The ECO seems like a very nice unit as well similar to the P38 but a bit cheaper (like 1600) and the US Stove they have on display for about 1000.00 - again the trade of is the venting. If I was to go with any other stove than a Harman I would more than likely have to run full pipe out the basement and up to the roof and around the soffit (the wife would prefer not to have it running up the side of the house as it viewable from the street and isn't the most eye appealing) - I could live with it to get heat at this point if I had to but I do see the point and would prefer not to have to run a pipe all the up the house, the only other place would be in the back but I run into an issue with it being the gable end where the oil tank is and I don't think I would have enough room to sneak the stove in and run the pipe up and out staying away from the compostable and windows in the back of the house - there is also a 100# propane cylinder on the back gable corner.
Really to me it's in the basement it doesn't have to look pretty it just needs to get the job done so appearance isn't an issue - function yes - would like to hook it to a thermostat and auto ignite would be nice but needed - my plan is that if it doesn't have an auto ignite I could just fill the hopper and turn it to low during the day and then when I get home to work in the shop turn it up to heat up the area.
So I guess it comes down to do I spend the money on the more expensive stove with the bells and whistles and do a simple direct vent out the sidewall - get a cheaper model without all the features but spend more to get it installed (and maybe have some issues with the building inspector if he has to guess on some of the spec's; that's a big maybe but after just building a house I have had my fun with inspectors - not that I had a bad experience but some can be a bit more easier than others). So I leave it to you all with more experience than I and am open to your opinions - I may be completely off my rocker with my ideas on the venting and such if so please say so - my skin has thickened from working in my cold basement lol.
Whew that's a lot of info to digest and I think I confused myself so please forgive me if something isn’t clear, and I will do my best to answer any questions you may have and i do have some pictures if you all would like to see them of the house and my choices for installation.
Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post!
Doh all that and I forgot the square footage that I'm heating... about 1000...
-Dave