Newbie with toddler, cast iron or steel?

[enigmablaze]

Wow I am overwhelmed with the knowledge I'm gaining on this forum! This is my first post, I am trying to find my way here. We have an enclosed porch on the back of our house we turned into a dining/family room. It is on a slab and has no insulation in the ceiling so it gets freezing and basically unusable in our midwestern winters, my hubby has wanted a wood-burner for years (grew up heating with wood) and we want to finally do it. Of course now we have a toddler and I am definitely nervous bringing in a box of fire at his level!

Calling our local dealers has been discouraging, but I'm trying to find a really safe stove for a toddler (or any advice on how to keep them safe since obviously they are crazy hot), I think my favorite is the Jotul F100 (cast iron) but a guy today told me his 3-walled steel stoves are the only way to go since they stay cool on the sides, how is that possible and it still heats?

Anyway, I'm sure toddlers have successfully been around stoves for ages, I just want to try to make a safe decision for him...advice?

 

[begreen]

First thing I'd have insulation blown or foamed in to improve the heat holding of the space. No point in heating outdoors no matter what the fuel is. We had an old porch converted into our kitchen entry way and the heat loss was ridiculous. Make sure you get a stove big enough for the job. The F100 is pretty small which mean short burntimes and frequent refills.

There is no difference in safety between stoves at a toddler level. The door on all models is likely to be very hot. The good news is that most kids intuitively pick up on this and know it's hot. A little reinforcement with No, owwee hot! helps. If you need better peace of mind for toddler years consider putting a child gate surround.
http://www.kidco.com/products-page/safety-gates/fireplaces/

 

[enigmablaze]

thank you begreen! We have spent years trying to figure ways to make this room more temperate, to make it truly insulated we would literally have to tear down most of it and rebuild it completely, which is out of the realm of budget. I'm hoping the stove will help us use that room more. I'm guessing it's about 200sq ft, do you really think the F100 would be too small?

 

[jb6l6gc]

What type of ceiling/roof structure does it have. Some types wouldn't be
Too hard to add insulation to.
If it has attic space you could add blown in
Insulation pretty easily without creating too much work.

 

[enigmablaze]

jb616gc, the ceiling is wood plank with a rubber roof immediately over it, there is no way to insulate it unless we would drop a new ceiling down but since it is a shed roof already the ceiling gets lower than 8ft, the room would be extremely low!

 

[Creekside]

Here is what we did, we have a 2 year-old and 4 year-old. We had the obvious worries about them getting burned but now I am more worried about them trying to open the stove and load it while the fire is going. I have no doubt each of them would try it at least once if they could get to the stove. And the older one could easily open the door. Anytime I bring in wood from outside they both run to the door, come out, and cry if they don't get to carry in their own piece of firewood.

 

[begreen]

jb616gc, the ceiling is wood plank with a rubber roof immediately over it, there is no way to insulate it unless we would drop a new ceiling down but since it is a shed roof already the ceiling gets lower than 8ft, the room would be extremely low!

Could a layer of foam board be attached then sheetrocked over?

 

[kennyp2339]

As Creekside mentioned, getting burned by the stove is an extremely low probability, having the toddler / kiddo throw something at the stove or try to open the door is much higher, now is the time to start fire safety, believe they will learn very fast, they are much smarter than they appear at times.

 

[xman23]

The kids issue is discussed here from time to time. A few burners have put up fences, but. most of us do not and have not had an issue teaching the kids what hot is. I've had five grand kids learn this. It's a rite of passage here when they get mature enough to make the fire and maintain the fire. Until then they get no closer than warming there butt. The kids love the stove heat.

So go for it, you'll surely put some heat into that insulated porch. I may not be ideal location, but..... Thinking about it, a wood stove goes through a burn cycle for every load of wood. That is a heat cycle, up and down in temperature. So a structure with more mass and insulated well will retain the heat, making the stove cycle maintain much more even heat in the room.

 

[mass_burner]

We have a close scenario to yours, slab floor off back of house. But our roof extends to the end of the patio, and glass sliders all around. We have a little jotul 602 in there which works fine, 300 sq ft. But it does require more frequent loading due to its size.

Other posters are right, you've got to do something about heat retention. We only use ours sporadically in the winter.

 

[electrathon]

Kids are smarter than you are giving credit for. They learn " HOT" very fast.

 

[RSNovi]

It has been easy to teach our young children not to touch the stove. They learn quick.

What bothers me is them accidentally falling or throwing something at the stove.

I just watch them closely.

 

[Swedishchef]

Welcome to the forums!

When heating a space, with a wood stove or not, you should always try to retain some heat. I understand that with the current setup and budget it may not be easy...but as someone else mentioned, perhaps 1-2 inches of foam board would be possible? That would drop the ceiling about 2.5 inches max and cost about $300 in materials. You'd notice a huge improvement in heat retention with 2 inches of foam.

The F100 is a nice little stove but it has a small firebox. I'd try to step it up a size if possible.

As for kids around a stove, my kids never had a gate. They were often warmed. My youngest, when he was 1-2 years old, would deviate 10 feet away from it when it was lit to get from one side to the other.. I would say "Liam, it's hot...be careful". He'd make a sad face (because he was fearful) and would leave. lol

Andrew

 

[rowerwet]

My sister and I both got burned by the wood stove that taught us not to run near the stove.
I have four kids 14-4 only one has gotten a burn and she couldn't tell us how (too young) none of them want to get near enough to be burned

 

[KillerWhale]

Hello there - I have a Jotul F100 in my living room. I also have a 2 year old and 4 year old. We never used a heat shield/fence and told the kids "oweee HOT" about 5 times and that worked, also if they go close it is very hot so they seemed to have figured that out. We still use discretion and pretty much say that to them every time we fire it up (every day right now). I think its something you always need to be aware of but they seem to catch on pretty quick. They both snuggled up beside the stove last night after a bath it was pretty cute

 

[Dobish]

we have a 9month old and a 3 year old. the 3yo understands that fires are hot, but we worry about him "being a fireman and rescuing", so we don't let him play near the stove. Due to the layout of our house, we actually just ordered a large gate and plan on sectioning off a large part of the living room. this allows the little one to play, but we don't have to worry about the stairs or the stove.

It should be showing up today!

 

[drastic]

+1 to Begreen and Kidco, great system and Even though my son knows what hot is we keep it up for running and tripping purposes.

 

[heavy hammer]

My wife was scared our two year old daughter would get burned by our stove. When the stove is not in use she would play with the handles and take the stove top thermostats off of it. The moment we fired it up she would not go within two feet of it. She has never touched it and I have even tried to get her to help me load it. What I'm getting at is kids are smart, you can never be to careful but they figure things out pretty quick. The wife is the one to worry about she thought she would go lay on it and get third degree burns. She wanted to gate off the whole room block off one side entrance etc. it works out kids figure out real quick what hot is.

 

[CheapBassTurd]

We have no choice but to fence in the stove corner.
State mandate for fostering.
I don't recall ever touching a hot stove more than once either. LOLOL
It's a very quick lesson, and learned well.

CheapMark

 

[pen]

When we had only one boy there was no need for a gate. He knew the stove was hot, and that was that. I saw other folks with gates where their kids always "teased" the stove as it seemed to me to be the forbidden fruit. With that I swore I would never have a gate around the stove. Then we had our second child, another boy. As he got older he had the same respect for the stove that his older brother had but when the two were playing, good sense was out of the question. Just due to the fact that they were occupied with each other and realize that the stove was ansecondary thought of them, I bought two fireplace screens and placed those around the stove.

These serve as a boundary from direct contact with the stove even though they are movable. Having some protection in the event of an accident is good but many circumstances I don't think solid gates are necessary.

We have three kids now and the screens have serviced us well.

 

[Dobish]

We got ours up yesterday

 

[mitchell721]

+1 on the foam board on the ceiling and maybe some of the window and door expanding foam for areas your can quite get the foam board into