Totally Amazed!

Was over at a buddies house today. Very large (3200sqft) open A frame with 20' ceilings. It was 65 degrees inside when we got there. He decided to light a fire in the Sierra 8000 to take the chill off. After only a half hour the temp was rising nicely. What amazed me was how the stove at only 500 degrees ( felt practically cold to me compared to the Elm) was able to warm the house so quickly. I've got a feeling when I start heating drywall instead of concrete I will experience something totally different with wood heat. Stove didn't appear to be putting off much heat but the room was really responding well. No wonder you guys with small stoves in rooms with 8 or 9 foot ceilings talk about temps in the 70s and 80s.

You and I are kind of in the same boat. You are losing a lot of heat to concrete and I am fighting off drafts. Not sure what your outcome would be, but I would imagine I would be able to us 2 or 3 Keystone stoves as oppose a Defiant, Encore, and a 30NC if I was able to eliminate the draft issue.

I'd imagine you could probably make it with a 16"-20" Elm as oppose to the 30" you are currently using.

I could feel the room almost immediately start to get warmer. I got home and started my stove and had the opposite results. I got the stove to 750 degrees and it felt mighty nice a few feet away but after 3hrs the other side of the room didn't change a bit. In fact since the stove has been off for a couple days I doubt the basement will even be 5 degrees warmer 8hrs later with me keeping the Elm over 500 the whole time. Thats how bad it is. It usually takes a full 2 days before things start to overcome the sink. Its supposed to be 80 here tomorrow and honestly I will probably keep the Elm alive all day just to get it to 75 down there. Other option is to leave the basement door open. Its a great place in the summer on hot days. Never have airconditioned the basement.

This is in the basement, and there's no insulation? No wonder. Insulation will be far more important than the heat source. Ground probably stays at a constant 50 Fahrenheit or so year-round. And that's a pretty big heat sink.

There's a reason basements in northern climates were used mostly as root cellars.

You'd be far better served spending some time and money insulating it than pumping more wood in that big stove. And not just drywall - you should probably consider some kind of moisture barrier and serious heat insulation as well, assuming you are using this as a full-time living space. You'll lose a bit of the cooling factor in summer of course.

Appears to be a plate-steel stove. I wish more makers of these would offer the top or rear-vent option; I would have a lot more stoves to choose from since I like the hearth-mount into the masonry chimney. I'm assuming that your buddy had the blower cranking in order to heat up that room so quickly...

Is it possible that these fish and elephants have a common evolutionary ancestor?

Nashua could really throw the heat yes your memory is correct. But also I needed to have a hired hand to keep it fired. The Elm is close with a forth the wood usage. As for the Magnolia, I owned up to it. Although I didn't make the draft connection until recently as a contributing factor in overfires, fact is the Elm is more controllable and is robust enough to handle repeated hot firings. As for the basement heating issue, I understand what I'm up against, just saying I experienced a situation that is probably much tougher than the average persons house and it palled in comparison to my basement. Someone that has always heated a well insulated space might be just as amazed at my situation if thy were to experience it.
Some yrs ago we were on vacation and got freaky cold in Nov. My FIL went over to start the stove and get some heat in the house as a precaution. He slept in the basement so he could monitor the stove and ad wood. He froze that night even though he kept the stove roaring all night long. He walked into a 40 degree basement and tried to heat it in a short time.I told him then it would have taken 2 days at best before any warm would have come to the space.

We have an abundance of very old stone and brick houses around here, with exterior walls consisting of plaster applied directly to the masonry. Same effect you describe, although surely to a lesser degree above ground than below, where the walls are heat-sunk to the earth. It actually works to our advantage, as a sort of primitive geothermal system, moderating interior temps on very hot and very cold days.

One place to check for leaks in the basement is where the sill plate rests on top of the cement block. I've seen major leakage between there and a couple tubes of caulk made a big difference.

Even more I'll bet if its a walkout.

So why don't you insulate it?

Planning on it. Even bought the stuff. But like anything else all in due time
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If you go back far enough, yes! Cheers!

Yes he did.

I would say that the reason the room heated up so well was it was well insulated.

Some talk about needing a bigger stove, that only burns more wood, money would be better spent insulating your house. So as to burn less wood.

The home was built in 71 and was insulated but he recently had it re insulated so yes it was a well insulated home. Even so there was a tremendously large area in the great room with very high ceilings and it responded very quickly to the heat. If that stove had been in my basement you wouldn't have known it was on for hours. Only way you could have known there was a lit stove would have been to see the flames or be standing right beside it. I could feel the heat from 15ft away 1/2 hour after it was started in his house.

Wow that is awesome I am glad you had such a good experience!