Which would you rather have 50,000 btu's 24/7 or 73,000 max sporadically throught the day?

[Charles1981]

I would want to focus on making sure I have enough dry wood for the upcoming seasons. That unit should be really pumping out the heat and for much longer than 6-7 hours.

@ 3 cuft fire box and only 6 hours of burn time you are probably really going through a bit of wood.

That has been my goal the past 3 years is making sure I got ahead of wood.

The first year my wood was pretty wet and burned so so. Last year I had more CSS earlier but not great but the stove burned so much better with more heat output for longer periods. This year so far I have wood that has been seasoned almost 2 years, I am two years ahead, and the stove is really keeping up with our needs almost perfectly (so long as it doesn't get below zero degrees).

Seems like your experience could be greatly improve with more adequate fuel.

 

[OK_Bill]

(snip) ... So my question for you all is this. Given my situation - would you rather have a constant 50,000 btu's (Pellet stove) in the centeral rpart of the house or a stove that can get hotter but is not running at max capacity all the time and at times goes cold.

I am assuming the constant 50k would keep the house warmer?

Wise ass answer: Both.

Big house here in OKC. 3800sf, and its not a wide open plan.

We placed a VC Encore in a 4 seasons room toward the back (bedroom) part of the house, which also happens to be on the north side. 50k BTU's there is just about right to keep that part of the house warm when the cold snaps hit us and temps drop into the 20's or even lower.

I also have a Harman Accentra 52i pellet burning insert on order which will be installed in the living room... central part of the house and with good radiant contact with 3 living areas as well as the kitchen. I think the 52i will be able to maintain comfortable temps throughout the central part of the house during typical winter conditions: highs in the mid 40's and lows around 30. We shall see... but it sure does look like we're thinking along similar lines.