Wood Stove or Pellet Stove, questions about both!

[Ilovemountains]

New member here, Ive got a few questions. After the blizzard this past weekend and going without heat due to the power being out Ive made up my mind to install some type of alternative heat in my house.

The house is about 2500 sf, was built around 1900 and totally restored by me over the last few years.. The house had 5 chimneys that all came down during the renovation, 3 were block that had been added on over the years, 2 were for wood, one went to the basement for the old oil furnace the other 2 were the original brick chimneys that ran through the house up and out, one in the living room with an old fireplace, the other in the dining room.

Anyway Ive been thinking about installing a second form of heat for a while now and have the room for it but am back and forth between pellet or wood. I like wood, its cheap, I can cut my own and doesn't require power, the downfall is I don't have a chimney. I could build one though, which leads me to my next question. Can I build a block, brick or stone cased chimney up the side of my house without removing the new vinyl siding from behind it? The house had old cement board siding over the original wood siding and the 3 block chimneys were build right over it and strapped to the house in the middle and top, I really just don't want to have to remove all of the siding and figure out how to seal the chimney to the house, then the siding up to the chimney if I don't have too... OR I could look into a stainless steel kit, but I'm not sure how safe they are compared to a traditional chimney. Ive also thought about pellets, but then again, like this past weekend I would have been without heat, because correct me if I'm wrong they all need power to operate.

Ive been around wood stoves and fireplaces since I was a child, I really think wood is the way to go but like I said I'm not sure about the chimney and the associated costs! In the attached picture I want to install the stove in the downstairs left most room in that corner, I was thinking about building a stone cased chimney for asthetics but would be open to a stainless steel or pellet stove... Any help making up my mind would be great! Thanks, Matt

 

[begreen]

Greetings, it's a beautiful looking house Matt.

If at all possible, figure out a way to run a chimney properly, up inside the house. It can be boxed in on the upper floor. This is going to give you much better performance with a cleaner look and operation. If you have a good source for wood and don't mind the work, I'd consider heating with a wood stove. The size of the stove will depend on the area that can be heated. How open is the floorplan on the first floor? Very open or a lot of rooms separated by doorways? If the floorplan is open, you will get the best heating with a large freestanding wood stove. We heat 2000 sq ft right through power outages with our Alderlea T6 and stay nice and cozy.

 

[Ilovemountains]

Thanks, I don't have any other pictures on my PC at work.. It was a LOT of work but turned out really good, the garage has been my latest project!!

The downstairs is very open, I'm looking into installing it in the dining room, the living room has too many windows and has the air return and thermostat for the downstairs heat pump unit, I was told that if I install a stove in that room it will throw the system out of whack and wouldn't circulate the heat properly... The stairs are open on the living room side as well..

I really would like to add a stove as a supplement to the heat pumps and as an emergency back up for days like this past weekend. The heat pumps work OK but struggle when its really cold outside to keep the place comfortable even with R-19 in the walls and R-30 in the attic, all Low E glass windows, Tyvek & Green Guard fan fold insulation behind the siding!! A big problem the house has is the floors in most of the downstairs are not insulated and I cant get under there to install any, with the old stone foundation they stay pretty cool.

I like the idea of running the chimney through the floor like the original was, I could even remove the "plugs" that I put in when I re did all of the original floors, I pulled a few pieces out of the attic and filled in where I removed the old chimneys... I wonder if a stainless kit would work as opposed to building a full brick chimney inside... Im not opposed to putting it on the outside either, a nice stone or brick chimney would be fine with me, but I know they heat better when they route up through the house the one issue is there is a closet directly above the corner that Id like to put the stove in, Im not sure how that would work!!

Thanks for the input, a close friends dad owns a masonry company, he did my block work on the garage, Im going to have him take a look... What are your thoughts on pellet stoves or do you recommend wood?? I still have the original wood shed back beside the garage and have cut wood for years so dealing with its not a problem, though I dont care for the dust / ash and bugs that come along with it... Decisions decisions!

 

[begreen]

Sounds similar to our old house. We also use a heatpump. It works great in conjunction with the wood stove. We have a stainless, class A chimney system. Properly installed, I would trust it more than a brick and mortar chimney. It's a very safe installation. For more information about chimneys and why it's a whole lot better to run a flue inside, here's some reading material:
http://www.woodheat.org/chimneys/chimneys.htm

It's great that your dad is a mason. He can help you design and build a sharp looking stone or brick hearth for the stove. For a stove, as mentioned above, I prefer wood. We had a pellet stove for 5 years and really liked it. Fortunately, we are in an area where pellet pricing is good and competitive. The pellet stove was very convenient, ran on a digital thermostat, just like a furnace. However, it wasn't much good during power outages, it was noisy and required more maintenance than a simple stove. Now we have great heat and silent warmth with a nice wood stove.


PS:I added some paragraph spacing to your posts to make them a bit more readable. My eyes get blurry when faced with a large block of type.

PPS: We were faced with a similar issue of cold floors. I finally bit the bullet and got a proper foundation under the house with an adequate crawl space. Then I carefully caulked every gap around the sill and joist space, then insulated the crawlspace walls with 1.5" foamboard, turning the area into a conditioned space. The difference has been great. It never gets below 60 in the crawlspace and our floors are cozy warm. The ductwork is well insulated, but now that it is traveling through a relatively warm space, the heat loss is minimal. Our heat pump can handle the house down to about 24 degrees before the electric coils kick in. Actually it may go lower, but at that temp I always have a fire burning.