Englander or other add-on wood furnaces...thoughts?

I had an older model Englander add on. It was not EPA but worked for me for about 15 years. The chimney had to have some extensive repairs so for the cost I upgraged to a gasifier boiler. The only real trouble I had with the englander was getting up every 3-4 hours to load the thing. It got to be automatic waking up to stuff the stove and so I didn't realize the interruption to my sleep until I got the gasifier. As far as the added price for EPA is concerned (IMHO) that is another story. I now have an EPA certified boiler that I am quite happy with but I went EPA primarily to avoid future expense. Prices don't seem to be going down so I went with the EPA certified to avoid added expense of future cost increases.

Knowing then what I know now, I would pay the extra for an EPA furnace. Personally, I'm sick of seeing smoke, cleaning the chimney two or three times a year, and refilling the stove every five or six hours. With that said, my Daka heats my home just fine and will do for a few more years until I have the money for a Caddy.

I went with a valley comfort apex ( aka blaze king) to heat my 2050 sq ft home with full basement and am very happy so far. Get 2 to 2.5 days out of 10 cubic feet of seasoned ash in -20C weather in Nw Ontario
That should be 25 to 30 days a full cord or a bit more during this colder stretch.
House never climbs above the thermostat setting (71f) and I have been getting 10 to 12 hour burns and waking up to 6" of hot coals and a house that is still 71f
Not sure if it is the best on the market but working well for us.
The only bad things I can say is if you let the house get 10 degrees or more cold don't expect it to recover in a hour, it will be more like 2 or 3 hours.
Our old furnace we could build a huge fire and bring the temp right back.
but on the plus side the apex is not running 700 stack temps either,( more like 200 250) and my wood consumption looks like it will be 1/2.
Only 25 days use to date though.

I have been burning the Englander 28-3500 wood furnace for about 5 years now. Works fine to heat my ranch style house, 1450 sq ft. and 1450 finished basement. It is a ford or chevy in terms of wood furnaces. Works fine. No frills. Not sure if EPA. If you can afford more, there are Buicks, Lexus and Mercedes ( wood furnaces in car terms) out there, just researcch some of these posts.

http://lamppakuuma.com/index.html

This was just posted in another thread. I have no experience with them but looks interesting if you have forced air.

bigoakhunter said:

I have been burning the Englander 28-3500 wood furnace for about 5 years now. Works fine to heat my ranch style house, 1450 sq ft. and 1450 finished basement. It is a ford or chevy in terms of wood furnaces. Works fine. No frills. Not sure if EPA. If you can afford more, there are Buicks, Lexus and Mercedes ( wood furnaces in car terms) out there, just researcch some of these posts.

Click to expand...

I've had mine about the same amount of time and have the same sentiments. I actually bought mine used from a member here who had it for two years and then opted for a coal stove. As oakhunter pointed out, it's a no-frills workhorse for sure (but it does have a nice big window which is a rare option for wood furnaces). I don't get full overnight burns with it, but in our house (about 1000 SF, not that well insulated) we can go to bed at 10:00 p.m. with the house at 73 and a good load of hardwood in the firebox and wake up to 65-66 and a nice thick hot bed of coals ready to ignite a new load for the morning around 6:00 a.m. Once I load it and turn the air up the house is back to 70-72 by 6:30 or so.


Another nice feature of an add-on is that you can use your furnace fan to boost the air movement. The 850 CFM blower can be a bit weak at the extreme ends of the duct runs, but turning on the furnace fan really helps to pull cool air out of your living space, mix it with warm air from the furnace, and move it through the house. A couple things to keep in mind. AFAIK Englander does not offer a filter housing for the 28-3500, but a U.S. Stove Company housing (meant for the Hotblast furnaces) will fit with minor modifications. They can be had at most Tractor Supply stores for $60 or so. The housing allows you to use a 16x20 standard furnace filter, which is essential for us because of my wife's allergies. Also, I bought an 8 gallon Kenmore humidifier which now sits right in front of the filter on the intake. I fill it every night before we got to bed and put it on full blast. That ensures that the intake is taking in nice moist air to be circulated through the house. We've noticed a big improvement since adding the humidifier. It's a much cheaper option than installing one in the ductwork. I plan on keeping this furnace until we can afford to convert to hot water baseboard with a gasifier, but even then I'll hang onto the Englander as it would make a great heat source for a hunting cabin one day

Here's the link to my install thread:

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/englander-28-3500-add-on-install-thread.37290/