I'm looking at replacing my old wood furnace with a more efficient longer burning one and can find plenty of info on the caddy and kuuma. I have been wondering about the energy king 385. If you own one how do you like it? Wood consumption? Burn times? It looks to me like a good furnace and worth a look, but I would like some input from someone who has used one. Thanks.
Anyone using an Enegy King 385?
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sloeffle
Minister of Fire
I looked at one before I got my Caddy. The furnace seemed like it was built very heavy duty but I didn't like how you had to clean the burn tubes. You somehow would need to crawl into the furnace to clean them. I also like how the return air is setup on the Caddy better. You should also put the Kuuma on your short list.
Why would you need to clean the burn tubes? From what they told me they don't have the door on the front like the caddy because you don't have to clean them.
I've looked at the caddy and it seems to me you couldn't get enough wood in that little firebox to get a very long burn time. What's your experience? How big of house are you heating?
sloeffle
Minister of Fire
Ash will adhere to the burn tubes. If you search on this site, I am sure you can find lots of posts about cleaning burn tubes. I clean mine a few times a year. I also wouldn't believe everything the dealer tells you.
My house is a 2200sq ft ranch in central Ohio with good insulation. We have no problems keeping our house between 70 - 75 degrees with temps above 0F. The firebox is plenty big enough. I generally only fill it a third of the way and that usually lasts about 3 - 4 hours depending on the temperature outside.
Dry wood is key with all of the high efficiency furnaces, woodstoves and boilers.
brenndatomu
Minister of Fire
Burn tubes? You mean the heat exchanger tubes? I think maybe we are confusing terminology.
Usually the secondary air tubes in the top of the firebox in most modern stoves are referred to as burn tubes.
The Heat Exchanger tubes, which are accessed via the cleanout door on a Caddy, most definitely need cleaned periodically. Even if you are burning perfect wood they still need to be cleaned to maintain efficiency. One load of too wet wood and you have a heat sucking creosote mess. If the EK has no way easy way of cleaning the HE, that would knock it out of the running for me.
A large firebox is not needed for most people unless you have a very large heat load. If that is the case, you could go with the Max Caddy.
It is harder for manufacturers to get a clean burn on a larger firebox. They are gonna hafta figure it out now though with the new EPA regs on wood furnaces
I would think the EKs would be a lot more popular than they are if they were a real contender in the modern wood furnace market. I dunno, I have have looked at them in the past, but have never used one. Have read a few threads here and other places where people have posted trying to get an 385 EK to work well for them...
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