AP story about wood & pellet stoves

[daydreamer]

What do you think of this story? It says you can't use a pellet stove to heat your whole house. It also says you have to keep the other rooms cooler. I use a pellet stove to heat my whole house but of course it's only a small area. Also I think their numbers of cost of fuel are wrong.
http://cjonline.com/life/at_home/2009-10-24/more_homeowners_look_to_stoves_for_heat

 

[Excell]

It is tippical of an article writen buy some one that doesn't have any first hand experience with wood or pellet stoves . Its not really wrong just not accurate .
If you don't have any other heat source some rooms will be cooler than others .

 

[MCPO]

A few homes might be layed out better for a pellet /wood stove than others but the majority of folks who utilize a pellet/wood stove for primary heat are going to endure some major differences of temperatures from one room / floor to another not to mention cold basements and freezing pipes.
The ideal setup for a pellet stove/ or any other space type heater is to zone the bedrooms and other seldom used rooms and stop beating your head against the wall trying to push heat from a space heater into the other end of the house. It wasn`t designed as a whole house heater.
I think of a pellet stove as supplementary, nothing more.
I think the article was right on target.

 

[NotMyJob]

I thought the article was spot on. I wouldn't have a pellet / wood stove as an only source of heat, even though it can heat the whole house that's really not what it's meant for.

 

[dbjordan]

I found the article was spot on, and with my house layout my pellet stove is our primary heat source. Yes the rest of the house is cooler than the room that the stove is in. The only room we turn the baseboard on is in the bathroom. We keep the door closed and use a progamable thermostat in there. I works great for us. Others milage may vary.

 

[kinsmanstoves]

What do you think of this story? It says you can't use a pellet stove to heat your whole house. It also says you have to keep the other rooms cooler. I use a pellet stove to heat my whole house but of course it's only a small area. Also I think their numbers of cost of fuel are wrong.
http://cjonline.com/life/at_home/2009-10-24/more_homeowners_look_to_stoves_for_heat

This is a very good article. I would agree.

Eric

 

[krooser]

The only thing I disagree with is the statement about pellets being more expensive than NG... I saved about $600.00 each of the last two years and keep my house 8 degrees warmer than before...

 

[ducker]

The only thing I disagree with is the statement about pellets being more expensive than NG... I saved about $600.00 each of the last two years and keep my house 8 degrees warmer than before...

I'm pretty much in the same boat... I don't want to heat my whole house to 71 in the winter.. just a room or two, and I only have a single zone forced hot air system.

So my alternative, lower that thermostat connected to my furnace and turn up my pellet stove to keep my living room very comfortable and my gas bill quite a bit lower.

 

[Fsappo]

The only thing I disagree with is the statement about pellets being more expensive than NG... I saved about $600.00 each of the last two years and keep my house 8 degrees warmer than before...

In Central NY using natural gas in a high efficiency furnace is about the same price as buying wood at 50 bucks a face in my 1600 sf house...it's just not nearly as much fun.

This artical was written by a guy who asked his uncle and his neighbor what they thought about pellet stoves and chimley flumes. Every house is different. There are plenty of folks in the north country who heat 2 story homes with wood/coal/pellets. It just takes a little know-how to move the air.

Some homes, on the other hand, just cant be heated with one source of heat.

 

[defield]

I agree with Franks, especially the statements . . . . "This artical was written by a guy who asked his uncle and his neighbor what they thought about pellet stoves and chimley flumes. Every house is different. "

It was a fairly bland, vanilla, generic article and the tone of the writer just was not that of one who had personal knowledge of what he was writing about. Kind of like a rookie news reporter reading the teleprompter . . . .

Also, that is one of my gripes about consumer reports. Lab tests done by people who do not necessarily have real world experience with what they are testing.

Ranger

 

[stoveguy2esw]

i found the article fairly vanilla , the writer could have looked for sources that actually used the stoves rather than industry reps (oops im an industry rep lol) thoughi heat my house exclusively with pellets and have no issues doing so , house is comfy even in the coldest of times, was able to do the same with wood BTW, changed due to the spouse's inability to operate the woodstove while i was away on buisness.

decent article though i thought it belittled the effect of heating with alternative sources such as wood or pellet stoves

 

[FireintheHole]

Yes, the article was basic knowledge and standard, but with a few misconceptions as the moving of the air to heat a whole house,
which was not mentioned in the article. Floor vents, duct fans, and inexpensive flexible duct bring solutions for making a 70k BTU
space heater into a whole house heating system.
One thing I also saw that with the price of natural gas, the article said "A pellet stove wouldn't be a good choice at this time."...
Would this mean that pellet prices will have to come down to compete as a fuel? I sure hope so.