Back to the stove selection, and how hot 4' away?

[brider]

I'm confusing myself again, but in the end I hope to be more educated:

Found a new stove I like, the Harman Oakwood, but it's rated to heat a 2,000 sq ft max area, 11,000-42,000 BTU/hr.

If it's rated BTU/hr is about the same as a different stove that's listed for a 600-1500 sq ft area, then really the max areas are just a calculated or estimated value, right? The BTU/hr number is the number to pay attention to, am I correct?

Here's a question I haven't asked before for you thermodynamic students who remember your heat transfer: If a stove surface is 500 deg (is that a realistic number?), how hot will the air be 4 ft away? By air, I mean typical sea-level, normal pressure, etc.

I'm using this info to decide WHERE in my designated room to put the stove. There is a more-better location than the one I originally selected, but the dining room table would be about 5 ft away. Wondering if a person sitting there would be roasted alive.

BUT, I view the Harman as a useful tool for it's stove-top and grill feature, and that might come in handy close to the table.

 

[Adios Pantalones]

My lazy little dog will lay there, but I would not sit there for long.

But then- I get hot easy... she just sleeps more.

 

[quinn]

I have the Jotul Firelight about 5 feet from my dining room table. I am no thermodynamics expert by any stretch of the imagination and the Firelight is a really big stove and we love the heat close to where we eat. Plus, it'll keep your food warmer longer.

 

[fossil]

Well, actually, I am a thermodynamics expert of sorts...at least that's what a couple of schools said. But the problem you posed has no simple closed-form solution. A whole lot more information would have to be provided, or assumptions made for boundary conditions, then some finite element analysis done on a computer, invloving differential equations. Now, you don't really want us to get into all that do you? I didn't think so...good. If you're burning that stove good and hot, and you've just come in from the frigid cold, then sitting right next to it is gonna feel real good...for a while. Then it's gonna start feeling a bit too warm, so you'll move away or turn around, or go on about your business. The manufacturer's ratings have to be taken as sort of rough guidelines, I think. The BTU output depends on a lot of things...notably the type and moisture content of the fuel, and how much is in the box burning. The square footage that the stove will effectively heat is dependent on scads of things...configuration, insulation, and on and on. I have a little stove in my 320 sq. ft. workshop that's rated to heat something like 2000. If I load it up and burn the poop out of it, it'll drive me out of there on a moderately cold day...but if it's real cold outside and I keep a reasonable burn rate going, it's toasty warm and comfortable after giving it all time to warm up. I don't find it difficult to find the happy medium...burning at a rate & temperature that's good for the stove and good for the room comfort. A wood stove isn't a binary (on or off) device, it's analog over a useful range...you can adjust the BTU output while burning it to suit your preference within certain limits (too hot for you or the stove, too cold for you or the stove). Our Lopi sits about 5 or 6 feet from our dining room table, and nobody yet has complained about being too hot or too cold. There, I'm completely confident that I've cleared up any confusion you may have had in this matter. :gulp: Rick

 

[webbie]

A harman oakwood uses a design which tends to throw a lot of the heat from the rear and rear top of the stove, so you are unlikely to get roasted 4 feet from the front.

It is not simply the heat of the surface you are concerned with, but the radiant energy (think hot sunshine) pouring through the steel....and especially the glass. But, again, this stove features a rear burn chamber so a lot of the heat ends up back there.

 

[brider]

That's all good enough for me to continue on with my selection.

Turns out the position next to the dining room table won't work, sticks out too far into the "flow" of the room.

 

[Todd]

Look at the soapstone stoves. They don't throw off the searing heat like steel and cast iron. My computer sits 7' away from my stove and when it's chugging along at 500 I can sit there for hours chatting on the Hearth forum without braking a sweat.

 

[begreen]

Similar with the Alderlea stoves. Four feet away there's just a gentle radiated warmth.