Best Zero Clearance Wood Burner?

[Fireman56]

I am building a new home and I am looking for a ZC wood burner. I want to capability to have ducting for outside air and possibly ducting to be able to blow heat into another room if possible. I was wondering if anyone would have any words of advice or recommendations for me.
Thank you in advance.

 

[begreen]

Welcome. There are several options. Good brands are Kozy Heat, RSF, FPX, Valcourt, Northstar, and the major mfgs. like PE, Osburn, Regency have added some nice units using their time tested fireboxes in a ZC format.

 

[Isaiah53]

I went though the same process about 4 years ago. I cannot say what ZC is best for your application, but BG gave a pretty complete list. I ended up going with an FPX 44 Elite and have been very satisfied with its performance. Puts out huge amount of heat with a very large firebox and high capacity blower. Remote blower uses outside air and reduces noise. Nice traditional fire and large viewing area. Only negatives are the doors tend to build up creosote especially at low air and consequently low output operation is not really practical because of it. Have to cycle it up and down during shoulder months which works for me, Tends to consume a lot of wood (about 4-5 cords of soft wood a season for me). They use cooling air ducts that can be a challenge to locate from an interior downstairs location.

I originally wanted ducting to other rooms as well (which is not an option on the FPX). I could not find any positive reviews of one of these systems. Seemed as though all complained about low air output and cold air. I am skeptical they work except with very short runs (like an adjacent room gravity vent), due to the small diameter ducts and heat loss in the ducts. I would definitely not run them through an un-insulated area like an attic or basement.