Contemporary stove designs

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begreen

Mooderator
Staff member
Hearth Supporter
Nov 18, 2005
107,085
South Puget Sound, WA
This site has a nice display of modern wood stoves. There are some neat designs. I wonder how well the Stovax Riva Studio 3 works in real-world practice and how one keeps the window clean. Some of these companies have several different stove designs worth looking at though I'm not sure all are sold in the US.
 
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In principle the air flow needed should scale with the fire volume. So an ultawide air wash might work similar to what we are used to.

The oven-mode of door opening is funny tho.
 
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The Grappus, Heidi, and Me pedestal are really impressive pieces.
 
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How many are available in North America? Morso was the only one I recognized.
 
Several dropped out of the market in 2020. I think the Wittus, Hwam, Rais, Nectre, Morso models are sold here. There are also some by Osburn & MF Fire with contemporary styling sold here.
 
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Very cool stoves. My neighbour has a Rais 140 or 160 that swivels and has soapstone. Definitely fits in with their house as they built with top dollar finishings. Not gaudy, just beautifully finished and the windows alone with hidden hinges from Germany must have cost $150k.
 
in my opinion, most look like artwork, or sculptures.. rather than true heat source.
but i suppose if one lives in a fancy modern apartment or home, a traditional wood stove may look out of place, not pretty at all.
 
But that is what folks in the 40s would have said about current day cars too. Works of art rather than true means of transportation.

Assuming they heat well (even if they are small, geared towards smaller homes in Europe), they are true heat sources...
 
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24/7 whole house heating with a wood stove is more of a North American thing. In Europe, it's more typical for the stove to be used as a room or area heater, while the room is in use. Smaller stoves work well in this regard and can be quite efficient heaters.
 
I'm not sure that is generally true. In urban Europe, yes, but even in a dense country like the Netherlands there are many 24/7 burners in rural areas. I only see those nice modern stoves in towns and cities. There are many "regular" cast iron stoves outside of the towns.

Farther North I surmise that to be even more the case, as well as farther East.

Not all of Europe is modern townsy folk...
 
I don't know about the Netherlands. They are more affluent. I found this to be true in the parts of France, Ukraine and Bulgaria where we stayed. We had a fellow here from Hungary that said likewise. Also, common in the UK according to reports here. From what I saw, smaller room stoves were much more common. Large 2.5-3.5 cu ft stoves were rare, but then again, the houses were often smaller too. This was mostly in towns and rural areas. We didn't see a lot of wood heat in the cities.
 
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My room mate in college was from the Alsace. Been there a lot. Many 2.5 cu ft stoves there, rurally. Indeed none above 3, that I remember.

I actually saw more stoves in less affluent rural areas. The ones in (more affluent) cities are likely more modern (and smaller) indeed.
 
Yes, we saw more stoves in rural areas too. They were mostly old stoves, often without secondary combustion and mostly room heaters. Rooms were colder too. 60-65º was not uncommon. This was between 10 and 20 yrs ago so things may have improved.
 
I think there may be a misunderstanding. While many stoves are smaller there, they (at least rurally) are used for 24/7 heating. Restarting in the morning on the last coals is very common. 6-7 hrs of heat but 2-3 more hrs of minimal coals is what they use. Rurally many folks work at home anyway (agri).

And they reload in a fireplace mode, one or two splits each time.

So while that may look to Americans as a room heater, they are being used for home heating. I also think that the homes there have a lower heating needs the way they are built. (No stud built walls etc.) So a smaller stove actually is able to heat a home more easily there than here.

This is how I and all my friends grew up.
 
It seems to vary from country to country. As noted, UK homes are notably poorer insulated and sealed than their counterparts in Germany and Sweden. But yes, you are correct, they feed their stoves a few splits at a time and do keep the stove running all day. This is the way we heated our place for a decade with the smaller F602 and then the F3CB but it really only heated the kitchen/dining area. The rest was colder. St. Coemgen can tell us more about Hungary.
 
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