Europian Style Wood Stoves

[Huntindog1]

Why do you think they make their stoves tall and skinny rather than short and wide like in the USA.

I noticed in the vogelzangs they are not very deep as in for an ash bed and they have less head room. But like a Englander NC 30 they can have a deep ash bed and stack wood rather high in them as in alot of head room.


I figure it like this as the fire burns down your heat in the top of the stove becomes harder to maintain as thats why its good to start a fire top down style as you create a small space up in top of the stove to get heated. its very easy to heat such a small space. Plus when you load wood high in the front of the box partially blocking the smoke's exit path up and out of the stove these type stoves heat up much hotter as I think your creating a little burn chamber that builds heat hotter and gets more of the btu's out of the smoke gases.

So having a stove with less head room but a stove thats wide to still be able to load a decent amount of wood , your using the idea I explained above to make the stove overall more efficient thru the entire burn process. As keeping the fire closer to the burn tubes up in the top keeps the heat up there longer with the fire being closer to the tubes.

The Burly T3 Europian stove with its tall lots of head room design and the way the secondary air comes in from the corner vertical corners in such a way to cause a tornado like mixing of the air and smoke gases, maybe it needs the head room to get all that mixing done.

 

[My Oslo heats my home]

I think a lot has to do with current European styles and secondly I'm sure it has to do with limited space.

 

[corey21]

I think a lot has to do with current European styles and secondly I'm sure it has to do with limited space.

The limited space is all i can think of as stated above.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Style and space. If it offered that great of an advantage they would do it here. Can you imagine the marketing that a company would do if they had a stove that was super duper efficient?

 

[precaud]

Why do you think they make their stoves tall and skinny rather than short and wide like in the USA.

I think it's a combination of aesthetic and practical factors. Average home size in EU is 33-50% smaller than the US. See some recent data:
http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/average-home-sizes-around-the-151738

They are also more inclined to zone heating, i.e. not trying to heat the whole house from one location, and not keeping the whole thing warm even when it is not all being occupied and used. They are more likely to have two smaller stoves in different parts of the house than one large one. I think it's fair to say they're more conscientious about the use of energy and materials than we are.

It's always dangerous to generalize about personal things, but I think Europeans more than Americans want their stoves to be works of art. And large fire views play a big role in that.

They're also more willing to tend the fire more often.

So EU stove fireboxes on average are smaller. And with proportionally more glass.

It's harder to get a tall firebox geometry to burn clean over the whole burn cycle, so these small/tall fireboxes have to be hyper-insulated

I have stoves of both types so I'm not saying either is better than the other. They both have their place.

I still lust after a Xeoos Twinfire, but unless/until I come into a large chunk of expendible cash, it will remain in the realm of unobtanium. (sigh)

 

[Treacherous]

I
I still lust after a Xeoos Twinfire, but unless/until I come into a large chunk of expendible cash, it will remain in the realm of unobtanium. (sigh)

Those certainly make for an awesome light show.

 

[Huntindog1]

At the end of the video I like the view of the turbine like air mixing grate the smoke gases have to go thru to get to the bottom chamber.

I like this stove also:

 

[precaud]

I like this stove also:

Yeah, I looked at that one last year and I don't see what makes them so efficient. I saw reports that construction quality wasn't good. Two years in and I don't see any user reports. The Twinfire makes sense. The Burley doesn't.

 

[begreen]

The Burley may not make sense, but it puts on a mesmerizing light show. The Twin-Fire's show is unreal.

 

[Huntindog1]

It might be the twist in the air flow it causes and mixes the air and smoke more. Plus maybe higher firebox temps.

Twinfire is definitely the cooler stove or should I say hotter.

 

[precaud]

The Burley may not make sense, but it puts on a mesmerizing light show. The Twin-Fire's show is unreal.

Yes, it's a nice fire view. It looks like they're burning peat in that video, no?

I'm just surprised that, two years in, we see no independent tests, no reviews, no user reports, nothing to support/refute their claims, lots of questions but no answers. Appears to be a UK-only product for the time being.

A Twinfire would fit perfectly on my hearth...

BG, looks like you have cold weather up there, are you burning now?

 

[begreen]

Funny you should ask. I just started our first fire this morning. A cold front came in overnight and I decided to wake up the beast.

 

[Treacherous]

It sure did cool off.

I got my first dusting of snow for winter today.

 

[precaud]

NOAA sez you guys should have a drier than normal winter this time around.

 

[begreen]

Uh oh, sounds like I better batten then the hatches then.

 

[Shadow&Flame]

I also think its odd that most all euro type stoves have a fire bar or grate...wonder why our stoves dont. One reason could be multi-fuel, but it still would help to keep wood off the glass in the smaller stoves.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

My 1st stove was a multi fuel CDW. It had a grate on the bottom. It did a great job keeping ash out of the coals. It was nice, but there were better stoves out there. I never looked back after replacing it with the Century.

Matt

 

[clemsonfor]

Stoves dont have grates in them as the epa stoves urn gasses not really wood, like a fireplace where you want lots of air around the wood to burn it nicely.

 

[precaud]

Uh oh, sounds like I better batten then the hatches then.

A contrarian hedge?

 

[precaud]

Stoves dont have grates in them as the epa stoves urn gasses not really wood, like a fireplace where you want lots of air around the wood to burn it nicely.

My X33 is EPA and has a grate, and separate control of underfire air. Very handy when it comes time to burn down a bed full of hot coals... the stove runs just as hot when doing so. An essential feature for a tall firebox, IMO.

 

[corey21]

Stoves dont have grates in them as the epa stoves urn gasses not really wood, like a fireplace where you want lots of air around the wood to burn it nicely.

I agree.