Getting tired of the wood - not sure a pellet stove would save $

[Tonyray]

I see you are agreeing with me then. I hope to be able to do this pellet thing for many years to come.

yes..
might have posted to the wrong person as it was meant for someone who was[is] on the fence about getting a pellet stove..

 

[alternativeheat]

I see you are agreeing with me then. I hope to be able to do this pellet thing for many years to come.

I thought the 40's and 50's were great years, some of the best of my life actually. Now in my mid 60's I notice the stamina isn't like then, I could keep up with my teen age and young adult sons back then.

 

[Mysticenchantment]

I have natural gas and the pellet stove. I run the stove because my wife really really likes it warm. I keep the furnace set on 74 to keep it what she calls "freezing" if the stove malfunctions or runs out of pellets. With the pellets I can keep it warmer in here for the same amount of cash. The natural gas heat is great and convenient, but before the pellets I was paying RG&E close to $400 monthly for her to have the thermostat on 76 with the furnace running nearly non stop. Oh, and running the furnace so much the friggin thing broke down a lot. The last winter I used the furnace as the sole heat source I had to replace the blower motor and a silver can thing that attached to it, the combustion blower, a vacuum switch, the flame sensor 4 times, and the glow bar once.

I'm more than happy to spend 15 minutes a week cleaning the thing if it keeps her warm, and so far I've used about 3/4 ton of pellets. The gas bills have been around $60 monthly (including the furnace when it runs, the water heater, and the stove).

 

[SidecarFlip]

Age and wood don't go well together. We have some friends, a couple in their late 50's who live north of us that heat their large home solely with wood via a central wood furnace with propane backup (no ng) and it takes about 5 full cords a year, thats cutting splitting and stacking and even though they own 120 acres of mixed hardwood, it's almost a full time job in the summer months being enslaved to the winter heat issue.

They were down a few weeks ago looking at out pellet/corn setup but thinking about a multifuel central furnace. I can sympathize with that.

Wood is fun when you are young but turns to drudgery when you are older.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

Iv always been a part time burner. I love the stove ,the fire, the warmth ect but sometimes i just dont have time needed to go 24/7.

 

[CladMaster]

If I had NG here I'd change over too, I'd also do it like they do it in the UK, forced hot water into full size radiators in each room with a stat on each radiator.

A combination boiler is hard to beat, heats DHW on demand as well.

 

[SESZOO]

In my 60s and have been burning wood since I can remember ,We had 3 old stoves and a fireplace in our house growing up in West. Mass ,So it's been a long time . Decided a couple of years ago to give up on the wood ,(except emergency only ) and went with a Lopi Agp ,last Nov. which seems to be working good for us and love the fact that I haven't cut ,hauled ,split and moved 2 or 3 times any wood at all this year . Can't give any advice on a stove to buy , as I'm still new at pellets. ,besides one of quality would suggest going through a dealer just in case of problems . As far as I'm concerned though I should have gone with the pellets a long time ago other than keeping up with the cleaning it's been no mess or fuss ,even when today it's -18 outside and 70 in . Oh and about the getting older part , whens that happen.?

 

[maple1]

We've had our Regency 3100 wood insert for about 13 years now, but we are also 13 years older, and our source of free wood has dried up in the last year or so. Tho we probably will have enough wood for the rest of this year and most of next still. Thinking about moving to a pellet stove insert, and a Harman 52i at that.

We've lived in our home for almost 19 years now, and in all of that time, we have never heated strictly with our natural gas heater, as we used to supplement with a kerosene heater prior to the woodstove. We have no idea what it would cost!

So, February 7, we decided shut down the woodstove until they read the meter around March 6. It's going to be really painful, as January's gas AND electric bill (we have solar) was only $61.84. The majority of that was from the gas - H20 heater is gas, bills run around $18 in the summer for the hot water, a bit more in the cooler months as the water coming out of the ground is colder. We don't run the woodstove all day, mainly just after work and into the wee hours of the morning.

Just looked at Harman's savings calculator and was really surprised to find out that according to that, a pellet stove will not save us any money vs. natural gas. We had a pellet stove in our old house, supplementing electric heat and spent about $380 a year on pellets (2 tons @ $170/ton + a few more bags). I would expect from talking to the local pellet store guys that we'd go through probably the same amount. But at a lot higher price.

Anyone else gone from natural gas to the pellet stove? I'm beginning to wonder if it wouldn't be more economical, given the high cost of the Harman insert, to buy a couple cords of wood instead. Would love to hear some of your thoughts.

Thanks!

Exactly what kind of NG 'heater' do you have?

 

[dalspot]

Ok, first sorry for the delay in answering some of your posts...

I actually kinda liked the kerosene heater! Used it for many years, kept the wick clean, bought quality fuel, didn't have any smell, but kept three rooms warm enough to keep the heat off. We would put it in an 8' doorway between the family and dining rooms. Dogs used to love it! The 4 of them would lay in a circle around it. We got the wood insert because we were losing too much heat up the chimney. While our forced-air furnace is 19 years old, it is an efficient one, and due to the low usage, still has a useful life.. I hope!

You put up with a kerosene heater so you DON'T HAVE TO USE NATURAL GAS???????????????? WHAT???? Your bills are ridiculously low and there is no WAY you're going to save money with pellets, even if you supplement your diet with them. If you want to save anything, look to a high efficiency gas heater.

 

[dalspot]

If I thought we'd go through 4-5 tons of pellets a year, I wouldn't even be considering a pellet stove. We live in the mid-atlantic so winters -*usually* are not that bad. Of course I picked the coldest winter month in decades to try the gas approach. I'm not looking forward to the bill! But it's the only way to see just how much it might cost to heat the house on the gas furnace alone. We have used the wood stove a few of these really cold nights, as I would expect we'd be doing anyway if it were not the primary source of heat. House is set at 62 during the day while we are at work, and at night. 67-68 when we are home in the evenings. So we're not staying as warm as we are used to using the wood stove.

Just did this exact thing you are thinking about this year. I have natural gas and supplemented with a wood stove insert for the past 11 years. Up until the last 5 years I had access to free wood but have been buying about 3-4 cords a year. This past spring, at the end of the season, my wood stove (30 years old) finally broke down structurally. I was going to replace with another wood stove but after much research and visiting local wood shops decided on a pellet stove. What I took into consideration was the cost and my age. The wood stove and pellet stove were going to cost me just about the same. This made the cost irrelevant to me. Since I have been buying my wood, the cost of fuel is almost equal but pellet are going to cost me a little more. I could buy wood at $210 a cord and spent about $840 a year on a cold winter. I estimate now that I will go through 5 tons instead of the 4 ton I figured on, of pellets this year. At $ 230 a ton I am going to spend $1150 for this season.

 

[SidecarFlip]

I thought the 40's and 50's were great years, some of the best of my life actually. Now in my mid 60's I notice the stamina isn't like then, I could keep up with my teen age and young adult sons back then.

.....andtaking a leak takes longer too......................

 

[georgepds]

I thought the 40's and 50's were great years, some of the best of my life actually. Now in my mid 60's I notice the stamina isn't like then, I could keep up with my teen age and young adult sons back then.

Oh I don't know, I had more fun than was legal or good for me in my 20's. I used to bounce better. I remember falling down a 500' shale incline up in the Austrian alps, brushing myself off, walking to the nearest road, and hitchiking into Innsbruck.. that's not going to happen again

Now that I'm in my early 60's things are looking better than the 40's and 50'.. more time and money than before, a good wife I love to talk to, and still "alert, oriented, and continent" as they say in the medical community

That said, the last time I hauled wood inside I had to knock it out of an 8' drift up here North of Boston.. The drifts are midway up to the second floor windows, the low spots ar 6' deep (that's getting old, not me) . I like all the rythms of wood: stacking, hauling, burning, ash removal.. it's just the hauling out of mounds of snow that slows me down. I'm seriously consideraing a ton of biobricks next year so that when the wood piles disappear.. I'll just grab a brick from the back porch

 

[SidecarFlip]

I know about the bounce part, I slipped on ice at the grocery store and landed on my arse and hurt for a week. People who are sue happy would have sued the grocery store, I chalked it up to not paying attention to where I put my feet. I've had 3 friends die from broken hips redulting from what I used to consider simple slip and fall incidents.

 

[tiger]

House is set at 62 during the day while we are at work, and at night. 67-68 when we are home in the evenings.

At those settings, I'd have to factor in additional expense.... for a divorce lawyer.

 

[Tiger Joe]

I'll chime in here. I'm new to pellets and don't heat my house with them, but I have Natural gas, I live in a pretty similar climate to you, and actually I keep my house at the exact same temps you do- 62 when not home and 68 when I'm home.

I heat my house on NG with no supplemental source of heat for less than the cost of 1 bag of pellets a day. We also have a NG fireplace insert we use.

If I was in your situation I would use gas with the wood burner to supplement on the cold nights. that's what my dad does in his house (which is larger than mine) and his gas bills are 30% less than mine.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

I think id get tired of wood too if i fired all 4 of my stoves all the time. It would be like a second job. Having wood as an alternative or backup heat source lets you be much more flexible. Being a part time burner keeps it interesting.

 

[TonyVideo]

I have an old 1880's home that has some insulation upgrades. 11 foot ceilings on 2 floors. 3 layers of brick on the perimeter walls and 3000sq.ft.. I have natural gas but running just gas sucks a lot of it and $700 gas bills in the coldest months to keep it at just 70 and turned down slightly at night. We are never upstairs much during the day so why heat it or the whole house in areas we are not in. I decided to get 2 stoves one P43 in the back part of the house and one P68 in the main area. I heat the main area at 74 and the back at 70. Comfort where we are. Upstairs could be at 65. Zone heat so to speak. I use natural gas when Temps fall in the high teens or low 20's or below as I put the stoves in stove mode and set the furnace thermostat to 74 which is in the same room as the P68 which is set just below so it will not keep the temp to 74. This allows my house when it gets colder for the NG to kick in periodically so the rest of the house does not drop below 65. To me this is the best of both worlds. Heat where we spend most of the time and not have to maintain all 3000 sq ft to one temp.