Glad I started buring wood pellets 10 years ago !!

[coobie]

Propane prices were very high about 10 years back.I was pi$$ed about the price back then and it encouraged me to invest in a wood pellet stove.I have never look back since.IMHO it was a GREAT choice and feel I have saved a lot of $$ verses burning propane.I see some states now are charging $4.00 per gallon for propane.I now use 1 tank(500 gal) a year and filled this past august for $1.25 gal.

 

[alternativeheat]

Propane prices were very high about 10 years back.I was pi$$ed about the price back then and it encouraged me to invest in a wood pellet stove.I have never look back since.IMHO it was a GREAT choice and feel I have saved a lot of $$ verses burning propane.I see some states now are charging $4.00 per gallon for propane.I now use 1 tank(500 gal) a year and filled this past august for $1.25 gal.

Here in SE Ma. I burn the two highest fuels at our house. oil at $3'67 a gal as of todays price ( up from $3.49 when we got oil a week or so ago. And Propane, the wife tells me the last delivery of that was $4.50 a gal. We don't use a lot of propane, it's for cooking and hot water and two cloths driers ( we have an apartment on the house that is rented with a laundry facility built in). Still, compared with the oil it's really not a lot of volume but expensive at that cost.

I offset the oil with coal by quite a bit but am still researching pellet stove options. 30 years of shoveling coal and rising prices and limited supply is the reason for that. Still cheaper than oil though. I think there are more efficient pellet stoves out today than my 30+ year old radiating only, home built coal stove. Been a good old girl though, still going strong !

 

[charger1966]

10 Years ago we bought my inlaws house. It had and still has an oil burner forced hot air system in the basement. The first winter is cost us $over $2500 to heat it from Nov. to May. That was the last year we used it. The follow fall we invested in a pellet stove. We bought the Envirofire EF 2 free standing stove and have not looked back. With the first year of 6 tons used,no insulation in the house at all, it still saved us a lot of Money. Since that year we had the insulated & replaced half the windows. Last year we only burned 3 tons and this year it appears it will work out to be the same. The only drawback is the availability of the good pellets and the prices. The first year we burned Allegheny's , at $185 per ton. This year we are using Stove Chows ae $219 and Barefoot's at $200 a tone (deal off of Craig's List), Even at those prices it is still way less expensive to burn these as to burning Oil. It is amazing how the oil companies keep raising their prices and the Government does NOTHING. Oh we are in Upstate NY. North of the Mohawk River. Not Westchester. LOL

 

[Tonyray]

10 Years ago we bought my inlaws house. It had and still has an oil burner forced hot air system in the basement. The first winter is cost us $over $2500 to heat it from Nov. to May. That was the last year we used it. The follow fall we invested in a pellet stove. We bought the Envirofire EF 2 free standing stove and have not looked back. With the first year of 6 tons used,no insulation in the house at all, it still saved us a lot of Money. Since that year we had the ihaitensulated & replaced half the windows. Last year we only burned 3 tons and this year it appears it will work out to be the same. The only drawback is the availability of the good pellets and the prices. The first year we burned Allegheny's , at $185 per ton. This year we are using Stove Chows ae $219 and Barefoot's at $200 a tone (deal off of Craig's List), Even at those prices it is still way less expensive to burn these as to burning Oil. It is amazing how the oil companies keep raising their prices and the Government does NOTHING. Oh we are in Upstate NY. North of the Mohawk River. Not Westchester. LOL

bought a ton of chows at HD here in bucks county, pa...
they burn hot as haite but my complaint is they are very ashy, and although the ton was shrink wrapped, half way down we had some layers of ice in between the bags.
some of the bags I open have lot of fines and pellets are swollen a bit here/there...you know the deal... middle or bottom of some bags have a solid " Brick] of pellets. stored outside at HD.
thankfull I have a auger fed Harman..... would I buy chows again? 229.00 ton.. sure.. but being my 1st winter with a pellet stove, I no longer will buy them during a polar vortex.. Spring summer of fall for me As I have room in the basement for 6 ton...Also have a Ton of Energex hardwood premiums which I got free...Bought another ton weeks ago that we're stored in wharehouse so dry as a bone but,
the same brand pellets we're half the size in lenght as the free ton....they are burning lot faster so I had to drop the feed rate down....Hope the pellet makers aren't wiseing up to shorter pellets get fed thru the Auger in larger quantitie thus less burning time per bag...[at least it seems that way here with the shorter Energex pellets.]

 

[bbfarm]

Why would shorter pellets make a stove use more? Just curious, not slamming anyone.

 

[Tonyray]

Why would shorter pellets make a stove use more? Just curious, not slamming anyone.

more pellets Can get pushed into the burn pot at each interval as they take up less space than longer pellets..half inch pellet will burn faster than a 1" or longer.[assuming they are similar hardwoods]..
I know a 40 lb bag is a 40 lb bag short or long, but I get 2 or more hours out of longer stove chows than I do with shorter energex..when I got my 1st free ton of energex, the pellets we're longer and I had few hours longer burn time...these shorter energex are flyin thru faster.
been testing this for couple weeks......temperature of living space hasn't changed with either..both are putting out great heat...

 

[bbfarm]

Interesting. I have noticed our pellets this year from the same company are longer

 

[Tonyray]

Interesting. I have noticed our pellets this year from the same company are longer

That's good cause the trend seems to be shortening them..
I really hope it's just a manufacturing thing that happens now/then and not a trend.