Good News! the donor program is about to be launched.

[elkimmeg]

Tuesday morning early I am taking a 3 hour drive up to VC VT. Operations. Arrangements have been made to receive the full VIP plant tour. Craig you are welcome to join me. Or meet me there. The purpose of the trip is to bring back some stoves, to launch the donor program. I have been trying for a year to get this program off the ground. In a way I did cleanup and rehab some used stoves last year, which found their way into homes.

I had to modify the goals of the program. I learned that some recipients do not want the publicity or tag of being needy. The reason it fell apart last year. I had arranged quite a bit of media coverage. This year initially, I think it best to get the program established first have successful installs and develop a history of such. Refocus the emphasis of the program, to replacing older non- EPA compliant stoves. (Cleaner efficient burning).
Qualifying families need not be poor or needy, but are currently unable to budget a new stove purchase.

At this time, I do not know what stoves I will be bringing back. Some are stoves that have been burnt for re-certification. Once I have the stoves then, I can match them to the families and the installations.

Expanding this program, I have contacted another stove manufacturer and so far they have been receptive. I have also received many PM’s and private e-mails from forum members, offering assistance in the stoves installations Thank you.
Corie has been doing the same for families in the Philly area, rehabbing stoves and donating them. I am working on trying to get some to him.

This is the text of the l E-mail correspondence from the head of VT operations to me

Elk, it would be good to have you visit on Tuesday and we can go over
the service parts and have you drive back a stove or two to get your
program started plus I can provide a tour of foundry and enamel and
assembly plants....let me know if you need directions....dt

-----Original Message-----
From: elkimmeg
Sent: Friday, December 08, 2006 3:03 PM
To: Plant operations MGR
Subject: Re: Up date

(Name deleted) thanks I am thinking of a new approach matching the stove in hand
to a situation Before I looked at the installation first then the stove
If you could give me a run down of what could be available I may take
trip up there Tuesday an to pick up some stoves to get this program
rolling Thanks again Elk. If you have been following Hearth.com, a lot
of activity and discussion has been concerning VC stoves.

Question is there a way to establish getting replacement parts
About a dozen posters this year are rebuilding their older VC stoves.
I know it does not sell new, but it still gives press to VC and VC parts
are being bought, many forged in your foundry. I right now it seems
the earlier 0028 Encores need refractory packages ( dog houses) and a
few orders for them have come in from discountstoves.com. Just wondering
if their was a way to fast track, that process. From my experience of
Disassembly and rebuilding is it possible to get some older service
Manuals to advise others how to go about it. Would be helpful to say
remove this bolt that one tilt left and remove the panel. If one could
instruct how to do certain repairs more parts are sold and VC image is
enhanced in support beyond the sale plus being talked about

 

[laynes69]

I think thats awesome! Its good to here that people like you are doing good things for families who need help.

 

[kevinmoelk]

Hats off to you sir for donating your time and expertise to those that need help. I'm sure the program will be a success.

-Kevin

 

[Corie]

Along the same lines, I'm doing the first two donor installs this FRIDAY!

Harley's vigilant and my old dutchwest are both (God willing) being installed this friday for two families.

It's going to a be warm christmas for a few families for the first time in a while

Way to go Elk!

Keep me posted and let me know what you need.

It's a shame its this tuesday and not next don, because I would make the drive up to go with you.

 

[laynes69]

What will these families do for wood? I have heard of people giving wood to those who need it. Just wondering.

 

[webbie]

Sounds good elk, thanks for the invite but I have obligations this week - in fact, at this point booked almost until New Years! (family, etc.)....

I've done the VC tour and was very impressed. I know you will be. Good luck.

If your drive brings you through here let me know and we may be able to meet - although it sounds like a long day for you.....

 

[danielj618]

Thats awesome..a forum that has a "hearthfelt" purpose, doing something tangible for someone in need

commendable..very much so

 

[elkimmeg]

What will these families do for wood? I have heard of people giving wood to those who need it. Just wondering.

That's a good legitimate question one that I have thought about. by replacing existing stoves I hope they would already have a seasoned wood supply on hand.
Also part of qualifying that familly is the availability of inexpensive wood. Some members here have also offered free wood donation to the program.

We kid Roo and his devotion to PE and Husky saws. Many new members may not know this, Roo has supplied wood to famillies that really need it

 

[laynes69]

Thats good to hear. Last year I have the upper portion of my left lung removed and I wasn't able to do a whole lot of work, and some friends and family supplied me with enough wood till I was back on my feet. Its a good feeling. These familes will be able to put the money where they need instead of gas bills. It'll make them happy.

 

[elkimmeg]

Tommorrow Gooserider and I will be visiting VC in VT
Trader I will try to get an explanation about the ins and outs of the ever burn technology. Might even get a peak of future technologies
Promised is the tour of the opperations including the castings and enamaling

If any have some questions they want to ask let us know Im sure
Goose and I will be posting what our experience.

 

[MountainStoveGuy]

awesome elk. way to go!

 

[GVA]

Nice Job Elk Keep it up
Let me know if you need anything?

 

[Corie]

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh man.



I wannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnna go.

 

[elkimmeg]

We have another member that wants to join us Vintage 181
check you pm. Even if it the tour is out ,I still would like to get together, you have my cell phone #

Craig and webwidow I know short notice. It all fell into place kinda quickly. I was not sure I could do it till last night..

Craig VC expressed interest in advertising here. PM me after tomorrow. Me and the wife would not mind xc sking in your area some time after the new year
I have more interested participants /manufactures that have expressed interest

 

[wingnut]

Why is everyone fooling around with wood? Seems like burning a resource like natural gas is the way to go. No more dirty 2 cycle chainsaws involved. Elk I think its great you are helping people in need, but maybe more of of them fit into a NG heater like this. Allot of folks don’t have saws,pickup trucks,log splitter’s and the desire to burn wood. Seems like most people on this forum burn wood as a recreation/hobby and to save a buck or two not because they have to. Just a thought! Besides we all know how much work it is to keep up a wood stove. (Better To Be Safe)

 

[MrGriz]

That's an awesome program Elk! It's great to see those who can, help out those in need; especially at this time of year.

 

[DonCT]

If you don't come back with pictures, I will be VERY disappointed.......

Hey, maybe Craig could put a link on the main page for stove donations. Sort of a central depository for requests/donations/help.

 

[Jags]

Elk, Corie and you too spike (I'm gonna throw Craig into this list also, for maintaining this wonderful site, as well as anyone who may be doing similar things.), what you are doing is beyond awesome. To be giving of time, experience and expertise to those that may have no other means, ranks WAY up there on my "good guy" list. Throwing a buck into a bucket makes some people warm and fuzzy, but to get as personal as warming a fellow humans home has got to be on a whole new level. My hat is off to all of you.
I would personally like to give you a heart felt THANK YOU for what you are doing.


This is damn near bringing a tear to my eye (of joy), and if you pick on me for it, I will punch you in the nose (just kidding)

 

[Harley]

Great work, Elk and Corie both!!

 

[Gooserider]

Well we didn't take many pictures, but the plant was really impressive. They do some really heavy duty work there, and produce a lot more than just VC stoves - It seems they also produce cast iron parts for some other major stove brands, along with things like cast iron frypans - they can't let the cast iron furnaces cool down, so they do quite a bit of other production in addition to what they need for their own stove parts. It costs them just as much to run the furnaces when they are busy as it does when they are idle, so why not keep them busy making parts for other people? VC also makes nearly all their own parts, they have been working to reduce the number of parts they get from Asia. They have a few parts that are made from ductile iron, which they have to outsource as they can't produce it in their foundry, but they are also designing the new products to get rid of that. There is one plant in Mexico that makes some stuff, but almost everything else is either US or Canadian made.

The scale of the foundry is impressive on multiple levels - according to the engineer that was guiding us, VC is the second largest electricity user in the state of VT. At the same time, the plant also does a great deal of in-house pollution control and is quite clean from an environmental standpoint.

A few other odds and ends...

There is a REAL reason why the red enamel stoves cost extra. They aren't trying to jack extra profit out of them, but rather recoup the extra costs for producing them. The red enamel contains cadmium, which is toxic, haz-mat stuff. The regular enamels don't take anything special in the way of PPE beyond the ventilation system they are already using, and the general gear that everyone was using (they made us wear the same stuff). The cadmium in the red paint requires them to wear haz-mat "space suits" when putting it on, have limits as to how long the workers can spend applying it, and all sorts of other restrictions. It seems reasonable to me that the red costs more to buy because it costs more to make. I don't *KNOW* that this applies to other brands, but I would expect that it would - if there was a non-hazmat way to make the color I'm sure VC would be using it.

Once a stove design is in production, it basically won't change. The reason is that once it's been EPA certified, any changes will require the stove to be re-tested and certified. This is about 20K above and beyond the costs of the design change engineering, and there is no guarantee that they will pass the retest. This cost makes them very reluctant to do any changes to a working design.

If you have looked at BBQ grills, you may have noticed that the VC grills are taller than the brands imported from other countries. The reason has to do with the dimensions of a shipping container - They size the grills (and almost any other imported products) to enable them to stack as many layers in the freight container as possible. Since VC is produced domestically, they don't have to worry about this aspect of the design.

We got a very interesting discussion of the "BTU rating game" - in essence the key limiting factor of stove performance is the size of the firebox. Regardless of the brand, you can only put X amount of wood in a given size firebox, and that amount of wood can only put out a certain number of BTU's. However the question is how fast do you burn it? You can either burn slowly and have a lower BTU output for a longer time period, or burn faster and get more BTU's for less time. They showed us some graphs of the same VC stove's heat output depending on the reloading frequency, that showed this very clearly - the longer burn times had less peak output. VC chooses to use lower BTU numbers than some other brands, in exchange for extended burn times. Other makers offer higher numbers, but (as we've seen many times here on the forums) need to be refueled every four hours.

I was also impressed by the large numbers of quality checks that VC was employing all through the process. I think their build is about as good as you are going to get from anyone. There may have been issues with quality in the distant past, but I would say they are not a problem any more.

Gooserider

 

[Gooserider]

Why is everyone fooling around with wood? Seems like burning a resource like natural gas is the way to go. No more dirty 2 cycle chainsaws involved. Elk I think its great you are helping people in need, but maybe more of of them fit into a NG heater like this. Allot of folks don’t have saws,pickup trucks,log splitter’s and the desire to burn wood. Seems like most people on this forum burn wood as a recreation/hobby and to save a buck or two not because they have to. Just a thought! Besides we all know how much work it is to keep up a wood stove. (Better To Be Safe)

Wingnut, I'd argue that a gas insert / stove is probably less efficient than having a gas furnace. As such, I would consider an appliance like that to be a definite luxury item. Certainly it is not going to reduce the utility bill - (the reason we started burning) There are also a fair number of programs to help people get newer more efficient gas (or oil) appliances. OTOH, there isn't much out there to help get rid of those older Pre-EPA stoves. (there are a few rebate programs in high polution areas, but IMHO they aren't for enough money to help our target audience - I wouldn't have been tempted by the ones I've seen even if they were available in MA, which they aren't)

When we started burning, we cut our gas bill (which also included cooking, hot water and clothes drying) by about 80%. This translates to several hundred $'s / month. Yes, I use a "dirty 2-cycle chainsaw" but that doesn't make that much pollution compared to the amount of natural gas it saves. (The wood is "green-house gas neutral") Yes, it takes more work, but I don't use a log splitter, but rather a maul. I also don't have a pickup - the wood I scrounge goes in the back of our mini-van. But most of my wood came from the truckload of log-length I had delivered, it was about $350 for about 5-6 cords, which I'm hoping will be less than my pre-EPA monster will burn all winter. Upgrading to an EPA stove would reduce that amount of wood.

Manually processing wood is a lot of work - so is a health club, but I don't have to pay to process my own wood :coolsmile: It's a choice - like all things - do you want to put 'sweat equity' into a wood pile, or pay a utility bill?

This is a program for people that burn wood. Doesn't mean you can't start a program for people that burn gas, or that either is "bad"

Gooserider