Hi guys.
No question here. Just want to introduce myself before really posting away (sorry Mods, i really can't find the "introduce yourself section").
I've been a lurker here for quite some time since I used to own a 2 bed-room house that has a BK princess freestanding that I really really loved. That princess was bought through craigslist and replaced an old Taiwan made clone of those classic stoves. And since we upgraded to a 4 bed room two story house couple of years ago @ roughly 2k square feet, I really missed that princess stove specially that my peak of winter heating bills go up to mid 300 bucks monthly even after all the post-audit sealing and windows upgrading we made.
We are about to go on our second winter on this house which has 2 masonry fireplaces with outside chimneys. The fireplaces were both originally made for wood but converted to gas by the previous owner. But based on the chimney sweeper (who also my friend) said that both were not really that used much as wood or even gas. Aside from repointing of some bricks and re- dressing of the chimney top, both structurally sound and are very clean inside and out with the clay upper lining really void of creosote. One of the chimneys actually is very clean with the fire bricks are-as far as we can tell- as clean as the day they were installed (aside of course from three decades of dust and cleaning). The metals of the gas appliance inside has almost no soot when closely examined. I plan of eventually converting both into inserts but because of the initial big outlay per stove we'd only be be able to do it one at a time.
I know for a fact that three of my neighbors have EPA stoves/inserts in their homes and two of them use the Blaze King brand. Freestanding stoves have been stricken off the short list (by the wifey of course) due to various reasons and based on both of the fireplace dimensions only cubic sizes similar to princess insert will be able to fit in while maintaining proper clearances. And since I'm looking for the longest burn time I can get in between loading and our shoulder seasons in our area are particularly long the princess insert could be the perfect one.We are looking on initially supplementing gas heat and then eventually going full wood as much as we can.
Anyway, since we still have about three seasons worth of seasoned/ partially seasoned firewood of various tree species stored in an empty lot we own, we think we'd still be able to enjoy wood heat this season. BUT- of course there's always a but- all the short listed dealers that we called said that the shortest delivery time they expect now is four weeks after making the order :-(
Where's BKVP, I think I need him.
Anyway, guys, I apologize for the long intro but because of this great site's members are knowledgeable and helpful I really have not found an opportunity to post any question that has not been answered yet. That's it for now.
Thanks again.
No question here. Just want to introduce myself before really posting away (sorry Mods, i really can't find the "introduce yourself section").
I've been a lurker here for quite some time since I used to own a 2 bed-room house that has a BK princess freestanding that I really really loved. That princess was bought through craigslist and replaced an old Taiwan made clone of those classic stoves. And since we upgraded to a 4 bed room two story house couple of years ago @ roughly 2k square feet, I really missed that princess stove specially that my peak of winter heating bills go up to mid 300 bucks monthly even after all the post-audit sealing and windows upgrading we made.
We are about to go on our second winter on this house which has 2 masonry fireplaces with outside chimneys. The fireplaces were both originally made for wood but converted to gas by the previous owner. But based on the chimney sweeper (who also my friend) said that both were not really that used much as wood or even gas. Aside from repointing of some bricks and re- dressing of the chimney top, both structurally sound and are very clean inside and out with the clay upper lining really void of creosote. One of the chimneys actually is very clean with the fire bricks are-as far as we can tell- as clean as the day they were installed (aside of course from three decades of dust and cleaning). The metals of the gas appliance inside has almost no soot when closely examined. I plan of eventually converting both into inserts but because of the initial big outlay per stove we'd only be be able to do it one at a time.
I know for a fact that three of my neighbors have EPA stoves/inserts in their homes and two of them use the Blaze King brand. Freestanding stoves have been stricken off the short list (by the wifey of course) due to various reasons and based on both of the fireplace dimensions only cubic sizes similar to princess insert will be able to fit in while maintaining proper clearances. And since I'm looking for the longest burn time I can get in between loading and our shoulder seasons in our area are particularly long the princess insert could be the perfect one.We are looking on initially supplementing gas heat and then eventually going full wood as much as we can.
Anyway, since we still have about three seasons worth of seasoned/ partially seasoned firewood of various tree species stored in an empty lot we own, we think we'd still be able to enjoy wood heat this season. BUT- of course there's always a but- all the short listed dealers that we called said that the shortest delivery time they expect now is four weeks after making the order :-(
Where's BKVP, I think I need him.
Anyway, guys, I apologize for the long intro but because of this great site's members are knowledgeable and helpful I really have not found an opportunity to post any question that has not been answered yet. That's it for now.
Thanks again.
Last edited:
