If You Could Change One Thing...

[stoveliker]

Grea thread, I really like hearing what other have to say.

I’d be knocking down the brick chimney and replacing with a double wall stainless Class A - and trying to control myself by not then getting vortexed into buying a BK

Lol,.resulting in another thread 5 years from now where it'll say you should better have bought a BK

 

[Caw]

Lol,.resulting in another thread 5 years from now where it'll say you should better have bought a BK

If there's one thing you BK owners love its talking about your BKs! Lol. They are indeed quality machines I'll give you that.

I actually gave cat inserts serious consideration but for me a regular tube stove made more sense based on my BTU load and fireplace size. I'm very happy with my choice.

 

[stoveliker]

If there's one thing you BK owners love its talking about your BKs! Lol. They are indeed quality machines I'll give you that.

I actually gave cat inserts serious consideration but for me a regular tube stove made more sense based on my BTU load and fireplace size. I'm very happy with my choice.

That's fine; not all situations lead to BK being the best choice. And they are boring...

One does see complaints every now and then for cases where the BK was not the best choice. The life of a good stove is long though, so for the cases where it is a good solution, one tends to hear happy folks for a long time...

 

[qwee]

I would change 3 things. I built a masonry heater. I went to Las Vegas and observed/assisted some pros build a small masonry heater that was to be auctioned in Wash DC. Unfortunately, their heater didn't have an oven, a bench, or a bio firebox (air 360 degrees around fire = better burn).

So, when it came time for me to build a MH I just did what I knew firsthand = no oven, no bench, no bio firebox. I should have had more faith and figured these things out, but at the time, I wasn't even sure if I could build a MH. On the next one.......

 

[WoodBurnerInWI]

One thing I would do over would be to re do my hearth area. I like the slate tile hearth pad I got, I like it even more since I got it half off since it was the last one a local fireplace shop had in stock! But what I would do after getting the pad laid down is to build a nice stone surround behind the stove going up my walls at least halfway. I don't have issues with too hot off walls, the worst I see temps wise is around 140 degrees and that's if I let my stove really go nuts! With the stove purchase and install, that pretty much left no room for the nice stone work. I'm tentatively planning to put in that nice stone surround next year. Unsure at the moment if I will hire a mason to help or do it myself. I'll at least get some quotes to see what it would cost to have a mason do it. Otherwise I'm happy with my stove location and wood storage situation

 

[Mark N MO]

I honestly wouldn't change anything. The Buck Stove 91 is a beast of a stove, built like a tank. Very easy to operate and maintain. The recommendation for it, by our local dealer was spot on. This is our 13th winter with it. The chimney is 18' of stainless lined masonry, and never has an issue with drafting. I'd highly recommend the 91.

 

[Caw]

Very interesting mantel supports you have there...never seen it done that way. Did you do it so you don't have to deface the front facing masonry? Very nice stone work.

Also the Buck 91 has a GIGANTIC firebox. Isn't it like 4 cu ft? You must be able to push 24 hours with that if you wanted depending your BTU load.

 

[jetsam]

If there's one thing you BK owners love its talking about your BKs! Lol. They are indeed quality machines I'll give you that.

I actually gave cat inserts serious consideration but for me a regular tube stove made more sense based on my BTU load and fireplace size. I'm very happy with my choice.

I grew up with old stoves that put out tremendous heat and used tremendous wood, and did not have tremendous burn times.

Now I have a stove that will go 24 hours on a load.

If you heat only with wood and have a job that takes you out of the house for 10 hours minimum per day, this actually enables a really nice lifestyle change. No more starting fires and babysitting, no more getting up in the night to keep the fire going. You break the cycle of having the super hot load to warm up the house, followed by the creosote making low load to try to keep it warm while you're gone or asleep...

I mean, both ways heat the house, and that's the goal. But I find the BK way gives me a lot of time back, and a lot of flexibility. (I reload it fully whenever I want... on the way out, I load the stove without caring or worrying where it is in the burn cycle. I put the wood in and walk, and the thermostat sorts out the rest. I would have melted through a few stoves trying that with some of my old ones!)

It has also saved me so much aggravation in the years when I didn't have dry wood ready to go. Those of you who have ever burned a season with wood taken straight out of the woods to the stove.... imagine you have a dead standing oak that's sorta wet on the outside. Now imagine using that wood for a cold start... and then imagine throwing it into a red hot pit of coals.... you would be at that stove for hours a day lighting fires if you had to start it up from low coals 2+ times per day. Not that I am endorsing using wet wood in any stove, but I've been there!

There's also probably nothing particularly revolutionary about it for a supplemental heater in the winter. Any stove with secondary combustion (and no insulation plated on) will get the BTUs into the house. I may be kind of an edge case being a wood-only heater with nobody home to load the stove!

 

[Caw]

You're kind of making my point for me!

 

[jetsam]

You're kind of making my point for me!

Fanboys gonna fanboy.

Also, BKVP ships me a large dry oak split every time I talk up one of his stoves. That's why I post on this topic a lot during cold snaps.

 

[Theodore2]

If I could change one thing... it would be the white noise of the fireplace insert fan. We love the heat from our Napoleon 1402. But after a week or so of that droning sound, my missus can't stand it and insists on turning the fan off and just getting by with radiant heat while she's in the main room. I have to admit, it IS a bit overwhelming after hearing it many days straight. Seems like stove designers have increased efficiency with catalytic converters and other controls, but wish they would give some more attention to acoustics of airflow next.

 

[Caw]

My insert fan isn't too bad on low. It's definitely there but I don't notice it anymore unless I'm trying to hear it. On high its absolutely intrusive but thankfully running it on low is plenty 95% of the time. We only run it on high if trying to cool off the box or it's really cold inside and we want fast heat.

A silent blower would be a great product im sure a lot of people would pay good money for. I actually have a moderately loud tower fan in the stove room that's infinitely more annoying than the blower but it makes our whole airflow pattern work so it's always on. I need to look at getting a newer one.

 

[ManitobaSky]

In my perfect dream fantasy world I would have removed the flue for the oil furnace. That would have allowed in interior chimney and a sweet sweet Blaze King! In reality since I pretty much had to got with an out and up chimney and I was too chicken to risk a BK and have issues with freezing the chimney up, I do wish I had gotten a stove with a bigger firebox. If I could go 12 hours between fills that would be ideal, vs the 9-10 on my current stove.

 

[Todd]

I wish I would of stuck to my original install option of exhausting my stove straight out the wall and up the side of the cabin so I could have an easy cleanout tee and not have 9' of exposed stove pipe inside.

 

[begreen]

I changed the one thing in 2009 when I upgraded from the Castine to the T6 and I changed over the house to heat pump heating from propane in 2006. Never looked back. The heat pump can carry the house load down to about 25º on a calm day, 30ºF on a windy one. Now that we are buying wood I am using it almost exclusively for 45º and above weather.

 

[Caw]

I changed the one thing in 2009 when I upgraded from the Castine to the T6 and I changed over the house to heat pump heating from propane in 2006. Never looked back. The heat pump can carry the house load down to about 25º on a calm day, 30ºF on a windy one. Now that we are buying wood I am using it almost exclusively for 45º and above weather.

That's exactly how we burn. I have a somewhat older heat pump system, from 2006, but we use that exclusively when the weather is 45 or higher then rely 100% on wood when it's cold. We have backup resistance heat but it only comes on a few hours a year on brutally cold nights when the stove peters out around 4 or 5 am. It's a great system and I'd highly recommend it to anyone around my latitude or lower.

The only downside for me is that it runs R-22 and is 15 years old so when it breaks I'm likely gonna have to upgrade to an R-410a system.

 

[jetsam]

If I could change one thing... it would be the white noise of the fireplace insert fan. We love the heat from our Napoleon 1402. But after a week or so of that droning sound, my missus can't stand it and insists on turning the fan off and just getting by with radiant heat while she's in the main room. I have to admit, it IS a bit overwhelming after hearing it many days straight. Seems like stove designers have increased efficiency with catalytic converters and other controls, but wish they would give some more attention to acoustics of airflow next.

Most insert installs could be converted to a freestander install, which makes the fan noise optional.

This requires either a complete relocation of the install, or a new hearth and either another hole in the chimney or a rear-venting stove.

I have Insert Buyer's Remorse sometimes too (mostly due to efficiency losses inherent to stuffing your stove inside a fireplace), but when I go through that conversation with my wife in my head, that's usually the end of that train of thought. ("I want a slightly more efficient stove so the living room is getting smaller and we have to redo that wall put in a new hearth and throw out this perfectly good stove that heats the whole house and get a new one.")

If we're here for long enough to run that insert into the ground though, I do plan on doing exactly that... or maybe sooner if BK releases my 20cf Super King by then! (10" insulated flue? OK, let me grab the sawzall, we're goin' straight up with this...)

 

[armanidog]

I would have gotten those fallen trees I passed by in the last 4 years, I have a 2year supply after this season but I would like to have a 4 year supply. Even better would be a winning lottery ticket enabling me to pay someone to cut, split, and stack the firewood. i'd still cut the grass though.

 

[fvhowler]

Agree with the OP. I would rebuild the hearth and raise the Hampton stove by 10-12 inches. Several years ago, we custom built our home and I was adamant about keeping the hearth at floor level, which I do like the looks. Now with back issues, I'm considering raising the hearth for ease of use.

 

[Prof]

I would change 3 things. I built a masonry heater. I went to Las Vegas and observed/assisted some pros build a small masonry heater that was to be auctioned in Wash DC. Unfortunately, their heater didn't have an oven, a bench, or a bio firebox (air 360 degrees around fire = better burn).

So, when it came time for me to build a MH I just did what I knew firsthand = no oven, no bench, no bio firebox. I should have had more faith and figured these things out, but at the time, I wasn't even sure if I could build a MH. On the next one.......

My heater was built without a bench. This was unacceptable to my wife, so I used some 2 inch pipe and wood to make a bench next to the heater--not quite an integrated bench, but a few minutes sitting against 120-30 F heater will take the knots out!

 

[qwee]

Any pictures of your bench? I also need to build something.

 

[brickie]

Not one thing.

 

[Caw]

Not one thing.

View attachment 274292

I love that giant brick feature... very sharp. I'd love something like that in my living room for aesthetics and to allow for a free standing.

Might be nice to have the door open towards the wood. Mine is currently set up the opposite way as yours...door opens left, wood on the left. I'm eyeballing moving the wood to the right side so I don't have to lift it over the door when reloading when we rearrange our living room.

My dog wouldn't drink that warm water! He's a diva.

 

[Tom Cat]

I would more seriously consider a cat stove for better heat control. My Heatilator insert puts out a lot of heat for a while then dies down quite a bit. I knew this going in and wanted something low in initial cost.

Of course rearranging the rooms of the house so that the stove would be in the center would also be nice.

tom

 

[Prof]

Any pictures of your bench? I also need to build something.

The bench is just some 2 inch hemlock boards glued together with 2" pipe. I made it a bit shorter than a chair so we could easily lean back against the heater.