Insert vs free standing replacement

[Charlie250]

Hey everyone my first post here. Im at a point where i need to make a decision and im not seeing a clear direction on which will be best. So here we go: We bought our home 3 years ago. Its a 1600sqft ranch house. Has a fireplace in the center of the house (picture added) and a fisher baby bear wood stove in the far end of the house (garage turned family room). The fisher had a falling down external chimney, i removed the chimney and had a double wall pipe installed through the roof. Then after all this i look up the manual for the fisher and the clearances are no where close. So i am at a crossroads.

Should i go through the expense of making this hearth bigger for the baby bear to have its clearance. Im not sure if my insurance company will even be okay with an old stove like that. Should I replace that fisher with a new stove (blaze king or ideal steel hybrid? Or say the heck with that spot and get some type of insert put in the fireplace.

Sorry i know its a lot but i wand to get burning again. Theres a ton of wood here and that has turned into quite the hobby for me. I have a tone of wood split stacked and seasoned and now dont want to use that stove. Thanks for any help.

 

[begreen]

Welcome. It looks like the Fisher has some ventilated heat shielding, it just should have extended to the left front of the hearth. That reduces the clearances from 36" to 12". The floor protection is inadequate, but could be extended if the goal is to keep the Fisher. An insert in the fireplace would serve the different purpose of heating the home's interior, so it might be nice to have both.

 

[Charlie250]

Welcome. It looks like the Fisher has some ventilated heat shielding, it just should have extended to the left front of the hearth. That reduces the clearances from 36" to 12". The floor protection is inadequate, but could be extended if the goal is to keep the Fisher. An insert in the fireplace would serve the different purpose of heating the home's interior, so it might be nice to have both.

So that heat shielding reduces it 12” for this illustration?

 

[begreen]

Yes. It qualifies as long as it's non-combustible and has the required 1" air gap behind it and is open at the bottom and top. The floor protection should extend 12" from the sides and 18" in front of the door.

 

[Charlie250]

Yes. It qualifies as long as it's non-combustible and has the required 1" air gap behind it and is open at the bottom and top. The floor protection should extend 12" from the sides and 18" in front of the door.

The drywall would still need to be covered 36” from the stove correct? That posted note is 36” from the stove. Thats what had me thinking of a new stove. Building that surround that high might start to get pricey. I couldnt really think of a clean way to just add something on to whats there.

 

[begreen]

Yes,. The shielding protects the drywall. Done right, it's very effective. Truth be told, the radiant heat up that high may not be strong but if you are going for 100% right for insurance purposes then it should be that high. One other thing - stovepipe clearances. Is the stovepipe single or double-wall? If double-wall then it's clearance requirement is 6". If single, then it's 18".

 

[Charlie250]

Yes,. The shielding protects the drywall. Done right, it's very effective. Truth be told, the radiant heat up that high may not be strong but if you are going for 100% right for insurance purposes then it should be that high. One other thing - stovepipe clearances. Is the stovepipe single or double-wall? If double-wall then it's clearance requirement is 6". If single, then it's 18".

Thanks. Its double wall.

 

[Charlie250]

Well…after some more reading and thought. We are going to get a new stove. The baby bear is great but has really short burn times and the more i read the new stoves would he great for full time service.

Im curious how would a jotul or woodstock ideal steel stack up against the baby bear as far as radiant heat goes? Ive never used another wood stove so the baby bear is all i have to compare to. Also would i be better off using one as an insert if it fits or just replace the baby bear in that location?

 

[begreen]

In general, look at the stove clearances for a comparison. A radiant stove will generally have higher clearance requirements. In this case it depend on which Jotul model. The F500v3 is radiant the F35, F45, and F55 are more convective. The Ideal Steel is sort of in between with the soapstone side panels, but generally Woodstock stoves are radiant. If this is a smallish area then putting in a big 3 cu ft stove may be overkill.

I'd put the heat where you hang out the most. That may be to put in an insert and leave the Fisher as is.

 

[Charlie250]

In general, look at the stove clearances for a comparison. A radiant stove will generally have higher clearance requirements. In this case it depend on which Jotul model. The F500v3 is radiant the F35, F45, and F55 are more convective. The Ideal Steel is sort of in between with the soapstone side panels, but generally Woodstock stoves are radiant. If this is a smallish area then putting in a big 3 cu ft stove may be overkill.

I'd put the heat where you hang out the most. That may be to put in an insert and leave the Fisher as is.

Thanks. After 5hrs or so the baby bear was able to get the heat back to the rest of the house. But the room the baby bear is in would be 86 degrees and the back of the house would be 67-72. I was okay with this because the bedrooms are in the back of the house and we like it cooler to sleep. My concern is if we put an insert in the fireplace (which is more centered in the house) the bedrooms would be too hot.

Also if i were to leave the baby bear there, and get the clearances in spec im not sure it would ever be used if we had an insert in the other room. Id hate for that $2200 worth of double wall to go to waste sitting there.

Tough decisions. Any suggestions on what to use on the wall behind the baby bear. Id like to just add to that instead of tearing it all out. Im not sure theres an easy clean way to go about it.

 

[begreen]

Have you tried using a fan to even out the heat?

For more even heat in the house put a table or box fan at the end of the hallway, placed on the floor, pointing toward the woodstove. Run it on low speed. It will blow the cooler air down low, toward the woodstove. The denser cool air will be replaced with lighter warm air from the stove room. Running this way you should notice at least a 5F increase in the hallway temp after about 30 minutes running and an equal drop in temp in the stove room.

For extending the wall shield, any non-combustible on 1" non-combustible spacers will work. Sheet metal or cement board work. Or a basic metal stove board from Imperial can be used.
(broken link removed)

 

[Charlie250]

Have you tried using a fan to even out the heat?

For more even heat in the house put a table or box fan at the end of the hallway, placed on the floor, pointing toward the woodstove. Run it on low speed. It will blow the cooler air down low, toward the woodstove. The denser cool air will be replaced with lighter warm air from the stove room. Running this way you should notice at least a 5F increase in the hallway temp after about 30 minutes running and an equal drop in temp in the stove room.

For extending the wall shield, any non-combustible on 1" non-combustible spacers will work. Sheet metal or cement board work. Or a basic metal stove board from Imperial can be used.
(broken link removed)

Man just when i thought i had it figured out haha. So im looking at the roofing I was going to use as a wall cover heat shield. And its listed as 31 gauge. I googled and first thing i see says heat shield needs to be 29 gauge minimum. Any thoughts on this?

Well i just had a thought. Would it be okay to double up the metal?

Okay so i should have started with this. I called my buddy that works at a lumber yard. He can get me 26 ga cut to size for a great price so im going with that. Now can i use metal studs to attach it ? That would leave the 1” gap (or bigger). Mount the studs to the wall then screw the metal to the studs?

 

[begreen]

31 guage sounds paper thin and too flimsy.

 

[Charlie250]

31 guage sounds paper thin and too flimsy.

I agree. I edited the above post. Im getting some 26 ga from a lumber yard. It will even be cut to size so i wont need to cut it. And not much more $ than the other. Thanks for the input.

 

[Charlie250]

Welp heres what i came up with. The bricks came from a walk way outside that was here when we bought the house. Half inch cement board doubled up for spacers. 24ga metal roofing i ordered from a lumber yard.