New house, thinking about a second stove.

[Dustin]

Hey friends,

First off, you guys have really, really helped me over this past year with a wood stove purchase. Well, I finally have a quadrafire 4100I insert, and I love this thing!

The insert, is in the center of the house, it heats one side of my house great, the bathrooms, bedroom, and the upstairs with ease. There is a 20x20 family room behind the stove room, that I can't seem to get about 66 degrees even during the shoulder season, while the rest of the house hangs about from 75 to 80 with a hot burn.



This family room is going to be the TV / Man room. I'm a single guy in a 2200 square foot house, so I guess the entire house is a man room, but the insert is in a more "formal" living room with nice hard wood floors, it looks sweet!

anywho, I'm thinking about a small stove in the corner of the huge family room, to help out the insert on those cold, cold days.

I'm kicking around the idea of a really small pellet stove, or a nice small soapstone stove...


Thoughts?

dustin

 

[begreen]

Sounds like this is more a problem of getting the air moving than a second stove. Have you tried using a fan in the family room, place on the floor blowing into the area where the stove is? It sounds counter-intuitive, but that is how I've heated my office this year. It works as long as there is a reasonable chance for a good air exchange between the areas. However, if the family room is completely isolated from the stove area, then it may take a bit more work. If the areas have a common wall, got sawzall? Pay attention to load bearing walls of course, but the family room is completely closed off, is there way it could be opened up?

 

[Dustin]

The it does have a common wall, it's a huge brick fireplace! it's a double sided two flue fireplace. I'm NOT going to use the fireplace in the other room for anything. It's an old "heatlator" and it's a piece of crap. The chimney is un lined, the firebox is all coroded, pretty much it's a piece of crap. And, that's gonna be the wall where my flat screen TV gets mounted

The room is about 4 feet lower than the stove room, it used to be a garage at one point. Iv'e found getting heat into this is difficulty, because it is lower than the rest of the house. I talked to a neighbor that said the fireplace used to be "walk around" but the previous home owner put a door on one side, and a wall on the other. Iv'e thought about taking the wall out and making it a "walk around" again. I do like having that separation though. The family room is more like a "cave"


I have thought about putting a fan in the wall, that might do it. But I have a feeling that this insert will have its work cut out for it heating the rest of the house when it gets cold, and if I can find an excuse to have two stoves in the house, well..alright!!

Do they make small wood / pellet stoves that would heat a 20 by 20 family room with an attached 10 by 6 laundry room?

 

[DBoon]

The Lopi Answer and Pacific Energy Summit are too good places to start, if you have your mind made up on another stove. There are other small stoves (1.4 to 1.6 cubic foot fireboxes) from other manufacturers as well.

Another way to look at this also is to put a bigger stove in this room, and use it as more of the heat source for the rest of the house. It sounds like, with the room being set below the main house, that warm air from this room will travel into the rest of the house pretty easily, though we don't know enough about your layout to know for sure. Plus, it sounds like this is the preferred room you are going to be in most of the time anyways.

 

[begreen]

The Lopi Answer is a nice small unit. For a PE that would be the Vista insert. (The Summit insert is their big boy.) However, the corroded firebox has me concerned that it might be unsafe. A pellet insert or freestanding stove might be safer if the old heatilator is in bad shape. There are small pellet units that might work well for you in this location. The Enviro Princess or the Quadrafire Castille come to mind.

 

[DBoon]

Yes, thanks for the correction. The Vista is the small PE stove.

 

[Dustin]

some pictures of the new stove, and the family room behind. This room sits lower than the rest, when it gets cold this winter I'm thinking it's going to be a bear to heat the upstairs, and downstairs with this insert. I have baseboard heat that I refuse to use. My power rates are pretty cheap, but, I just don't like using it.

The upstairs is right off the main stove room, and has a door I can close if I want to and keep all the heat down here. My thought process is, If I'm spending a bunch of time in the family room, I can run the stove in there with small hot fires and keep it nice and toasty, and, with the family room being below everything, it will probably help the insert out with the rest of the house.


I thought about making the family room the "main" stove room. The reason I didn't is to keep the rest of the house warm, it would have to be damn hot in that room...


Does woodstock make a nice small soapstone stove?

 

[Wet1]

Having two stoves makes a lot of sense when they are located at opposite ends of a difficult to heat home, but they also require twice as much work. In your case, it seems pretty silly to have/need a second stove 20' from your existing stove. Just moving some air in a well thought out manor should easily take care of heating that room. If your insert is not enough to heat the rest of the house, maybe you should consider exchanging it for a larger one that will better handle the heating requirements.

 

[ControlFreak]

D/F:

In my opinion, I think you're on the right track by thinking of adding a pellet stove as a minor temperature correction to just bring up the temp just a bit.

A second wood stove is going to be double the work, and you will be constantly lighting it to keep from overheating the whole house.

The pellet stove can sit in there and just add heat as needed without making you a complete slave to wood.

I have two stoves, one in the basement and one on the first floor. I know how much work it is, and I would prefer the pellet stove in the basement. Something I might do if a nice used unit comes across my path.

 

[pinewoodburner]

Woodstock has 2 sizes of stoves, neither of them are large.
One is rated for 800-1300 sq ft, the Fireview is rated for 900-1600 sq ft
If you get one, get the larger one and you don't have to burn it hot unless you need the heat. You can fill the box and cut back the air and get 12 hr burns with a nice low heat output.

 

[wendell]

I disagree with the second stove being twice the work as it sounds like you will just be using it for evenings and weekends when you are using the room. A small soapstone stove could be a great choice as you can just get it going good and then enjoy the warmth off the soapstone without having to keep feeding it. My stove is in the family room in the basement and for the last several weeks it is the only room that needs heat and it has been working great.

 

[dac122]

I have a 10x15 Sunroom with high heat loss. I sold the originally Jotul Number 1 that was in that room because it was overkill, and have since wanted to restore the room to a 3 season room. Not wanting to haul any more wood, and interested in the pellet experience, I came across a well used Jamestown J1000. It works well and their support is top notch. Parts are available but aren't easy to come but since I only have $500 into my entire install including the stove, I'm not too worried.