New ICF Build - thinking blaze king or PE

[OntBG]

Hi everyone,

I built a new ICF house that is pretty big but pretty airtight and well insulted. 2400 sq ft main floor and basement is the same. Heat loss calculation for the house is a little under 44,000 btu/hr.
I had chimney installed when I built, it is a double wall SS stack that goes straight up from the basement inside the house with only the last 5 or 6 feet out of the roof not in the house. Once a stove is installed, I will be around 28 ft tall from stove to chimney end cap. This will not be my primary heat source, just for enjoyment and also power outages

Am primarily considering a Blaze king ashford 30, however I am also curious about PE stoves. I have done a fair bit of research on cat vs non-cat stoves, and am confident I can burn properly seasoned wood and figure out hot to operate. The thermostatic air control sounds like it could be huge

I know BK stoves are known for not much fire display, is there ever active flames once cat is burning or is it really just a “black box”. The only reason I am really considering the PE is to have a better flame display, but it’s not a massive issue to me. I feel like a cat stove is good for my application because even though it’s going into a large room in the basement, the ability to throttle it down is enticing especially in the shoulder months where my house doesn’t lose a lot of heat.

What are the opinions of the experts here? Is a BK ashford(or Sirroco) good choice for me? Or should I be considering the PE stoves more? I have heard only great things about Pacific Energy.

 

[stoveliker]

The BK will have flame when turned down less.
The BTU output range has been extended to the low end and that is the range where no flame exists. But at normal outputs, as the PE can do, you'll have flame.

Note that you will need a key damper (or two) to mitigate the overdraft of your tall flue.

 

[EbS-P]

Two questions.
Do you want wood to be primary heat or supplemental?
have you done the math on savings versus your other heating method?

 

[Murray01]

Worse case scenario, power is out for a week in the dead of winter. Are the stoves you're looking at big enough to heat 4800 square feet?

 

[all night moe]

Open floor plan? 4800sq ft is a lot for any one stove. Especially a basement dweller.

 

[BKVP]

You mention how tight the house is. How are you, regardless of which stove you purchase, get combustion air into the basement? Is it a daylight basement where you can run fresh air line to the exterior wall for air?

BKVP

 

[EbS-P]

You mention how tight the house is. How are you, regardless of which stove you purchase, get combustion air into the basement? Is it a daylight basement where you can run fresh air line to the exterior wall for air?

BKVP

this and just as important is how is fresh air being handled?

 

[OntBG]

Worse case scenario, power is out for a week in the dead of winter. Are the stoves you're looking at big enough to heat 4800 square feet?

I mean, based on the calculated BTU’s and and what the theoretical maximum, I think it will be ok. I understand not every room is going to be 75 degrees but it should be enough to keep the family warm and stop pipes from freezing right? That’s what I’m asking for here, to get others opinions.

 

[OntBG]

You mention how tight the house is. How are you, regardless of which stove you purchase, get combustion air into the basement? Is it a daylight basement where you can run fresh air line to the exterior wall for air?

BKVP

The basement is about 6 ft below ground level. I do have windows in the basement, but yes that is a question I was looking for an answer to as well. I know that outside air kits are not recommended in this situation. Then I see others on reddit saying that I won’t need it since stoves pull less CFM than bathroom fans or range hoods.
What would your suggestion be for the air supply, other than just opening a window lol. Others have said to just open a window on startup but Im curious if the house will be too tight even after it’s running?

 

[BKVP]

If you have a daylight basement and you can box in a fresh air line along a wall, on the floor, to an exterior wall that would provide above grade air, that would be optimal. Keep in mind, FA lines are not to exceed the height of the stoves firebox floor.

BKVP

 

[OntBG]

Open floor plan? 4800sq ft is a lot for any one stove. Especially a basement dweller.

Yes both floors are pretty open. It will primarily be used as a supplementary heater, as I love wood heat and it will probably cost me more to heat with that than with my air source heat pump.
4800 sq ft is kinda relative isn’t it? BTU heat loss would be the best way to compare wouldn’t it? I am not interested in doing more than one stove. I will primarily just use it for enjoyment other than if the power is out

 

[all night moe]

4800 sq ft is kinda relative isn’t it?

No, it isn't. With an open floor plan, and a way for heat to migrate in an outage, you should be ok keeping the house warm enough. Keep pipes from freezing, and be comfortable. Without that open floor plan, the convection of heat would have a hard time moving around.
I'm at 4500sq ft without an open floor plan. No way one stove would heat my house. I wouldn't be able to move that heat between rooms.
Either way, you may want to look for a larger sized burner. Note what others have said above. They are well versed.

 

[tabner]

Based on your stating that the basement is 6 foot below grade, i don't think you can get a fresh air intake setup, and meet code. I would be concerned about draft in an ICF home, with a basement install, since they're pretty air tight i believe?
do you have an HRV system? I don't know much about them, but i think there's a way to dial up the air coming in to be slightly on the positive side, to account for the stove draft?

 

[EbS-P]

Going with a heat pump I suggest a secondary stove like the PE. We have mild winters here and the heatpump carries shoulder season. But we a have several stretches of several days where we light the stove and it’s nice to load it, see it, feel it for a few hours and then when the mood or temp strikes. Light it up again. No need for low and slow of a cat stove. I have a button for that.

Yes both floors are pretty open. It will primarily be used as a supplementary heater, as I love wood heat and it will probably cost me more to heat with that than with my air source heat pump.
4800 sq ft is kinda relative isn’t it? BTU heat loss would be the best way to compare wouldn’t it? I am not interested in doing more than one stove. I will primarily just use it for enjoyment other than if the power is out

 

[stoveliker]

On the other hand, needing 44,000 BTU/hr is not low and slow, and the thermostat of a BK would still provide the "knob-even-heat" for which you need electricity with your knob ...

Point is that one can run an Ashford mid-range or 3/4 range (<44,000 BTU/hr), see flame, and still need to modulate with another regulated heating appliance on top to keep temps comfortable.

Not saying anything bad about the PE stoves. I just think your argument is not all that valid in this case, given the BTU needs the OP posted.

 

[begreen]

2400 sq ft per floor? I'd put in one stove per floor. Put in the BK and the PE for the best of both worlds. Maybe put in a PE zero clearance fireplace on the main floor?

 

[moresnow]

I had chimney installed when I built, it is a double wall SS stack that goes straight up from the basement inside the house with only the last 5 or 6 feet out of the roof not in the house.

What "SS stack" did you install?
Size?
I.D.?

 

[OntBG]

On the other hand, needing 44,000 BTU/hr is not low and slow, and the thermostat of a BK would still provide the "knob-even-heat" for which you need electricity with your knob ...

Point is that one can run an Ashford mid-range or 3/4 range (<44,000 BTU/hr), see flame, and still need to modulate with another regulated heating appliance on top to keep temps comfortable.

Not saying anything bad about the PE stoves. I just think your argument is not all that valid in this case, given the BTU needs the OP posted.

You are telling me the same things that my local dealer is lol. He sells and installs PE, BK, VC and Jotul. He recommended the Blaze King in my situation, I trust him cause he doesn’t just seem like a sales guy from some of the other stores.

44,000 BTU is also going to be worst case scenario basically isn’t it?
Heat loss calculation will be coldest day of the year when I really need all that if I am understanding correctly. My heat pump (48,000 BTU) has a back up electric that didn’t even kick on when we had a week at -25 Celsius last year. I think running this stove full tilt will be enough on the coldest days to maintain comfort, and during less cold months I can just do 3/4 or 1/2 throttle. It really is shocking the difference in heat loss compared to my last place.

 

[OntBG]

What "SS stack" did you install?
Size?
I.D.?

6” ID
Brand was ICC if I remember correctly

 

[OntBG]

2400 sq ft per floor? I'd put in one stove per floor. Put in the BK and the PE for the best of both worlds. Maybe put in a PE zero clearance fireplace on the main floor?

I definitely have thought about this lol. I know exactly where I’d put it on main floor when the time comes. Thinking I’ll try the basement one first and see how it goes. The rec/tv area is in the basement so I’ll spend a lot of time down there next to it.

 

[OntBG]

If you have a daylight basement and you can box in a fresh air line along a wall, on the floor, to an exterior wall that would provide above grade air, that would be optimal. Keep in mind, FA lines are not to exceed the height of the stoves firebox floor.

BKVP

Can you explain what you mean? The base of the stove will be about 5.5 feet below grade. I certainly can get outside air in, but it’s not able to be hooked up directly to stove, is that what you are saying? I have seen others do it where it stops just a few inches short of the stove intake.

What are my options to get fresh air to stove safely? Also, another installer said basement outside air kits are OK if you put a loop in, I haven’t heard anyone else suggest that, not sure how I feel about that one.

 

[DuaeGuttae]

I have a Blaze King Sirocco 30.2 in a new, very well insulated and air sealed house in Virginia. It's located on our main floor and heats about 1700 square feet on that floor and about 1,000 on a smaller upper story. There is an unfinished basement below that allows us to have an outside air kit hooked up directly to the stove. All our ductwork runs through conditioned spaces, so we do use it to circulate heat.

We have been very happy with the stove. We are running it pretty low these days, and that does gunk up the window, especially in the corners, but it spreads inwards. It's true that on low there isn't much to see. When we reload the stove and burn in the new load on high, there are definitely flames, and some of the gunk burns off. If we burned on high for longer, it would be clearer, and we had a cold snap where we did run on high for a day, and it got much clearer. Most of the time, though, we don't find that it all burns off, and it comes back pretty quickly as soon as we lower the thermostat. It's just the price we pay for having the ability to turn the stove down. Our house is well insulated enough and right now the weather is mild enough that if we were running a stove without such turn down ability, we'd likely not be running it so much. We're glad for the thermostat. If I could have a cleaner window, I would, but I wouldn't choose a different stove for the cleaner glass. I did love the nice fire view on my previous stoves in other houses.

The house you describe would be much bigger, however, and in a colder climate, though perhaps even better insulated and air sealed than ours, though ours is excellent. If your basement is a finished area where you'd spend a lot of time, it certainly makes sense to have a stove there. We do really like our Blaze King Sirocco for our well insulated house.

How high are the ceilings in your house? You mention a run of twenty-eight feet for the chimney. Is that just because of attic space and clearing the roof line, or do you have high ceilings on the main floor? I ask because it's important to consider not just the square footage for which the stove is rated but also the cubic footage. If your ceilings are higher than eight feet, you need to imagine that you have extra square footage.

Edited to add pictures.

Here's a photo of a small load that we put in to keep the stove going overnight. This is the initial burn in with the thermometer on high. You can see the leftover dark spots on the windows where the gunk was from the day's low burn.



This is the famous "black box" mode after I turned the thermostat to its final position for overnight. You can look into the center of the firebox, but there's not much to see other than a slight glow at the bottom. It will nevertheless do an amazing job of keep our house warm overnight.

 

[Murray01]

If I’m reading your posts correctly, you have a heat pump for primary heating with electric heat for backup? If that’s the case then you could run the electric heat in rooms that are too cold and/or rooms with plumbing if you find it necessary. Our bathroom is the furthest from the wood stove, once the temperatures reach -20C the bathroom baseboard heater will kick on periodically, mostly at night. We don’t have an open floor plan in the back part of the cabin. It amazes me how much heat gets pushed down the hallway into the bathroom with daily traffic. We have a BK Princess. Many people with Cat stoves on this forum don’t run their Cat stoves during the shoulder season and heat with another source. After running a BK during shoulder season I can see why. It’s a running joke here, wife wants a fire on a cool September evening, I light the fire and she opens a few windows knowing that in a couple of hours it’s going to be uncomfortably warm. With your setup having a choice between heat pump, electric heat and wood heat I would think you’ll have more than enough heat.

 

[OntBG]

I have a Blaze King Sirocco 30.2 in a new, very well insulated and air sealed house in Virginia. It's located on our main floor and heats about 1700 square feet on that floor and about 1,000 on a smaller upper story. There is an unfinished basement below that allows us to have an outside air kit hooked up directly to the stove. All our ductwork runs through conditioned spaces, so we do use it to circulate heat.

We have been very happy with the stove. We are running it pretty low these days, and that does gunk up the window, especially in the corners, but it spreads inwards. It's true that on low there isn't much to see. When we reload the stove and burn in the new load on high, there are definitely flames, and some of the gunk burns off. If we burned on high for longer, it would be clearer, and we had a cold snap where we did run on high for a day, and it got much clearer. Most of the time, though, we don't find that it all burns off, and it comes back pretty quickly as soon as we lower the thermostat. It's just the price we pay for having the ability to turn the stove down. Our house is well insulated enough and right now the weather is mild enough that if we were running a stove without such turn down ability, we'd likely not be running it so much. We're glad for the thermostat. If I could have a cleaner window, I would, but I wouldn't choose a different stove for the cleaner glass. I did love the nice fire view on my previous stoves in other houses.

The house you describe would be much bigger, however, and in a colder climate, though perhaps even better insulated and air sealed than ours, though ours is excellent. If your basement is a finished area where you'd spend a lot of time, it certainly makes sense to have a stove there. We do really like our Blaze King Sirocco for our well insulated house.

How high are the ceilings in your house? You mention a run of twenty-eight feet for the chimney. Is that just because of attic space and clearing the roof line, or do you have high ceilings on the main floor? I ask because it's important to consider not just the square footage for which the stove is rated but also the cubic footage. If your ceilings are higher than eight feet, you need to imagine that you have extra square footage.

Edited to add pictures.

Here's a photo of a small load that we put in to keep the stove going overnight. This is the initial burn in with the thermometer on high. You can see the leftover dark spots on the windows where the gunk was from the day's low burn.

View attachment 333728

This is the famous "black box" mode after I turned the thermostat to its final position for overnight. You can look into the center of the firebox, but there's not much to see other than a slight glow at the bottom. It will nevertheless do an amazing job of keep our house warm overnight.

View attachment 333729

Thank you very much for the photos and for your input. The fire view is nice to see for realistic expectations. Honestly all the other stoves I’ve owned did not even have glass, so I feel like anything is a bonus.
Yes, we have 9ft main floor, but again, I’m not expecting it to heat my entire house to 75 degrees. Chimney is so tall like you said because we have a steep roof and it goes through attic space then has to meet proper clearances and height above roofline.

It’s mostly for the basement and to keep the house at a reasonable temperature for family if the power goes out for a few days.

I’m your first photo that says burn in, you mean before cat damper is engaged?

 

[OntBG]

If I’m reading your posts correctly, you have a heat pump for primary heating with electric heat for backup? If that’s the case then you could run the electric heat in rooms that are too cold and/or rooms with plumbing if you find it necessary. Our bathroom is the furthest from the wood stove, once the temperatures reach -20C the bathroom baseboard heater will kick on periodically, mostly at night. We don’t have an open floor plan in the back part of the cabin. It amazes me how much heat gets pushed down the hallway into the bathroom with daily traffic. We have a BK Princess. Many people with Cat stoves on this forum don’t run their Cat stoves during the shoulder season and heat with another source. After running a BK during shoulder season I can see why. It’s a running joke here, wife wants a fire on a cool September evening, I light the fire and she opens a few windows knowing that in a couple of hours it’s going to be uncomfortably warm. With your setup having a choice between heat pump, electric heat and wood heat I would think you’ll have more than enough heat.

By back up electric I mean it is electric banks in my forced air furnace in case the heat pump fails or temp drops below -30 C. It’s a Mitsubishi City Multi unit and I can’t believe it operates at such low temps. I will also run the air handler fan when stove is running to circulate heat.

Also, I figured that cat stoves are actually better for shoulder season than non cat since generally you can turn them down to lower heat outputs