Newbie needs advice

[the_dude]

Howdy. I haven't been around here much lately, and when I was I'd be found in the wood shed or hearth room.

Anyway, I have a small 1 1/2 story home that is very open. A few years ago we installed a Kozy Heat wood burning fireplace that does a splendid job heating the ground level and the loft.

However, we also have a finished basement, and I'm now looking to utilize that area as a more regularly used family room. I'm looking at adding another heater down there. I'm not real keen on maintaining two wood fires, so I'm leaning heavily towards a pellet stove. The stove I've been researching is the Cumberland MF3800.

The questions I have are:

1. Is the Cumberland a decent stove?
2. How difficult is stove installation? I'm pretty handy and have a close friend that is extremely handy. Is installation something we could handle? This is important since the nearest Cumberland dealer is 2 hours away, so I'm thinking installation may be an issue.
3. Anything else a wood burner should know about pellets?

Thanks guys. I'm looking forward to being able to use my basement square footage and would greatly appreciate your advice.

 

[imacman]

Glad you've come over from the "dark side" of the forum :lol:

Cumberland isn't a well known stove, and I can only remember someone asking about them once. I think you need to use the search feature to find any info about them here.

Installs can range from very easy, to difficult based on where it's going....no way to answer your questions about that w/o more info.

IMO, you might want to do more research into some more well known stoves, especially if the dealer is that far away.