Hey guys! Just spent a few hours reading through posts. good group of advice givers here so I joined up.
I am living in a two story turn of the 20th century house. Not necessarily drafty. But lacking insulation and attic has holes big enough to fly a paper airplane right thru one side to the next. I am renting the house, So capitol investments are not in my best interest.
The house has no fireplace but has a oil furnace in the basement with hot water radiators around the house for heat. I keep it at 60* and I have been paying 1.5-3K a year for heat. So we would like to add a supplemental stove so we can at least have a section of the house warm and cozy, if not take some strain off the oil bill.
My girl wants a fire to watch, she was a fan of the gas Propane stoves with the embers, But the BTU cost shut that idea down quick and I started looking at the pellet stoves in the store. She still likes the cast iron models but understands they are heavy as sin and may be harder for me to work on.
We went to three different local stores and got ideas for different stoves. I figured I'd bounce some models off you guys and see if anything stands out.
Store One:
Guy had St. Croix stoves. He was pushing the Prescott model for 3100. But it seemed high compared to the lower end models we had been looking at and i didn't think it had an auto ignition( i think i was wrong) but still in the high end of the range and didn't really jump at me. The Hastings was nice, but lifting the cast iron sides off to maintain it seemes daunting. And some stove access pannels were in the back, not moving a 500lb stove to get to them. Interesting auto shaker that agitates the burning fuel. and stoves claim to be able to burn almost anything.
Store Two:
Lady here was pushing us toward the CAB-50. Really like the HUGE hopper and it seems really easy to maintain. nice big access doors on the sides. styling is what it is, But i'm more concerned about heat output and efficiency(but remember my girl wants the pretty fire and cast box, she refers to the CAB 50 as the Auschwitz oven, sry if anyone gets offended). Seems like it might be a bit high priced at $1850 compared to tractor supply and Big box offerings. is it worth the extra 600 dollars? They also carried the Enviro stoves but i haven't looked into them too much yet.
Store three:
Quardifire and Harman offerings. They did have the Cab-50 here as well and I told him that was what we were looking at currently but wanted to see what higher end options get us. the P68 would certainly get the job done but i wasn't sure I could come up with the $4200 + $500 for the vent for something like that. I did see that Quadrafire had a CB1200 sitting there that I really liked, It not too much more than the CAB50 and it has a much bigger window to see the fire through and has a real heat exchange. still fairly easy maintenance access. It not a cast iron piece of artwork, But I think it doesn' t look to bad. Only problem I have heard is the efficiency is not really good on them so they cost more to run?
I was also supprised to hear that two of the three stores did not recommend outside air supply. I have always thought they were the golden rule when It came to high efficiency?
My house is about 2000 sq feet with four main rooms on the lower floor separated by open doorways upstairs is bedrooms... we want to place heater in the downstairs living room.
Sorry for the long post, like I said. I'v thought my self into a corner!
Dan
I am living in a two story turn of the 20th century house. Not necessarily drafty. But lacking insulation and attic has holes big enough to fly a paper airplane right thru one side to the next. I am renting the house, So capitol investments are not in my best interest.
The house has no fireplace but has a oil furnace in the basement with hot water radiators around the house for heat. I keep it at 60* and I have been paying 1.5-3K a year for heat. So we would like to add a supplemental stove so we can at least have a section of the house warm and cozy, if not take some strain off the oil bill.
My girl wants a fire to watch, she was a fan of the gas Propane stoves with the embers, But the BTU cost shut that idea down quick and I started looking at the pellet stoves in the store. She still likes the cast iron models but understands they are heavy as sin and may be harder for me to work on.
We went to three different local stores and got ideas for different stoves. I figured I'd bounce some models off you guys and see if anything stands out.
Store One:
Guy had St. Croix stoves. He was pushing the Prescott model for 3100. But it seemed high compared to the lower end models we had been looking at and i didn't think it had an auto ignition( i think i was wrong) but still in the high end of the range and didn't really jump at me. The Hastings was nice, but lifting the cast iron sides off to maintain it seemes daunting. And some stove access pannels were in the back, not moving a 500lb stove to get to them. Interesting auto shaker that agitates the burning fuel. and stoves claim to be able to burn almost anything.
Store Two:
Lady here was pushing us toward the CAB-50. Really like the HUGE hopper and it seems really easy to maintain. nice big access doors on the sides. styling is what it is, But i'm more concerned about heat output and efficiency(but remember my girl wants the pretty fire and cast box, she refers to the CAB 50 as the Auschwitz oven, sry if anyone gets offended). Seems like it might be a bit high priced at $1850 compared to tractor supply and Big box offerings. is it worth the extra 600 dollars? They also carried the Enviro stoves but i haven't looked into them too much yet.
Store three:
Quardifire and Harman offerings. They did have the Cab-50 here as well and I told him that was what we were looking at currently but wanted to see what higher end options get us. the P68 would certainly get the job done but i wasn't sure I could come up with the $4200 + $500 for the vent for something like that. I did see that Quadrafire had a CB1200 sitting there that I really liked, It not too much more than the CAB50 and it has a much bigger window to see the fire through and has a real heat exchange. still fairly easy maintenance access. It not a cast iron piece of artwork, But I think it doesn' t look to bad. Only problem I have heard is the efficiency is not really good on them so they cost more to run?
I was also supprised to hear that two of the three stores did not recommend outside air supply. I have always thought they were the golden rule when It came to high efficiency?
My house is about 2000 sq feet with four main rooms on the lower floor separated by open doorways upstairs is bedrooms... we want to place heater in the downstairs living room.
Sorry for the long post, like I said. I'v thought my self into a corner!
Dan
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