Pellet furnace options

[mithesaint]

I've been working on getting a pellet furnace for awhile now. I have a 2400 sq ft colonial that I've been heating with a Englander 10 CPM for 3 years now, and it's done a decent job and introduced me to pellets. It also lost the battle repeatedly during the really cold and windy times this winter, and I am finishing the basement and want that area to be warm and cozy, along with the upstairs master bath. That toilet is COLD in the winter.

I was previously decided on a St. Croix Revolution. I put a deposit down, and waited for it to arrive. That was a month ago. I'm still waiting. My dealer called me a week after I put the deposit down, and informed me that he couldn't get me one till "fall". He blamed it on St. Croix, and was very apologetic. I emailed him two weeks ago wondering if he heard anything, and no reply. I called on Monday, and he said he would call me back later that day after he talked to St. Croix. No callback as of yet.

If he won't call me back now, how are things going to go after he has my money? In addition, he's too far away to service it, but has offered to help over the phone. I think it's time to ask for my deposit money back, and move on.

The Fahrenheit unit is nice looking, but I'm pretty sure it won't heat my house all by itself on the worst days. Given the option, I'd like to get rid of the CPM and get that floor space back.

I can get a Harman PF 100 for around $5000 plus install. The dealer will come to service if necessary, but I'm around 40 miles so I assume the service call will be expensive.

I can get a PSG Caddy Alterna for $5500 plus install. Same deal with service. Does anyone have experience with one of these? I know they're supposed to be pretty good, but there aren't many people that have them. I like the fact that you can change the settings to make them a 60 or 80 or 100K BTU furnace, and the blower is 1650 CFM with 4 settings.

 

[hyfire]

How much is the house insulated? PSG is nice and I would get the back up electric power and the hot water loop...if its not too costly.

 

[mithesaint]

House is decently insulated for my area, but poorly air sealed. Walls are R-13 with a layer of blue board foam, but they skipped the exterior OSB sheathing and housewrap. When the wind kicks up, it gets pretty drafty in here. I've done a lot of work from the inside to tighten things up, but someday I'll have it stripped down to the studs, new windows (builder quality windows that are 17 years old now, and some should be replaced now)sheathed, foamed, wrapped and that should make a huge difference. Just a huge expense that I can't justify yet.

Already have a LP furnace for back up and a not yet installed HP water heater, so I'll skip both those options.

 

[moey]

Any idea what your heat loss is? I highly doubt you would even need a 80 or 100k btu furnace or for that matter even a 60k. My house is not insulated great 1986 2400sq/ft and our geothermal system only puts out about 40k btu at max it lost two degrees when it was -26F out.

 

[sinnian]

Have you looked into a Pinnacle? They've been around forever ~ there are some furnaces 25+ years old still in service. There are also a couple dealers in Ohio.

70K btu
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85-135btu
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[hyfire]

How often does trhe PSG need cleaning?

 

[mithesaint]

Any idea what your heat loss is? I highly doubt you would even need a 80 or 100k btu furnace or for that matter even a 60k. My house is not insulated great 1986 2400sq/ft and our geothermal system only puts out about 40k btu at max it lost two degrees when it was -26F out.

Don't know what the heat loss is, but I do know that my 10 CPM is rated at 52K btu, and it lost the battle multiple times this past winter. By the time I add the basement to the equation (another 1000 sq ft) and try to fully heat the upstairs, and account for duct loss, I'm pretty sure there will be days when I need every bit of those 60K btu, and potentially more. I don't need a 100k btu furnace, but there's not a lot of options, so I'm sorta forced into the bigger units.

 

[mithesaint]

Have you looked into a Pinnacle? They've been around forever ~ there are some furnaces 25+ years old still in service. There are also a couple dealers in Ohio.

70K btu
(broken link removed)

85-135btu
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Yeah, I looked at those. The dealer is further away than the other two, and I was a little bothered by the fact that the smaller unit was only rated to heat 2000 sq ft. Not sure why, 70K btu should be more than enough to keep 2000 sq ft toasty. I'll have to call them in the morning and see what I can find out.

 

[railfanron]

I think you should consider this. Stoves are rated in BTUs and manufacturers give an Approximate square footage. I've seen so many people complain about this or that stove doesn't cut it and how they got screwed. Everybody's houses are different. One 2000 sq Ft house may take 40000 BTUs and another 110000 BTUs. You have to look into your own houses heating requirements and size your stove accordingly in BTUs Not sq ft. My house 34 years ago was 1000sq Ft and could not be heated with 50000 BTUs now it's 2250 sq Ft and is easily heated with 50000 BTUs. Making everything weather tight and well insulated made the difference. I have a Harman p43 and it can heat the house in the coldest of weather but in the original house it wouldn't have kept up on a 10 degree day. Just sayin.
Ron

 

[hossthehermit]

Had my Revolution 6 years so far, put in pellets, clean it out most every week, 5-6 tons per year w/ no mechanical issues .............

 

[sinnian]

Yeah, I looked at those. The dealer is further away than the other two, and I was a little bothered by the fact that the smaller unit was only rated to heat 2000 sq ft. Not sure why, 70K btu should be more than enough to keep 2000 sq ft toasty. I'll have to call them in the morning and see what I can find out.

They're only $300 a part, and the 130 gives you double the hopper capacity. They're pretty bulletproof and much easier to clean than my boiler. Are you planning on installing the pellet furnace yourself?

If you go with the 130 I would get the water system for DHW and plumb it into your HP water heater. It will act as DHW storage when using the 130, and in the non-heating season you have the benefits of the HP. It really won't use too many more pellets to heat your DHW. I have my pellet boiler set up that way.

 

[mithesaint]

I picked up a St. Croix SCF 050 today. Brand spanking new, paid $1400 for it. Would have preferred a Revolution, but couldn't find one since they stopped making them. It's a little smaller than I wanted, but it will work.

The Harman and Alterna were too expensive. The Pinnacle unit was nice, but I would have had to keep the 10 CPM for the shoulder season because the Pinnacle wasn't an auto light, and keeping the 10 CPM made that one too expensive. Would have loved a Fahrenheit, but there aren't good used models around, and a new one was 4K.

Will start an install thread when I get closer. Gonna be a summer project.

 

[hyfire]

I been searching the St. Criox site, no where do they spec the efficiency of that furnace...However you got a smoking deal so i guess its not important...I only see an input spec of 45,000 btu. Are you sure it will meet your needs?

 

[mithesaint]

I been searching the St. Criox site, no where do they spec the efficiency of that furnace...However you got a smoking deal so i guess its not important...I only see an input spec of 45,000 btu. Are you sure it will meet your needs?

I know it won't be enough on the coldest days. I already have an Englander 10 CPM that runs out of heat on the coldest/windiest days. The CPM is rated for 52k btu iirc, but the SCF has a better heat exchanger, so I expect heat output will be similar. I'm planning on keeping the CPM, so when the SCF can't keep up I'll just fire up the CPM. I needed something to heat the newly finished basement, and I'd prefer to get as much dust and noise out of the living area as possible. The SCF wasn't my first pick, but I couldn't turn down that deal.

 

[Arti]

You got a great deal on a well built furnace.
As far as heat output I suspect that the Englander will put out as much heat or more than the SCF050. With the SCF and the Englander you should be able to easily heat your home. During the Coldest days in your area the SCF more than likely would not keep up.

According to the spec sheet on the ST Croix it will consume 5.2 lbs Corn an hour on the highest setting. So assuming that corn has 8,000 Btu's per pound that means that the total Input is 41,600. Assuming 80% efficiency then that means that max output would be 33,280 Btu's.

Judging from what you posted about your home I suspect that 40 to 50 thousand Btu's hr. would be needed on a cold windy 0 degree day so with both stoves you should easily heat your house.
In my opinion you are heading toward an ideal setup, a Furnace that is sized about right for most of the heating season and a supplement for the worst days of winter.
Looking forward to some pictures when the stove is installed.

 

[moey]

Unless your house has really crappy insulation or poorly designed ductwork I think you will be fine with that size furnace. Maybe on some days when its -20F you may lose a degree. IN my opinion smaller is always better it can run continuously then. We heat about 2200 sq/ft with 40k btu geothermal unit it will lose a degree sometimes at 4AM when its super cold. You could always add more insulation.

 

[mithesaint]

Unless your house has really crappy insulation or poorly designed ductwork I think you will be fine with that size furnace. Maybe on some days when its -20F you may lose a degree. IN my opinion smaller is always better it can run continuously then. We heat about 2200 sq/ft with 40k btu geothermal unit it will lose a degree sometimes at 4AM when its super cold. You could always add more insulation.

My issue is the air sealing, or lack thereof. I live in the middle of nowhere, and it's very flat. When the wind kicks up, it just howls. The electric poles along the road are leaning from the constant wind. As long as it's not windy, the CPM is fine down to 0, but when the wind kicks up, it gets cold in here quickly.

My house is a contractor grade house...foamboard instead of exterior sheathing, and the seams between boards weren't sealed. No housewrap. Poor quality windows and doors. I'm working on plugging as many holes as possible, but it won't really improve until it's time to replace the vinyl siding. Then, I can sheath it; replace windows, and get things sealed up properly from the outside. Unfortunately, we're talking about a 20-30K project, and that just doesn't make sense if it only saves me $500 per year on heating costs.

 

[hyfire]

You don;t have to go wild insulation is not that expensive, how about the kind of foam that they come with a truck and drill the walls? You have foamboard outside, whats in the interior walls?

 

[mithesaint]

You don;t have to go wild insulation is not that expensive, how about the kind of foam that they come with a truck and drill the walls? You have foamboard outside, whats in the interior walls?

R13 fiberglass. The 20-30K figure included replacing windows and siding, as well as the sheathing and air sealing. Everything is 17 years old, and was contractor grade to begin with. Just a wild arse guess at the price...just know that it wouldn't be cheap.

 

[mithesaint]

Install question...I had a HVAC guy out today because I'm in need of a new AC unit. When he was done with the estimate, I asked him about duct sizing for installing the SCF 050. He looked at the manual, and thought that it would be ok to hook the hot air output up to the cold air return of the existing LP furnace, and use the blowers in tandem to move heat.

I know it's not supposed to be that way, but I don't remember why. Can someone explain this to me?

 

[Arti]

It just seemed a little inefficient to run the big blower all day, Also moving the heated air over the main furnace motor will shorten it's life considerably.

Also your insurance company might frown on an installation that is not really recommended. Some Return air ducts are simply boxed in wood floor joists so it would certainly be a fire hazard if this is the case.
If you do this you will be using the basement for a cold air return which will make the pellet stove very inefficient.