Which one to buy?

[ken3698]

After many hours of research, I have decide to get rid of my double sided propane fireplace and buy a pellet stove insert. Propane $$ hurts every winter.

I'm down to the final two choices.. Hope someone can guide me to which one is better, the price is about the same for each.

Breckwell - P23I with 45,000BTU (broken link removed)
or
US Stove - 6039I multifuel with 52,300BTU (broken link removed)


I will be getting a thermostat to control the on/off. Reliability is my major concern.

Thanks
Ken

 

[JoeS]

Ken, It would be helpful to know just what you are trying to achieve. Are you using this as a major source of heat? If so, what is the layout of your home, sq/ft, # of floors, etc.

 

[ken3698]

I'm sorry,

Yes - I'm trying to reduce my furnace use much as possible. I currently have a 2400sqft house with two floors. This new unit will be installed right in the middle of the house on the first floor. I thought maybe running the fan motor on auto for the furnace to help circulate the air evenly thru out the house.

Thanks
Ken

 

[JoeS]

Ken, I to wanted to get rid of an inefficient propane fireplace. When I was doing research it came down to three stoves, the Breckwell, the Harman Accentra Insert amd The Quadrafire Mt. Vernon AE. The Breckwell dealer told me that his stove probably would not heat the area I needed (over 3,500 sq/ft) so that canceled that but it appears that it would work fine for you. I don't know much about US Stoves, I never researched them. Have you looked into Harman and Quadrafire? I ended up with the Mt. Vernon and did have some initial issues which my dealer and Quad were quick to resolve. The stove is fantastic and can it put out some heat! Since the install on 12/31/07 I have used no propane to heat the house! By the way, how will an insert work with the double sided fireplace?

 

[ken3698]

THe US Stove is slightly more expensive $100 but it has a higher BTU rating. Right now that's my leading candidate. The other stoves you mentioned are out of my price range...For the double sided fire place, I'm goind just drywall over the kitchen portion. Everywhere that I read states you onhly need to be 1 inch away from the wood on the backside of a pellet insert.

 

[JoeS]

The US Stove is also a multi-fuel stove which is a plus!
Good Luck!

 

[pegdot]

What about dealer service? Unless you are willing to do all the work on the stove yourself that needs to be a major consideration. Which stove comes from a dealer you can count on to be there if it quits in the middle of winter?

I can't remember for sure but it seems like I eliminated US from consideration when I was shopping because of bad customer reviews I read on the net. If my choice was only between the two I'd go with Breckwell for sure. Have you looked at any Englanders? I'd recommend them especially if you plan on doing your own repairs & maintenance.

 

[ken3698]

I just read that the US stove does not have an auto ignitor and cannot be used with a thermostat. This may be a issue, I want to install it to a thermostat for easier on/off use.

Now my view is switching to the Breckwell. My only reason for keeping the idea open is that we have a cheap supply of corn down the street and the Breckwell only recommends pellets.

 

[Xena]

For a home that size I personally wouldn't consider either
of those stoves. I'd probably be looking at the Harman P68
(assuming there's a good harman dealer close by). I'm no eks-pert by any means!

 

[buildingmaint]

I have a Breckwell BIG E . I like it because it has a big hopper that holds 120 lbs . It is nice to only have to load it every 60 hours or so . It would suck to have to load it every day , some times twice in cold weather. It is noisy. I have read on the Breckwell site that you can use corn in their stoves at a 1- 4 ratio [1 LBS OF CORN TO 4 LBS OF PELLETS] .I have heard that corn produces a lot of clinkers and you have to clean the stove more often.

 

[jtp10181]

THe US Stove is slightly more expensive $100 but it has a higher BTU rating. Right now that's my leading candidate. The other stoves you mentioned are out of my price range...For the double sided fire place, I'm goind just drywall over the kitchen portion. Everywhere that I read states you onhly need to be 1 inch away from the wood on the backside of a pellet insert.

Different stoves and inserts will have different clearance requirements. Make sure you read the manual.

Also not all "inserts" can be installed as "built-in" units. Again, make sure you read the manual before making a decision.

 

[mitakuuluu]

We just got a 45,000 BTU VistaFlame insert and it's heating our 1400sqft home pretty darn well over the past few weeks with average temps in the 20's and 30's. Have a nice insulating blanket of snow now too, but nothing like you'd get in Western NY.

It's a bit different than I expected - was thinking it'd be toasty warm in the living room near the stove, and ice cold in the bedrooms down the hall. Turns out that if we leave all the doors open, we get a pretty even 75ish in the living room and about 65-70 in the bedrooms (fine for sleeping).

The thermostat that came with has the option for hi/lo or on/off operation. After playing with it for a while, we've decided to put it on hi/lo, and set it up pretty high (75) so it basically runs on the setting we put it on, unless it gets really hot inside.

The stove does a great job at maintaining a constant level of heat (the range above). We run ours on setting 1 or 2 (of 5) and that seems to do a great job, and doesn't chew through too many pellets. However, it's not very quick to recover if you turn the stove off, open all the outside doors, etc, even if you fire it up to the '5' (topmost) setting. It's simply not moving as much air as our old forced air system did. If you are coming from propane, you are probably used to relatively quick gratification... bump up the thermo and it's instantly warm. Not so with our pellet stove, at least.

We've just gone ahead and gotten accustomed to leaving it on overnight, when we go out, etc; as it sucks to go out for a couple of hours and come back to a 55F house which will take an hour or two to warm up. Very nice to come back to 70F, though!

And it doesn't seem to be hurting too much in the pocketbook - I think our pellet bill for the month will be about $100, whereas the heating portion of our electric bill had been almost $300!

 

[Marster]

After many hours of research, I have decide to get rid of my double sided propane fireplace and buy a pellet stove insert. Propane $$ hurts every winter.

I'm down to the final two choices.. Hope someone can guide me to which one is better, the price is about the same for each.

Breckwell - P23I with 45,000BTU (broken link removed to http://www.breckwell.com/pellet.htm)
or
US Stove - 6039I multifuel with 52,300BTU (broken link removed to http://www.usstove.com/proddetail.php?prod=6039I&cat=3)


I will be getting a thermostat to control the on/off. Reliability is my major concern.

Thanks
Ken

Hi there,

Just had a Breckwell P23 stand alone installed last week. Very impressed with the stove. I use 1 bag of pellets a day on 1 or 2 setting and about 1.3 bags when temps are between 22-26. ( the coldest it's been since I had the install done)

My home is well insulated with 1,500 sq ft. Heats entire home with ease. Stove is very easy to operate. I dont know anything about the US Stove.......but I wanted to voice my .02 on the Breckwell.

I would think you may want to go with a bigger stove if you're heating more sq ft.......The dealer I bought from said to always go with a stove that sq footage requirment is larger than what you have.

 

[marie]

can we install a pellet burning insert into an existing double sided fireplace with zero clearance.?

 

[ken3698]

Yes, That's what I did... So far I have mixed emotions. My stove performs nicely, I'm not used to the drafts created by the stove though. Right now it's 11deg outside and my stove is keeping the house at 65deg. So far, when it's this cold we have to turn the furnace on occasionaly.

 

[JoeS]

Ken, what did you end up purchasing?

 

[ken3698]

I went and bought the P23I from Brekwell. I liked the idea of multi fuel, but the hassle free of igniting and the ability to control this on a thermostat made my choice the Breckwell..

I installed this on Saturday... Currently I have mixed emotions. The temperature outside has been between 0 - 20 degrees. This is pretty cold and been having to still use my furnance most of the time which I can understand. But I thought my living room would be warmer than it has been. The max so far has been 73 deg. Plus this new heat causes drafts going thru the living room so it's been kinda of a cold 73deg. Where ever you sit you have this breeze on you.

My wife currently doesn't like it. So I'm hoping when the temperature get's up greater than 30deg outside we will see more of a benefit.

Thanks
Ken

 

[flueinc]

The MT.Vernon would be a insert that can be installed in a gas fireplace. You will have to block off one side no one I know makes a two sided pellet stove