Why did you choose pellets over X fuel source to heat your home?

[krooser]

I went with pellets because I wanted to be warm.

My wife would set the t-stat @ 65F when I was on the road and sit and freeze. I'd come home and turn it up to 74... i was a trucker for the better part of 41 years and I slept in a freezing cold truck six nights per week because I couldn't afford to idle and stay warm... when I got home I wanted to be warm.

Now I heat this old barn with 2 1/2 - 3 tons of pellets every winter with the living room at 76F and the upstairs at 68-70F. I could care less about being "green"... I just want heat.

 

[David Holmes]

We live in the rural area and use oil for the primary heating source. Have burned wood for many years but changed over to a pellet stove this year and my body has been thanking me ever since. I love it, not cold enough for all day heating yet but come downstairs in the morning, push a button and go make coffee, come back down, presto heat.

 

[AddictiveStew]

Purchased an old farmhouse last year and there was an existing (allbeit beat up and unused) pellet stove pipe coming out of the wall. Naturally made the transition to putting one in myself this year (new pipe of course) due to the horrible price of heating this house with oil. Last year was $600/mo from Nov to March! Also did quite a bit of insulating, including bringing the attic from R0 to R49. That made a huge difference!

 

[ScotL]

I just returned from a trip to Prince George, BC - right in the middle of beetle kill territory. The primary heating source there? Natural gas (in the city anyay). Rural areas must be a different story.

 

[Tedinski]

I've been heating with wood for the last 8 years. It's been hard on the ole bod!

This year I installed a CAB50 & bought a ton of pellets. (Allegheny Pellets). I live in a tiny little place, just under 1000 sq ft. The ceiling is well insulated, and walls are at R19 except one, which is actually earth-bermed.

Anybody have any idea how many pounds of pellets I'll use this year?

Wish me luck!

 

[will711]

I've been heating with wood for the last 8 years. It's been hard on the ole bod!

This year I installed a CAB50 & bought a ton of pellets. (Allegheny Pellets). I live in a tiny little place, just under 1000 sq ft. The ceiling is well insulated, and walls are at R19 except one, which is actually earth-bermed.

Anybody have any idea how many pounds of pellets I'll use this year?

Wish me luck!

2 - 3 tons

 

[Tedinski]

2 - 3 tons

Youch! I was hoping to get away with less than that. Maybe 2 tons max.
It'd STILL be pretty cheap though, and OH SO MUCH KINDER to my back!

P.S. What does it mean when people put "basement dweller" in their post?

 

[will711]

Youch! I was hoping to get away with less than that. Maybe 2 tons max.
It'd STILL be pretty cheap though, and OH SO MUCH KINDER to my back!

P.S. What does it mean when people put "basement dweller" in their post?

You don't want to run out of pellets and they don't spoil it's your 1st yr you'll figure it out how many cord of wood you been burning ?

Basement dweller that's where your stove is located

 

[briansol]

first winter in my new house, I spent almost 5 grand on oil. (2006-7 when prices were $5/gal). 1000 gallons. ridiculous. and I don't even keep my place 'hot'.
I couldn't afford to do that again. I wanted to do wood, but at the time, I was working 1.5 hours away 10 hours a day, so I needed something that could run for 14 hours without me touching it.

The wood was iffy....
pellet, reliable so long as I filled the hopper in the morning.

And here we are.

 

[Tedinski]

You don't want to run out of pellets and they don't spoil it's your 1st yr you'll figure it out how many cord of wood you been burning ?

Basement dweller that's where your stove is located

Went through about 2 and a half cords of wood last year, but I was traveling off/on. To keep the woodstove from going out, I had to keep the house a minimum of about 75 degrees. That's TOO HOT for me! Any lower & I'd have massive creosote buildup in the chimney. I had 2 chimney fires last year... another big reason to switch to pellets.

I actually like to keep the house around 65. Being able to turn the unit off during the day, and down at night should save a great deal of fuel!

I guess I'm a basement dweller then. My whole house is a basement, with a roof on it!

 

[Tedinski]

The wood was iffy....
pellet, reliable so long as I filled the hopper in the morning.

And here we are.

What was your savings? How many tons did you go through?

 

[briansol]

I use about 3-3.2 tons a year ish. about 900 bucks worth. 1/5 of the old cost. about 1/3 of todays oil prices. and my place is warmer.

 

[Bioburner]

I've been heating with wood for the last 8 years. It's been hard on the ole bod!

This year I installed a CAB50 & bought a ton of pellets. (Allegheny Pellets). I live in a tiny little place, just under 1000 sq ft. The ceiling is well insulated, and walls are at R19 except one, which is actually earth-bermed.

Anybody have any idea how many pounds of pellets I'll use this year?

Wish me luck!

That's a lot of stove for that amount of home.

 

[Tedinski]

That's a lot of stove for that amount of home.

Yep! I plan on building on top of my basement. It's sized for what the whole house will be.

It's a long standing tradition in PA to put in a basement & a roof, and add a floor when you can afford it. The way things are going, I may retire & still be in the basement! :D

It hasn't been cold enough to really get the feel of the CAB50 yet... I have it on its lowest setting, and keep the thermostat on the far wall at 65. It runs for a bit, then it's off for a few hours. One night in the low 40's, the stove ran once overnight around 2 a.m... and not again until I was up & about with my coffee!
(It's a new enough toy that the "strange" noise wakes me up!)

 

[Tedinski]

Speaking of "Why did you choose pellets?", how many people here use multiple heat sources? Like a wood stove one place, pellet stove in another?
Does anybody on this forum have a Masonry Heater (Kachelofen)?
The convenience of a pellet stove is great (Oh Wonderous Thermostat! How I Love Thee!), but the efficiency of a masonry heater intrigues me.
I could probably heat my house on FAR less wood than I used to. Most of the heat doesn't go "up the stack" so to speak.
I'm thinking of building a simple masonry heater in place of my current wood stove. I could fire it once in a while when the weather gets truly cold, but not have to feed it all the time due to the pellet stove.
Just some thoughts.
Anyone do anything like this?

 

[Dollabill]

Oil here in Maine went through the roof so i switched to a corn fired stove at the time corn was 110 a ton pellets were 225 now that corn is through the roof i had one of two choices seeing we live in the country wood or wood pellets if you have a wood lot then Id go with wood< I dont so by the time you buy,split stack then clean pellets are the best deal

 

[Buc White]

I purchased my stove mainly because i had no heat in my finished basement. i enjoyed fires during the fall outside and figured, why not bring that inside. i didn't want to pipe in another zone for my basement so i decided to go with a pellet stove. my first season was last year and actually saved a good amount in oil cost. I filled up once and it lasted the whole winter, even with the stove in the basement and living in a decent size cape. my hairless cats love the stove too. they sleep on the top all winter long

 

[steamguy]

Your poll doesn't have 'electricity'...

When we built our 2200 sq.ft. house 24 years ago (doing most of the work ourselves) my wife absolutely had to have a fireplace, I wanted a stove alcove. Due to the rural location on the side of a mountain, our only heat could be electricity, so we went with a heat pump system. Many factors weighed, geothermal was one, but the cost was exorbitant at $25/foot to drill. Natural gas was out of the question after I called about a hookup to the local main which was about a mile away, and was told that it'd be over $20,000 to do it. Meanwhile I insulated to R-21 in the walls, and R-45 in the attic and underneath the house. We're in a VERY windy spot so heat gets sucked out FAST and I'd planned for it.

Three years into living in the house, we got a howler of a winter with the power off for most of a week, and us snowed in, big deep drifts everywhere. I fed that darn fireplace like it was a steam engine, but the house just kept getting colder and colder. When we finally got power back, it was 38° in the house. Once the power was reliable, we were off to the Austroflamm dealer to buy an Integra. We wanted quality and quiet, and it was both. That stove heated the house comfortably for many, many years...
And I never said another word about wanting a stove alcove instead of a fireplace.