Wood burning recommendation for addition

[flubone]

Greetings,

I've got a room that the previous owner added on. It doesn't have central air/heat going into it and its fine during the summer with a ceiling fan. However, if the temp drops below freezing outside this room may well be the same. Its buffeted on three sides plus the roof (there's a roof deck above and I have no clue if there's much insulation up there). He also installed two pairs of sliding glass doors, so there are lots of windows. So to some extent draft may be an issue. On the plus side, its got a gorgeous fireplace, very large fireplace. This room is the best part of the house and we desperately want to make the most of it during the winter.
Now to the problem...
A dealer (in fact every dealer I talked to) urged me to get an insert ONLY rated for the size room I have, telling me too large/powerful an insert would drive me out of the room. I firmly explained the condition of this room but it seemed to go in one ear and out the other. We ended up with the VC Winter Warm Small (Jan 2005). For our purposes this is a joke. Not much effective heat going on there (also one fan is down, stuck damper and loose gaskets. Damper and gasket is now fixed. Fan was never that powerful anyway). I have since run the numbers for the size of the room and calculated on this site (https://www.hearth.com/php/room.php) and came up with this info-

20,587 BTU/Hour required to heat a 3128 cubic foot room [8 high x 17 wide x 23 long] with 20 sq. feet of Doors, 108 sq. feet of Windows and 1 Fireplace.
Needless to say, none of this seemed to jive.

So what we are looking for is a new insert with...
-Powerful heat with variable control
-Powerful fan (and quiet if we can get it)
-Quick heat (this room is at the far end of the house from our front door, kitchen, etc. so we wouldn't heat it fulltime. Therefore if we do use it we want to speed up the heating process as much as possible)
-Non-cat and ease of use
-Quality
So have at it-educate me.
I've been impressed with what I've heard about the Clydesdale, but saw posted recently that it takes a long time to heat up quick from a cold start.
That's everything I can think of at the moment.
FYI I live outside St Louis now but grew up in Louisiana so this is all new to me.

 

[begreen]

This is a good sized room. For quick heat I suspect you want a steel stove. But by chosing the VC, I am guessing that aesthetics are also important, so it's a challenge. Are you dead set on an insert? If yes, have you looked at Quadrafire, Lopi, Avalon inserts? If a freestanding hearth stove would also work for you then there are more options. Is this space only used in the evenings? If yes, for how many hours?

 

[wg_bent]

something is wrong here. My Livingroom is 23x17 with 14' cathedral ceiling, sliding glass door and two windows...sounds similar. Yet on ANY day during the winter I can get that room over 80 if I want with my Osburn. The VC winterwarm small is a very similar sized stove.

Is your wood dry? Do you get a lot of black on the glass? Is the CAT clogged? It's my belief that your stove should not only heat that room, but half the rest of your house. Sitting in front of the stove when going full bore should be nearly impossible for more than 10 seconds. We've got some digging here boys and girls.

 

[firewatcher]

I had a similar situation as I am new to this whole wood burning thing. It sounds as though you are not getting enough heat output on your wood. Even though your wood may appear seasoned or the guy who sold it to you told you it was. It may not be. I would suggest getting a stove top temp gauge and see what kind of reading you get and ask the manufacturer what they recommend for the stove top temp. This way you see if your insert is getting hot enough.

 

[begreen]

I'm wondering if flubone is 1) expecting instant heat, 2) dealing with a leakier than average room, 3) dealing with poor wood and 4) dealing with a poorly made or possibly operated stove. If the cat is clogged and one fan already out, then it could be putting out a lot less heat into the room than expected. If all the above then - cold room.

 

[flubone]

Thanks for the imput.
Here's some more info based on your replies.

We are pretty set on an insert, although our hearth extends out 14 inches from the fireplace and yes looks are somewhat important. My wife and I are amazed at the quantity of "modern/gaudy" looking ones compared to "rustic".
Generally we use it in the evenings (6 hours) and all day on weekends.

We use aged hardwood (at least that's what we were told. We are currently finishing off last years supply (I store it underneath an overhang. Rain can't get to it and I don't detect and moisture/dew during the warmer months). We have gotten black glass from time to time but I assume that's inevitable to some degree, right? By no means does it heat the entire floor unless. When the insert is operating at full capacity (as we know it) we sit about 4 feet directly in front of it and don't really get a strong sense of warmth unless the outside temp is 50 degress or warmer. I don't know how to check on the Cat clog issue. Suggestions?


I'll try the stove top temp gauge. That sounds like a good idea regardless.

The room is most definetely leakier that normal. We're dealing with those issues bit by bit. But I still expect more and I'm still wondering whether we should upgrade to more BTU's, more powerful fan, etc. We haven't fixed the fan in case of the possibility of replacing the unit itself.


We ran it last night, temp was in the 50s, but ran a wall unit heater (sort of like you'd see in a hotel with ac and heat, installed by the previous owner up near the ceiling no less!!) to get the heat going faster. It took about and hour and a half from the time I lit the fire to get comfortable.

If by chance we do figure the unit is operating correctly and decide to upgrade, what is the possiblity of selling the VC???

Sorry if my original post was devoid of info. I was up late last night.

Thanks again,

Steve

 

[flubone]

I just got off the phone with a VC tech and he told me to remove the top panel and get a reading off of the top of the insert. I'll get back to you guys soon.

Steve

 

[elkimmeg]

Couple of points here the non working blower should have been addressed under warranty. You are running a stove designed for secondary burns coupled with
a cat Combustor and can't get the heat vollume you expected?. ITs not the cat but opperator understanding of how to run the stove. Sounds like wet wood
If the wood was wet then chances are the cat got clogged and rendered useless. Then you probably had to run the stove wide open just to burn the less than dry wood
So My guess you never had secondary burn or cat lite off and struggled to get heat? sound about right? Plain stove dymanics, raising the surface temp of the stove from 450 degrees to 600 produces 100% more heat. Even with a temp gage on it, If you do not clean the cat and remove the fly ash in the cat chamber nothing will be gained. If the wood was less than dry whether you had a cat or non cat stove you still have to bring it over 500 degrees surface temp have a decent bed of coals and the wood in the second stage of the burn cycle to achieve secondary burn.
The winter warm also has thermoatically controlled secondary air supply and should hold that 500 degreespluss for hours there after. Your manual; will tell you how to opperate the stove, how to remove the cat and how to clean it. Everbody should doa total clean out of your stove at the end of the burning season. Including getting as much fly ash out as possible . so It does not block air passages. Doing this in the spring also eliminates stove odors during the sumer time. I also clean my cat at mid season. My original VC cat stove exceeded my expectations I sold a non cat stove just to get another cat stove they function so well But I know how to opperate them.

You did not address venting issues that could n effect stove preformance Please tell us how your stove is vented into what size flue is it insulated and it verticle l run length in the damper area blocked off all these factors can reduce the effective ness of your stove. The issue may not be the stove or wood but the venting. Is the chimney exposed to the exterior?

One could put the best stove in the world of Roo, the PE Sumit, and its preformance would suck if poor venting conditions exist

 

[wg_bent]

I believe these guys are all on the right and same track I was on. Agreed, get the blower fixed. If you like the look of the stove, then keep it and figure out why your not getting the heat output you need.

A question for ELK here: If he runs that stove in bypass mode, it may not burn clean, but will it put out a lot of heat? Possible test here is to run in bypass mode for a burn...Good heat will tell you that the CAT is clogged or toast.

That stove should produce usable heat within 30-40 minutes and be DAMED hot within an hour. A temp guage is definitely a good idea here.
Even if the blower isn't doing much that thing should be difficult to stand in front of if its very hot. With my stove burning very hot, blower on lowest setting, you can't hold your hand in front of the outlet air for more than a couple seconds before it hurts.

That is a sweet stove, let's get it running right.