Wood insert heat feel, fan noise, wood sound, lopi declaration, don't use fire nuggets?

[bspooky]

Hey all, great site and lots of helpful info but I can't seem to find answers to some of our questions. And our local stores do not have demo units. Leaning towards a Lopi Declaration but I am thinking many similarly sized wood inserts or even stoves would be similar. After moving to a different house we have a fireplace now that requires the doors to be shut when burning but it doesn't provide much heat, so looking to improve on it (though we don't like losing so much height to the viewing area :-(. )

1) Will there be much/any radiant heat or otherwise without the fan going? With the fans turned off how would it compare to an open hearth fireplace (similar, a little less, much less?). I know open hearth fireplaces overall suck the heat out of your house, but they do warm up the room you are in. The fan noise won't be liked by some in the family so I am trying to determine if, when we run it fanless, will it do very well (or not at all) heating a 1,000 square foot greatroom. Or at least the two chairs that are 6 feet from the fireplace. we mainly want to heat this room so it is a toasty place in the house. The insert won't be used to heat the entire 2200 square foot home though if it does help supplement that would be great.

2) The marketing literature for the Lopi indicates the sight, sound, and smell of a wood fireplace. Is that just while you are loading wood into the stove insert or can you really hear any crackle with the doors closed? Our current fireplace you only get an occasional pop through the glass. We both miss the crackle and sometimes roar that you get in an open hearth fireplace.

3) just how noisy are these fans? Tabletop fan on medium? Stove vent fan? Bathroom vent fan? Computer fan?

4) I could have sworn I read in one of the insert manuals off the web that you shouldn't use the sawdust/wax firestarters...why would that be? We use these little nuggets (round on one side, flat on another, about 2 inches by 2 inches) to start fires and they work great. About 25 cents each. I have seen instructions for making your own, but at that price we don't. I think the manual I read that in was the Jotul 550 Rockland, one that won't quite fit anyway.

Thanks for any insight

 

[begreen]

Welcome. The Declaration is a flush insert and a very nice heater. It will definitely radiate heat, but works best with a fan. If you want an insert that heat reasonably well without the fan running, look at models that project further out on the hearth. The advantage is that in a power outage one will still have a good source of heat. In the Lopi line the Revere or Freedom would work better convectively. The Pacific Energy inserts are designed to convect well even when the fan is off.

Small wax firestarters are ok. Many of us use SuperCedars and they work great. Wax firelogs like DuraFlame are not ok for burning in an insert.

 

[Troutchaser]

We have a Lopi fan on the Leyden. On low there is hardly any noise at all. It's in the living room and we don't think twice about it. On high it might sound like a bathroom fan.
I don't want a fire smell. I hear an occasional crackle. I see the flames, feel the heat, and that's enough for me.

Curious BGreen. Why no Duraflame for a firestarter? I've been using them chunked up.

 

[begreen]

Breaking off small chunks to start the fire is very different from burning full logs of this stuff. Using full, wax-impregnated (or other substance) logs like Duraflame for the main fire is prohibited by most insert makers.

 

[4fire]

Curious BGreen. Why no Duraflame for a firestarter? I've been using them chunked up.

I'm curious about that too. When I used to work retail we had a customer or two who would buy them by the pallet load when they were on sale and burn them in their wood stoves.

 

[4fire]

This thread answers some of my fan questions too, as I have a blower for my insert on order. I should have it in the next couple of days. They sure ain't cheap!

 

[maverick06]

I have one.

1) You get very little radiant heat with the blower off. you get some, but not much, hardly any. for practical purposes, you need the blower running. This has been discussed many times. If you have an insert, you get very little heat unless you have the blower running. Free standing stoves seem to do better without a blower... again this depends on many things.
2) You get little noise of the fire, only an occasional pop or bang, very little. You get no smell from it unless you screw up when you open the doors, nor should you...
3) The fan noise - low its hardly noticable, on high its like the stove vent fan. I have mine on high all the time, but i am in the room next to the stove. pretty much, the higher the fan speed the more heat you get. I heat my house with the stove, its 1800ft^2 and not very well insulated. it can keep up, but in cold cold weather you really have to run it hard, but thats fine. Again, the blower is on high almost all the time. I used to always be in the room with the fireplace, I would usually run it about 2/3 power.
4) firestartes, as stated above, i use small portions (1-2 in^3 at a time). Works well.

if you get one you might have issues with the snap disk taking a while for blower to come on... there are a few fixes to this replace or bypass the snap disk, no big deal. I have a hard time keeping the glass perfectly clean on mine, but dont much care about that. Creosote levels are very low. I clean the stack once a year after burning about 2.5 cords of wood and have little buildup. its a very good stove.

 

[Troutchaser]

Breaking off small chunks to start the fire is very different from burning full logs of this stuff. Using full, wax-impregnated (or other substance) logs like Duraflame for the main fire is prohibited by most insert makers.

Thanks, BGreen.

Oh, and my snapdisc (just ordered a new one) didn't work at all last year, meaning I only got a year out of it. I hope that's not normal at $25 each. I just turned on and off manually.
My controller box on the fan has a dial that I can control fan speed with. So it's not just high or low. I can get medium low or medium or whatever. Not sure about others.

 

[bspooky]

Thank you all for the replies. It sounds like there may not be more radiant heat than our current with the doors shut unless we run the fan. Comforting to know the low speed fan is quiet-ish. Now to figure out if that is quiet enough. ;-) Any anecdotes on how well the low setting heats?

BeGreen, one that sticks out more would be my choice as well but the powers that be in the family want it more flush.

On the power outage part, my current firebox has an outlet under the firebox that would still be there. They were planning on running the fan to that box and hard wiring it but when I asked they said they could use a typical three prong end and plug it in. My thinking was that I could use a marine battery with an inverter to power the fan during an outage. Hopefully that is not a silly thought.

Good to know the snapdisk can be more readily adjusted if the fan doesn't seem to kick on as soon as we would want (if we use the fan, lol).

Sounds like for us it may boil down to how loud the low setting is and how much heat the low setting puts out.

 

[Troutchaser]

If you're in the room with a hot stove, a low setting should work fine for you. It is not loud. Hardly audible at all.
My snapdisk tripped the fan on at around 200*. That's much lower than others are indicating.

 

[pdxdave]

Thank you all for the replies. It sounds like there may not be more radiant heat than our current with the doors shut unless we run the fan. Comforting to know the low speed fan is quiet-ish. Now to figure out if that is quiet enough. ;-) Any anecdotes on how well the low setting heats?

BeGreen, one that sticks out more would be my choice as well but the powers that be in the family want it more flush.

On the power outage part, my current firebox has an outlet under the firebox that would still be there. They were planning on running the fan to that box and hard wiring it but when I asked they said they could use a typical three prong end and plug it in. My thinking was that I could use a marine battery with an inverter to power the fan during an outage. Hopefully that is not a silly thought.

Good to know the snapdisk can be more readily adjusted if the fan doesn't seem to kick on as soon as we would want (if we use the fan, lol).

Sounds like for us it may boil down to how loud the low setting is and how much heat the low setting puts out.

I have a Declaration. Without the fan it is useless as a heating appliance. However, with the fan running close to high I can keep the furthest room in my 1900 sq ft house at 70 F during 32 F weather. Typically once the house is warm, or for an overnight burn, I'll drop the fan speed to around 40-50%, and it will more or less maintain a comfortable temperature, and you won't hear the fan outside of the room it is in. As far as keeping the room you are in warm, you should be able to do it pretty easily on a low speed with a 'comforting' volume from the fan.

If you are stuck with a flush insert, I can't really say too much bad about it. Given the choice (I didn't have the choice either), I'd go a with a free standing unit so I wouldn't rely on the fan during a power outage and get more heat out of it. I'm sure that the battery would be OK, but more importantly is that you have a quality inverter that won't put out potentially harmful voltage to the fan motor, could be expensive to replace them.

 

[maverick06]

Given the choice (I didn't have the choice either), I'd go a with a free standing unit so I wouldn't rely on the fan

I have used the inverter option before. The inverter stopped with a low battery voltage after 30-45 min.... but the car did crank right over... Regardless it was a good excuse to get a generator. Now I can run that, the sump pump fridge, chest freezer, whatever else gets tossed at it.

 

[Stax]

Declaration here.

1) Will there be much/any radiant heat or otherwise without the fan going? Very little. With the fans turned off how would it compare to an open hearth fireplace (similar, a little less, much less?). Definitely better, but certainly not worth the cost of what the Declaration sells for. With the fans off, you'll fall way short of heating a 1,000 sq. ft. great room.

2) The marketing literature for the Lopi indicates the sight, sound, and smell of a wood fireplace. Is that just while you are loading wood into the stove insert or can you really hear any crackle with the doors closed? Sight, yes. Sound...not really. And the smell, sure when you're reloading.

3) just how noisy are these fans? Pretty noisy the more you turn it up. I personally think the fan is especially noisy on high.

4) I could have sworn I read in one of the insert manuals off the web that you shouldn't use the sawdust/wax firestarters...why would that be? Don't know.

The Declaration is a very nice unit and would perform very well in situation if you and your folks don't mind the sound of the fan.

 

[flyingpig]

Another Declaration owner here. I'm happy with it so far.

As other said, it won't be much useful w/o fan. But with fan on, it has enough power to heat my whole 2000 sq.ft. home in mild winter here. I can watch TV in the same room with fan around 50%, and I leave it high when I'm not in that room.

For a sake of comparison, it's pretty much the same level of a small box fan. On high, you can hear it clearly, but on mid to low, you stop noticing it after a while.

If you follow the instruction to open the bypass before reloading, you shouldn't have any smell in your room.

Cheers.....Som

 

[smokingolf]

During a recent, almost 9 days at my home, I put up sheets going into my dinning room and hallway to the rest of the house and closed the upstairs bedroom doors and my stove kept the living room and upstairs bathroom about 73 deg just from radiant heat. I now plan on getting a generator to keep a few things running as well as the stove. With the blower on the stove, I have it close to high speed, this keeps the whole down stairs warm, I still have to keep the bedrooms upstairs closed otherwise it gets too hot to sleep. With the fan on high you get used to the noise and don't here it after a while we have no problem watching TV with the fan on high.

And as long as I have a fire going in the stove the furnace does not run at all so this is has reduced our oil bill tremendously, the stove has all-ready paid for itself after 5 seasons and we don't have anyone home to burn 24/7.

Brian