Catalytic stoves v Secondary Air

[neiln]

Blimey, £250 on wood saved £400 on gas, wow.  Oh hang on... Heating bill, not gas... Your not on mains gas..  adds up now.  I reckon a cube of wood saves me about £65-75 of mains gas.

 

I spend time on arboristsite more than here which is why I know a bit about the American stoves and practices.  In fact I believe rarefish from there has just signed up here to ask about an Elwell axe.  I'll point him here for some first hand input rather than what I've (mis) understood.

[Witterings]

8 minutes ago, neiln said:

Blimey, £250 on wood saved £400 on gas, wow.  Oh hang on... Heating bill, not gas... Your not on mains gas..  adds up now.  I reckon a cube of wood saves me about £65-75 of mains gas.

 

I spend time on arboristsite more than here which is why I know a bit about the American stoves and practices.  In fact I believe rarefish from there has just signed up here to ask about an Elwell axe.  I'll point him here for some first hand input rather than what I've (mis) understood.

 

We are on mains but one of the big areas of the house is single storey, flat roof that's years old (although have just had it re-felted) and all outside wall and none of it well insulated so our gas bill for the worst 1/4 is around £850 which hurts.

 

We now switch the heating off altogether when the burner's going and when the main room gets hot enough open the doors to let the heat circulate around the rest of the bungalow.

 

This is also why I was interested in the larger stoves like the Blaze Kings and their efficiency, I also looked at the ones that run a heating system / hot water off them but you really need a much bigger 16kw stove and they eat wood in comparison so it'd take an awful long time to recoup the extra initial cost ... if you ever did.

[rarefish383]

I told a good friend that lives in London I joined up here. Turns out he is a member also. He asked if I would give my perspective on Cat v Secondary stoves, from a State Side view.

 

First my experience is a bit of Apples to Oranges. I come from a fourth generation Tree Removal Company. All of my wood was free from my Dad, or from farmer friends, that had dead standing Oak trees that needed removal to keep from taking out cattle fences when they fall. So I have no comparison of costs. Well, that's not exactly true. Our electric bill was 1/3 of my neighbors.  But, I don't know how they managed their homes.  When we built our house in 1987 the first thing I did was go look at stoves.

 

 First stove: our first stove was a Russo insert. It was a cat stove. It sat half in the chimney opening and half out on the hearth, with a decorative seal around the opening. It was a large stove, probably a very large stove buy your standards. I burn almost exclusively Oak, Cherry, Locust. The stove would take wood 22" long, but I split mine 18", to keep the window clean. I could pack the stove almost solid front to back. Side to side was harder, and as it burned, the pile would collapse against the door. With it packed tight I could get good 12 hour burns out of it. With the Cat engaged you could not see any flames, just a faint red glow. With roughly half of the stove sitting on the hearth, out in the room, there was a large piece of steel that got hot, and radiated heat. In our 1400SF house we had to keep the windows cracked in the living room and kitchen and the doors closed to the 3 bedrooms, down to freezing or a little lower. With the flat surface of the part of the stove that was in the room, if power went out we could cook on it just like a range. We had that stove just about 30 years, and I replaced the Cat twice, three Cats including the one in the new stove. Real bad winters I'd go through 5 cord of wood, mild winters 3-31/2.

 

Second stove: A few years ago my wife decided she wanted a "Pretty Stove" that didn't take up space on the hearth. So we spent about $5000 on installing a Jotul insert.  It is a "Pretty Stove". Here's where the apples to oranges come in. The Jotul's fire box sits entirely inside of the opening for the chimney, so there is no steel in the room to radiate heat. It has a very attractive surround that seals the opening. The firebox is also different. The old stove had about 14" on the hearth, and 12" inside, so it had a deep firebox. Since all of the Yotul is inside the chimney area, it is only about 13" deep. It is 25" wide. I still cut my wood at 18', because I have customers that take 18" wood, and I'm not cutting different lengths. So, the Yotul will not hold the volume of wood the Russo would. Since I have to stack it side to side, I can't pack it tight, or it will fall against the door as it burns down. I can only get a 3 1/2 to 5 hour burn, stacked as tight as I can get it. That's about what the sales man told me to expect. I have found that if I leave the blower on 24/7 it keeps the house comfortable. The 12 hour burn was the big issue when we first got the new stove. Now I'm retired, so filling it more often is not a big issue.

 

 So my perspective is more of doing the research of what you want, and matching it to your home, than if one is better than the other. I live about 30 miles from both Washington DC and Baltimore MD.  I'm still in farming country. In the winter I smell smoke from most of my neighbors. In the spring, summer, and fall, I smell cow poop. We are still allowed to have out side brush and leaf fires, except a few months in the summer.  I think if I could find a new Russo, that's the stove I'd like. It took a while, but my wife finally said it takes more work, in and out, and a bit less heat, from her new Pretty stove.  The Jotul salesman was honest and told us we would not get the same performance, they were two totally different stoves, Joe.

[neiln]

Thanks Joe,

I'll translate a few terms to British English

1400sf=square feet. large-ish but not huge....my rough calc gives ~1250sf for my largish for london 3 bed semi.

 

a cord of wood is 128 cubic feet or 3.5 m3

 

joe mentions power outages / black outs.  rural us, ice storms, wind storms etc its not uncommon for power to be out for a day or 2, or for rolling blackouts if demand exceeds supply in cold periods....People died in Dallas this winter when they had a bad cold storm and rolling black outs.  so wood heat is there as an important back up.  read norwegian wood, its law in norway to have a wood stove for the same reason

 

oh and if you've seen the axe thread here, Joe is the very kind gent that sent me the True Temper Jersey

[rarefish383]

Thanks Neil, thought that was you. You know you are one up on me with those two Kent's? I don't like being one upped by a junior guy, Joe.

[neiln]

No rush, I know you've got your eye out for something.