Hi Gang! Since the frost has seen the pumpkin already in my neck of the woods (South Idaho), I’ve again been thinking about switching from a woodburner in the shop, to something that gives me more control and flexibility and piece-of-mind. So, two things have come to mind and I am seeking feedback….direct-vent gas stoves and pellet stoves. Both can be set up on a thermostat so the shop will be all warm and toasty when I get home from the grind.
Gas is right there at the corner of the shop, a bit of plumbing and I’m essentially equal in terms of time and dollars to install either one. Heating about 600 sq. ft. of somewhat insulated space.
While I wouldn’t burn scraps anymore, the convinience of either alternative really appeals to me. Anyone out there have experience they want to share…or boondoggles that I’m missing? By the way, the brands that look the best so far are Quadra Fire gas, and Whitfield for the pellet stove. As always, your help is appreciated!
Shalom, PJ
Replies
Can't help, but do want to express my envy! I'm fortunate to have a woodburning stove this year, but if I could wave a magic wand and turn it into a pellet stove, I'd do it in a minute! Self-feeding, easy-to-find fuel, efficient, wow.
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
I've installed the Ecotherm brand in a small rental apt and it works very well, no problems for the renter at all and it was a snap to install and no problems for the renter to operate. It doesn't need any electricity as it has no external thermostat (though they have a built-in one), but my tenants seldom take it off the "low" setting. Give some thought to location: this one is at the entrance to the bathroom, so it keeps that room toasty, and then the warm air drifts out the door to the living area, and finds its way eventually up to the cooler loft area. Here the info on that:
http://www.controlledenergy.com/ (click on bottom right logo on that page)
Phone (802) 496-4436 or (802) 642-3199
Fax (802) 496-6294
Their largest model is the MV-130, for which i pay about $500 locally. It hangs on the wall. Efficiency rating is ~ 71 percent. Warranty is one and four on the exchanger.
In my next house, i'm going to use Orbis heaters in all the rooms. Again they don't need electricity, an issue in my rural setting. I've decided to go with Orbis mostly because of styling, better accessiblity to the controls and they have a stronger warranty: one yr. and ten on the exchanger. Efficiency rating is 76 percent; they are slightly more money. They make a larger model than Ecotherm has, which should work fine for heating my main area, with the smallest model in each room. Their details are here:
http://www.orbisheat.com/products.htm
For a bit more in the way of thermostat programming, check out Rinnai and Monitor brands, free-standing whole-house models. The Rinnai runs on LP or NG, has a fan, humidifier, programmable thermostat, runs at 84 percent efficiency, but costs about 3X as much as the others. You need a dedicated 110V outlet. I've never installed one, but several friends have them and love 'em, until the electricity goes out and they lose all their settings. The Monitors run on kerosene and claim effciency percentages in the 90's. Also, kerosene is quite inexpensive compared to gas, but you have to be able to position a tank where it gravity feeds the stove, or pay a couple hundred for a lifter pump. These heaters made a name for themselves in AK, but there are some probs with Monitors lately, so check out this wonderfully fun and informative site:
http://www.alsheating.com/MonitorHeater.htm
You need to give consideration to location of the vents on the outside wall. The different heaters vary a bit in directions for how close openable windows, overhangs and such may be. I call my tenants in case of very heavy snow to remind them to keep the vents clear. I also prefer a little vent in the sidewall instead of a chimney through my living space and sprouting out the roof.
I found the heaters interesting but they don't supply any info on what size of an area the recommended for which unit. Any cost comparisons between pellets and propane that you've seen? A pallet of pellets at the local lowes is about $180 (50 bags) but there is no burnheat info with them either.
Doesn't anyone worry about flames in a woodshop? Are the pellet stoves explosion proof like the gaspropane heaters? A benefit when spraying solvent based materials.
Don
Hi Don, Yep, I've thought the issue of the flame, it's certainly a consideration. The direct-vent stoves that I'm considering are just that...stoves. Basically like a wood stove (visible flame), but with an outside source for combustion air, same as the direct-vent furnaces that Splintie speaks of. The pellet stoves I'm considering are the same way... a heat exchanger set-up with outside air supplied to the combustion chamber.
I'd be willing to bet that no manufacturer would be as bold as to say their products are "explosion proof", but I'm hoping a little common sense will go a long way here. Mine is not a production shop, and the times during the winter that I need to spray I could count on one hand. All these years with a wood stove and no problems... I suppose that I figure I'm lessening my chances of a mishap by going this route.
Here's a link I ran across that you might find interesting, a comparison of various fuel costs per BTU.
The furnaces appear to be a BUNCH cheaper than the stoves I've seen, but I sorta want to see the flame. Probably a minor thing, but I would miss it if it wasn't there :)) I'll probably have this thing for a long time..... that's how I'm justifying the expense.... gotta have some good reason , you know!
PJ
http://www.aladdinhearth.com/Fuel_Cost_Comp.asp
PJ,
Great, I appreciate that link. I put a bid in on a new property yesterday and there are a lot of if's involved with this one, but the shop, a separate building has natural gas, but I didn't have a clue about comparing the different fuels. I had searched, but didn't find this or anything similar. The furnace in the shop needs replacing which is what made this an issue.
I agree that care and common sense come into play when spraying within range of a heat source, but isolated flame furnaces are available for just this reason. They ain't cheap(inexpensive) though. Lowes has a pellet burner for 1000 sq. ft. for a grand, but the fuel costs look like they will keep me with the natural gas. A wood stove for aesthetic reasons would be nice though. ;^)
Don
Great link! Now, if I could just find a supplier who'll sell me a full cord of oak, no less, for $115!! Didn't realize that natural gas and LP were that far apart in cost/efficiency. The LP costs almost half-again as much to produce the same amount of heat. Hmmmmmm.
A cord of Alder in our area I think is around $150 or $175. That would put the cost at about the same as the pellets, but the pellets would be alot easier to deal with.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
they don't supply any info on what size of an area the recommended for which unit.
My local stve guys put out a sheet every year with the current propane, electric, pellet fuel, and NG prices per BTU. They use an example of heating a similar space using various fuels at various efficiencies. The power company has a worksheet they hand out to help people size for heating and A/C based on their house structure. After you figure out your needs form the worksheet, you can multiply the BTU's you need by the cost of the fuel and the efficiency of the stove you're considering, not to mention the purchase price, to get an idea of initial cost of a more efficient stove v. payback time using the fuel you decide upon. This is going to be a function of how well-insulated the area is, the ratio of exterior surface to cubic area to be heated, and how warm you need to be compared to how cold it is outside.
Here's a sample: the studio apartment i mentioned has only r-11 bats in the walls and r-19 in the ceiling; there is unheated storage space on one wall; area is about 2800 cu. feet. I have the largest Ecotherm in there, but it never gets off "low". I believe the bills for gas are about $20 a month in winter. Anyway, the price diff between the largest one and the smallest is only $50 or so, so you might as well get the larger one and forget all this figuring that will certainly cost you more than $50 of time. And at least with the wall-mounts you won't have dust bunnies collecting behind them!
I'm in the market for a nice wood stove at a used price, so i keep checking back at a local seller who takes in trade-ins. They had zero used wood stoves the last time i went by, but several used pellet stoves. My neighbor down the road had some problem with hers last year--i forget what went out, but it was quite expensive to fix and required an authorized service tech to do it. I like the idea of no moving parts...
There is no "explosion-proof". You shouldn't spray flammables indoors around a flame and expect to live long or prosper.
Here's a link to the same chart that you can customize with your local data. You need MS Excel to do it. I'm leaning toward gas, but wonder if the cost advantage will hold up over time vs pellets.
Keep those cards and letters coming!
PJ
http://www.aladdinhearth.com/Fuel_Cost_Comp.xls
Peter, thanks for the table--great tool!
I get a big fill of propane in August when the Cenex folks run a special. Cost this year was 79 cents/gal compared to a high of $1.25 i paid mid-winter one very nasty year in western Montana. I can buy my own tank and pay it back in aprox. 6 years, and have my choice of who will fill the tank, go with whichever co. is cheaper at the time, though in reality, the suppliers don't vary more than a few cents a gallon in price usually. If i had NG available, this would be a no-brainer at about 1/2 the cost of propane.
Hey Peter,
My folks went from a real wood burning fireplace to a pellet stove fireplace (Pellet stove sat in the fireplace and exhasted up the existing chimney). The Pellet stove was MUCH more convenient than the real fireplace. Didn't have to stack wood year around, carry the stuff in the house (along with the critters in them), and starting the fire was much easier although still took tinkering with to get going.
Then I got a direct vent fireplace in my new place. Wow! Loads better than the Pellet stove. All I had to do to start the fire was flip the wall switch. No going to the store to get 50lb bag(s) of Pellets (always seemed to run out when I wasn't looking). And MUCH cleaner! Although the pellet stoves do burn cleaner than wood burners, they do produce ash that has to be cleaned up regularly.
IMO: If you have the option, go with the gas fireplace. The convenience alone is worth the possible extra cost of running it.
--Rob
Hey Peter J, How are ya? I live in N. Ga. in a 85 year old farm house I restored. No insulation. I looked at pellet stoves along with corn stoves. I went with a corn stove. Heats 2000 sq. ft. Works on the same principle as pellets. Much, much more available, cheaper, and alot more efficient than gas! Did I mention more available? Stay away from gas. My folks tried it in their fireplace. Very little heat and expensive. I buy my corn at the farm berua -sp? in 55 gallon drums. Takes 50 years to grow a tree for firewood, 3 months to grow corn. The government pays farmers not to grow it. Good luck with what ever choice you make. Rick W.
Can someone explain what a pellet stove is or how it works? Maybe we just don't have those in Texas because our winters are pretty mild...
As always, thanks!
lp
Larry,
A pellet stove is a stove that burns wood pellets! How's that for an answer. haha
The stove has a hopper that gets loaded with the pellets and get fed into the burner as needed by usually a screw device at the bottom of the hopper. The pellets are similar to rabbit food. Some heat by controling the feed of the the pellets and some have thermostats that control the feed. Everyone I seen requires electricity to operate so they are no good during power outages. Here in the northern midwest, most that have wood burning stoves have them for heat backup along with the aesthetic reasons. That amounts to them not being as popular as their effiecency would otherwise make them.
Don
Thanks Don.
I suppose the next thing you'll tell me is that a wood chisel is for chiseling wood and that a table saw is for sawing tables? Smile.
lp
Going out on a limb here, but along the same idea. Considered a corn stove? They're pretty popular around here. Know of a handful of places that heat their shops with it, and one guy down the road that kiln dries lumber by burning corn. Certainly cheaper fuel than pellets, and efficient. With ag prices the way they are, you ought to be able to heat your shop for next to nothing.
Although we don't own one, I have to give an all thumbs-up for the cornburners. If you are considering pellets, you do have to consider the corn burning alternative.
I saw one in action several years ago.
The only feature I didn't care too much for is a requirement for electricity that operates the drop rate out of the corn hopper.
(This could very easily retrofit to battery backup or solar.)
Handling of ash is not a major chore and is collected in a very tiny bowl that also maintains the flame in the form of a glowing mound of corn charcoal.
If I recall correctly, the charcoal was flipped over in one piece and the exposed bottom layer of ash scraped off, revealing the glowing coal to start another heating cycle. This was done maybe once a day ?
Anyway, this was many years ago (1989?) and I would appreciate updated info on sources for the corn burners (in the U.S.).
Thanks !
Alan
If your looking for web sites or manufacturers, sorry can't help you, but---I saw corn stoves for the first time myself yesterday while at Tractor Supply looking for a chain saw. Not a big variety of choices, but if you're near one of their stores, you shuld be able to see them there along with a variety of pellets stoves. They also carry fuel for both stoves along with use and installation literature.
Don
Thanks, Don -
Turns out we do have a Tractor Supply in our area.
We are adding another stop to our Sunday outing.
The unit I saw in '89 was made by a small company that put a lot into the quality and workmanship, such as the stainless steel crucible and extra thick sheetmetal. This probably led to the company's demise, especially considering their marketing approach - a unit sitting in the corner of a auto shop garage that served as a demonstration unit.
Hopefully the units that are carried in a national chain store is not "stamped out" in a third world country.
I have seen enough of the pellet burners and not very impressed with the overall quality. (I'm sure there are higher end units that need to be sought out.)
Alan
Cornstoves! Now there is one thing I hadn't considered. Where are you guys that these things are popular. People look at me like I'm from Mars when I mention them around here. I did a Google search and found some info on them. Is there a dry corn supply source that is intended specifially for stoves? It appears that high moisture is a concern, and these things produce CLINKERS....kinda like old coal burners, I guess! Danged if the more things change, the more they stay the same! What about a potato stove...big supply of those around here!
PJ
Dried and husked corn kernels that can be bought in bags or bushels in most farm supply or independent farms.
I like this idea much better then the pellets because that is one less thing you have to buy that is "manufactured" for the stove.
The flipping over of the ash lump in the crucible couldn't be any less messy. And the lump is very small, maybe about 4" square (?).
No smoke, no creosote.
And ask the Aztecs and other ancient indians - corn can be stored for a looooooong time and be eaten and palnted if times are hard.
I am not sure about having to go a store to buy bags of wood pellets just so a stove can be fed.
I understand the concept behind this but for that kind of trouble, I would rather chop and burn real wood.
The other alternative, ofcourse, is a non-wood burning stove, one of which would be the corn burner.
Alan
Ahneedhelp....
We have been heating our house with a pellet stove for the last 3 years and we really like it. We buy pellets by the ton delivered on pallets of 50/40# bags per pallet for $110/ton. In the coldest of winters here in Mt. we average 1 bag per 24 hours which works out to $2.20/day! Last winter we got 4 ton delivered and used only 3 by the end of May. We have a Quadrafire brand and it is thermostatically operated. The unit has blowers both for air circulation as well as combustion in the fire pot. the unit burns extremely clean and produces virtually no or very little ash which is collected in a drawer below the fire box. I think I cleaned and dumped the ash twice last season burning those 3 ton of pellets. In a shop enviornment due to dust etc. I would think that you might have to blow out the fan's a couple of times a year to keep them dust free but that's about the only real problem I see in using this type of heater. As far as power outages are concerned, no power also means no power tools to run and unless your in a very outage prone area it's not really a problem. I even have a generator setup that would run the pellet stove, refrigeration and a few lights through a bypass panel and I've yet to have to use it! Seens the longest outage we've ever had has been less than an hour or so.
Hope this helps,
Jon
"Knot's to you"
http://www.wood-workers.com/~jonweis
Well, I'm in Nebraska and they are pretty popular, but then, we got more corn than trees. You can waltz into any co-op (there's one in every town) and get a bushel or whatever. It was something like a buck fifteen a bushel last winter and the kiln guy was only burning about three a week. I wouldn't try using the stuff you get at Winn-Dixie. (that's a hat nod to all you southern folk.) I'd suspect potatoes might be a bit moist.
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