Buy A Better Stove

[Whitespider]

Well first off EXCALIBER, home heating LP is not $4.oo per gallon and never has been. Right now I believe the national average is about $2.75 (up a bit over last year) and the price is dropping; in this area it’s around $2.50 per gallon. Second, if you go back and read my post, I explained that to be realistic the furnace would not run 100-precent of the time, more like 65-percent of the time during those 40-hours. So if we take your number of 171-gallons a week, 65-percent of that would be 111-gallons, at $2.75 that comes out at $305.oo a week (less than half your number). And that would only be during the coldest week of the year, most other weeks would use quite a bit less.

And by-the-way, it isn’t out of the realistic to burn over 100-gallons of LP a week, heating 2000 square feet during the coldest month of the year. Two years ago I heated 100-percent with LP, and my home is relatively small; a single story farm house at 1350 square feet… I used 400-gallons in less than 5-weeks during the cold spell that year (and it wasn’t as cold as this last year was). Thankfully I was only paying $1.73 per gallon at that time, but it still cost me near $700.oo to heat that month. It was the price increase last year ($2.25 last fall) that prompted me to start heating the home with wood again. We heated 99.9-percent with wood last year, but we still need the LP for the water heater… We’ve only used a tick over 300-gallons since last Halloween.

Here's a link to a calculation guide to what size furnace (in BTU's) you should install based on home size and area... I live in zone 5 (the blue zone) and at 2000 square feet it recommends a furnace of 100,000-110,000 BTU's.

eBay Guides - How many Btu s do I need to heat my home

 

[Highbeam]

There is a difference between needing a 100k btu furnace and needing a constant supply of 100k btu. To properly identify your btu loss, and therefor the needed btu to hold a set temp then you would need to do a Manual J calculation which would use things like SF, insulation, and windows to actually estimate heat loss in your home.

Most homes are way less, like 30btu per foot.

The point of this thread is not about your home's needed btus. It is about a stove that can burn 40 hours straight at any btu output. Nobody else can do it but BK. People don't buy BK because, for one thing, they are ugly.

 

[Chris-PA]

Like I said it will heat your home on low and burn 40 hours. It may not keep it 75 degrees but will keep it warm enough to not damage anything then you get home

This is nonsense - how can you presume how much heat it takes to keep other people's houses warm? Other people have given reasonable information about how these things work, but you are so wedded to making your point that you're not listening. My house is 175 years old, of log and stone construction, built out of two separate structures joined together in the 1950s. There's precious little insulation in any of it. I just spent two days replacing a rotted window frame in the gable end wall over the log wall - no insulation. Very little in the half-attic walls. On a cold day it may be 90 by the stove, low 60's on the main floor, and low 50's in our bedroom. That's with the stove cranking. What do you think 10000 to 20000 btu's is going to do? That amount of heat on a cold winter day is fairly close to none for me, and mine can put out nothing indefinitely. So a cat stove capable of burning on low for 40hrs might impress you, but it's not much use to me.

For reference, 10000btu/hr is equivalent to 2 1500W space heaters.

 

[EXCALIBER]

Clearly we are discussing an average home not one with no insulation or someone who leaves all the doors and indows Windows wide open. There is no stove that will achieve efficiency under those conditions.

 

[Whitespider]

Most homes are way less, like 30btu per foot.

NOT WHERE I LIVE!
30 BTU's per square foot would be like a 40,000 BTU furnace in my home... The furnace would never shut down during January and February and I'd still have ice in the toilet. Do you have any idea how much heat gets sucked away when the wind is blowing 30-40 MPH when the temperature is 20 below zero?

When I first moved in this place (like I said, 1350 square feet) I had the old oil furnace replaced with a LP unit. I wanted an 80,000 BTU furnace but the plumbing and heating guy argued with me, claiming I only needed a 60,000 BTU unit. I finally agreed... on the promise he would exchange it if I wasn't happy. That was in November... he was back out here on January 9th (I remember because that's my birthday) putting in an 80,000 BTU furnace because we couldn't get the house temperature over 57-degrees that week. 30 BTU's per square foot my achin' ass.

 

[Chris-PA]

Clearly we are discussing an average home not one with no insulation or someone who leaves all the doors and indows Windows wide open. There is no stove that will achieve efficiency under those conditions.

You'd be surprised. Anything built before the 1950s probably had little insulation. Around here there is plenty of stone and brick construction - plenty of thermal mass but small R value. Frame construction from the 1950's and before is probably an empty wall cavity. If they put any insulation in there it was not much and a lot of it is probably gone (mice).

Nor do I leave the doors and windows open, it's quite well sealed, but that was a nice way to ignore my point. Can you keep your house from freezing with two standard space heaters?

Wood heat will never be suitable for those who want to treat it as a turn-up the thermostat instant-on system. Having a stove that can idle for 40hrs does not go near far enough in that direction. If you have a very well insulated home it would help - you could be gone for a while and not have it freeze - but if the output is not enough then it is useless. For the most part, if you heat with wood you have to be there - and if your there, then again it is of little value.

I can state with certainty that having a stove which can idle at low output for 40hrs would be of no benefit to me.

 

[Constrictor]

what does this long slow burn do to the pipe in the way of creating creasote?

 

[daleeper]

what does this long slow burn do to the pipe in the way of creating creasote?

With a cat burning at proper temperature and dry wood, the majority of the gasses are burned up as it passes through the cat, creating very little creosote in the chimney. BK stoves when burned properly have very little emissions, and very little heat going up the chimney on a slow burn.

 

[CrappieKeith]

With a cat burning at proper temperature and dry wood, the majority of the gasses are burned up as it passes through the cat, creating very little creosote in the chimney. BK stoves when burned properly have very little emissions, and very little heat going up the chimney on a slow burn.

I keep seeing the comment..if it is a clean burner then there's no creoste.

1st off flues gases condense when they cool...gas or oil does it..wood will too. Flue gases correlate to draft speeds.
To slow down a burn so much that you can get 40 hrs. from a few lbs.of wood. Physics says you'll have condesation if you extrapolate the numbers to their final conclusion.

 

[Coldfront]

This BK salesman is living in a fantasy world. Like was said what good does a 40 hr burn do? It sure as hell wouldn't keep my house warm through the majority of winter. Maybe in his test tube house in early fall or late spring. A 40 hour burn has no appeal to me. If you don't want to load wood once or twice a day don't burn wood would be the best advise. I like to keep my house about 75° even in the coldest part of winter that's why I burn wood.

 

[daleeper]

I keep seeing the comment..if it is a clean burner then there's no creoste.

1st off flues gases condense when they cool...gas or oil does it..wood will too. Flue gases correlate to draft speeds.
To slow down a burn so much that you can get 40 hrs. from a few lbs.of wood. Physics says you'll have condesation if you extrapolate the numbers to their final conclusion.

Crappie, what's your point here?

BK stoves are clean burners, yet I don't believe there is any stove that is 100% no emissions. Nor do they defy physics, however they seem to have designed a stove that is fine tuned to walk that tight rope of a clean, low burn that if run properly will not create a creosote problem. I am not going to claim that they create no creosote at all, because they will, just as any stove will, especially if not burned properly. There are some chimneys that will not draw good enough for the low burn the BK stoves are capable of.

The King model will hold 90 lbs of white oak according to their literature. I don't have a King, but I have an older model Royal Heir, and they are right on target for what it will hold. 90 lbs of wood is more than just a few lbs. of wood. OP talked about burning less than the best wood, that firebox is large at 4.3 cu. ft., so it will hold quite a bit of wood.

 

[EXCALIBER]

I keep seeing the comment..if it is a clean burner then there's no creoste.

1st off flues gases condense when they cool...gas or oil does it..wood will too. Flue gases correlate to draft speeds.
To slow down a burn so much that you can get 40 hrs. from a few lbs.of wood. Physics says you'll have condensation if you extrapolate the numbers to their final conclusion.

If I am reading this right you are saying all flue gases condense. So the only way to keep them from condensing and creating creosote is to keep flue temps way high like 300-400 degrees, thus keeping a brisk draft going up the chimney right?

So here is my question how do all the new furnaces get away with using PVC pipe to duct what little heat there is out of the furnace without creating massive creosote as you claim? Clearly 300-400 degree temps on PVC will be disastrous.

The same way Blaze King does by being very efficient and having hardly anything go up the flue as waste. Blaze King thus recommends using all double wall insulated or triple wall piping on their stoves to insulate the little amount of heat that is allowed to go up the flue, thus keeping a good draft.

 

[EXCALIBER]

This BK salesman is living in a fantasy world. Like was said what good does a 40 hr burn do? It sure as hell wouldn't keep my house warm through the majority of winter. Maybe in his test tube house in early fall or late spring. A 40 hour burn has no appeal to me. If you don't want to load wood once or twice a day don't burn wood would be the best advise. I like to keep my house about 75° even in the coldest part of winter that's why I burn wood.

Your are clearly still missing the band wagon coldfront. Clearly you cannot get away with forty hour burn time as your house is not up to specs. The average house has insulation. Still a Blaze King would allow you to burn way less wood in the winter while heating your home due to way higher efficiency. It would not matter if you were running it on high or med it will still make more use of the btu's the wood is putting out, instead of letting it go up the flue. More efficient is just that more efficient less raw materials used.

So I would have to ask on the cold days you say you have, how do you heat your home. If it takes 100000 or 80000 btu's to heat it? You must take the day off work to continually feed the fire as that is the only way to produce 80,000 btu's for 8 or 9 hours. Look most stoves at very best, with little pieces of wood, will struggle to produce 100,000 btu's. That is according to the manufacturer. Now the problem is the manufacturer can claim anything he wants for btu's as it is not regulated unless it has been to EPA testing and had its btu's certified. It may only produce 30000 real btu's who knows. Kind of like buying a car without the EPA fuel mileage sticker, they could claim it gets 80 mpg in this one ton truck, but once you buy it its too late. On a stove what proof do you have it doesn't produce what they claim?

 

[Highbeam]

Okay, lets go down that road. I personally think anyone needing 100,000 btus per hour every hour is mistaken or in need of a wood furnace but anyway....

So you think you need more btus then a BK on low burn for part of the year. Fine, turn it up. The BK is a huge stove and will kick out at least as much heat as whatever other stove you're burning. Repeat after me, 4.3 cubic foot firebox, this thing is a hoss. I will bet that your current stove is not only less efficient but also holds way less wood so in no case will your current stove perform as well as a BK during high, medium, or low burns. You want 100,000 btus you can get that and with less frequent reloads.

So maybe you work for a living and leave the home for 9-12 hours per day. Your current stove can be damped down and maybe make it all 12 hours without losing too much house temp, you probably think that is good. Now imagine that you could have gone to work and left the BK with a full load and come home to a warmer house and/or still be able to wait until bedtime to reload it.

Embrace the longer burns that a huge firebox with a thermostat can provide. Did you notice that there was a thermostat? That is also a very unique feature of the BK. The stat allows you to load this stove to the gills, set the stat to give you your desired heat output, and then walk away for as long as the wood will last.

I don't think anybody ever said that this stove only has a low burn setting. It will bake you out if you want it to.

 

[EXCALIBER]

As far as being ugly I would say they are not the most ornate stoves ever built, but I don't find mine to be ugly. Here are some quick pics of it, and not even cleaned it from burning the last couple of days.

 

[Coldfront]

View attachment 202260

I have a Pacific Energy Spectrom we do go to work 5 days a week and are gone 10 hours during the day. I fill the stove before we leave in the morning and damper it down, there are still coals when I get home and I fill it again and let it rip for a while. The house is usually down to about 60° when I get home, I'm talking mid winter. I'm sure my stove does not hold nearly the amount the King does, but am I really using that much more wood? My stove does not hold much but I can have my house back up in the 70's within a hour. If I win the lottery I might consider spending $2,000+ on a king but I think I would go to a wood furnace for that much money. The stove came with the house when we bought it last year and does the job. I'm not doubting the BK is a good stove but just because it holds 3 times as much wood as mine doesn't automatically mean it burns that much less wood.
btw my Pacific Energy Spectrom looks very similar to your stove in the pictures. I linked a picture of it at the top.

 

[CrappieKeith]

If I am reading this right you are saying all flue gases condense. So the only way to keep them from condensing and creating creosote is to keep flue temps way high like 300-400 degrees, thus keeping a brisk draft going up the chimney right?

So here is my question how do all the new furnaces get away with using PVC pipe to duct what little heat there is out of the furnace without creating massive creosote as you claim? Clearly 300-400 degree temps on PVC will be disastrous.

1st off plastic pipe is only used to vent condensate furnaces. Those 90% ers have hoses to drain the water to the floor drain.Since they do not have a draft there is also a small blower added to blow out the flue gases that need venting.
It looks like you are mixing up types of furnaces.
Anything that burns wood requires an all fuel flue, which is either clay lined masonry or high temp metal...2100 degree rated.


Hey if anybody is interested I've got some gorgeous swampland for sale in Aitkin Mn.

 

[Highbeam]

Really, who cares about efficiency ratings or pollutant emission ratings on a stove? They are all EPA certified and clean burning. The spread in emissions and efficiency doesn't add up to an armload of splits.

What is important is firebox size (closely related to max output) and technology (cat or non-cat) since the tech can have such a huge impact on burn times. Cost and looks are next in line since they drive many decisions.

 

[Whitespider]

Ooooh yeah, I've been to Aitkin, MN... and they do have some gorgeous swampland there.
Somebody should snap that up while Keith is willing to sell!

 

[wndwlkr]

You can build a better stove than you can buy. 40 hr burn time wow thats great. I like my 3 hr burn and heat for 48-72 hours. gotta burn it hot and save all those btus for later. built in my shop for my shop. One drawback, It's rather huge, 2000 lbs empty ,and 12 ft. long not for the average living room, unless you go for the wow factor. I've built alot of stoves over the years, this is by far the ultimate. cool looking to IMHO! should have built it 40 yrs ago. no smoke either when you burn at 2000* or above.


Thats it for now , Burn Smart!