Advice on new EPA wood burning fireplace zero clearance

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Advice on new EPA wood burning fireplace zero clearance. Looking to move to a different city and most of the homes have gas fireplaces. I know it would be expensive, but for this topic I'm trying to figure out good quality products. I currently use a Hampton HI200 wood insert in a mason fireplace with tiled chimney and a liner. It's an excellent product. I'm not asking for insert advice, I need a zero clearance sealed wood burning fireplace that does not require a mason fireplace and tiled chimney. I know Lopi & Regency is good, but I don't see this type of product. Below is what I have found by searching today, but I don't have any experience with these brands. I know Quadra-fire was a good pellet stove but I heard they went downhill a bit. Not looking for pellet stoves, but my brother has owned 3 of the Quadra-fires. Our local dealer sells Lopi, Heat&glo, and Fireplace Xtrordinair. One place online that sells these rates Superior and Osburn lower than Majestic. Would love to have an ash pan, but probably doesn't exist in these products and would reduce heat output. Last, I burn hedge (Osage Orange) which is close to coal on btu.

heatilator constitution wood fireplace
quadra-Fire Pioneer-II EPA Wood Burning Fireplace
quadra-Fire Pioneer-III EPA Wood Burning Fireplaces
Empire St. Clair 4300 EPA Wood Fireplace with Blower, 4.28 cu.ft., Metallic Black
heat & Glo Northstar Wood Burning Fireplace
majestic WMC Royal WarmMajic Wood Burning Fireplace
Napoleon’s High Country™ 3000 Eco
NZ6000 High Country Zero Clearance Wood Burning Fireplace
OSBURN HORIZON EPA WOOD FIREPLACE OB04010
Superior EPA Certified High Efficiency Wood Burning Fireplace WCT6920WS
Superior EPA Phase III Fireplace, Traditional, White Stacked Brick WCT6940WS
Ventis HE350 Wood Burning Fireplace
Valcourt Arched Faceplate Waterloo Wood Burning Fireplace with Chimney
Fireplace Xtrordinair 36 Elite large catalytic wood fireplace
 
Good for you on doing your ZC research ahead of time. Not sure I'd get too excited until you acquire the new residence and have the existing gas setup appraised for potential ZC utilization by a chimney/installation professional.
You may be in for some significant restructuring etc.
Best of luck and keep updating as you proceed. Always interesting for the rest of us:cool:
 
Neither company I had come look at my wood burning fireplace would install an insert in it. Not a brick chimney, so I had a free standing stove installed in another room with a new stainless class a chimney.
 
This helps,

Fireplace Xtrordinair® is a premier brand of Travis Industries, Inc., along with Lopi®, DaVinci Custom Fireplaces™ and Fire Garden™. Travis Industries, Inc. is the largest privately owned hearth manufacturer in North America. Jun 9, 2022

Hearth Technologies owns Quadra-fire, Heat&Glo, Heatilator, Majestic, and several other brands. You can see the resemblance in the models listed above.

SBI Stove Builders International has Osburn, Caddy, Drolet, Valcourt, Century, Englander, Olympia Chimney (Ventis), based in Canada.

Lennox has Innovative Hearth Products which is Superior. US made.

Wolf Stove is Napoleon based in Canada.

Jotul, Avalon, Buck, Blaze King doesn't seem to have them.

Pacific Energy FP30 Arch LE Zero-Clearance Fireplace, made in Canada, owned by NIBE Industrier AB.​

  • Catalytic-Free Technology
This is on the Empire. I would think you would have to be very careful loading. The liner is how they get their zero clearance.

1680526790457.png
 
You will need a flue pipe that's rated for modern wood stove use inside the wooden chase. They're usually double wall stainless with insulation between the walls. It's expensive stuff. I think gas uses a different type of flue which is not sufficient. Ripping out the gas flue to install the new stove rated one may be a lot of work depending on the house.

I have a Flame Monaco ZC EPA fireplace which was an SBI product. SBI has good customer support and makes decent stuff. Osburn is one of their brands.

A downside to ZC is that you need the fan going to really get heat out of it. I get tired of the noise about this time of year.
 
I imagine the cost isn't comparable to what we have now. 23 ft of double tiled gas/wood stone fireplace.

20230403_145518.jpg
 
Here is one house I looked at in Wichita. It's pending now. Not sure how it will pass mechanical inspection without a chase.Screenshot_20230403_155034_realtorcom.jpg20230305_153425.jpg20230305_153412.jpg
 
Looks like the quad, majestic, heatilator, heat&glow are the same thing with different fronts. I'd probably do with the Quad because of the single door out the four. It uses the same technology as my Hampton HI200 other than it has a blanket on top of the baffle. Has anyone had experience with this? How often does it need replaced? These stoves use normal fire bricks, another plus.

1680629705205.png


I haven't received a quote for the Fire X, but it uses this catalytic combustor. Same question, any experience with this? This one also uses fire bricks, but some of the bricks are cut narrow and at angles.


1680629512535.png
 

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Advice on new EPA wood burning fireplace zero clearance. Looking to move to a different city and most of the homes have gas fireplaces. I know it would be expensive, but for this topic I'm trying to figure out good quality products. I currently use a Hampton HI200 wood insert in a mason fireplace with tiled chimney and a liner. It's an excellent product. I'm not asking for insert advice, I need a zero clearance sealed wood burning fireplace that does not require a mason fireplace and tiled chimney. I know Lopi & Regency is good, but I don't see this type of product. Below is what I have found by searching today, but I don't have any experience with these brands. I know Quadra-fire was a good pellet stove but I heard they went downhill a bit. Not looking for pellet stoves, but my brother has owned 3 of the Quadra-fires. Our local dealer sells Lopi, Heat&glo, and Fireplace Xtrordinair. One place online that sells these rates Superior and Osburn lower than Majestic. Would love to have an ash pan, but probably doesn't exist in these products and would reduce heat output. Last, I burn hedge (Osage Orange) which is close to coal on btu.

heatilator constitution wood fireplace
quadra-Fire Pioneer-II EPA Wood Burning Fireplace
quadra-Fire Pioneer-III EPA Wood Burning Fireplaces
Empire St. Clair 4300 EPA Wood Fireplace with Blower, 4.28 cu.ft., Metallic Black
heat & Glo Northstar Wood Burning Fireplace
majestic WMC Royal WarmMajic Wood Burning Fireplace
Napoleon’s High Country™ 3000 Eco
NZ6000 High Country Zero Clearance Wood Burning Fireplace
OSBURN HORIZON EPA WOOD FIREPLACE OB04010
Superior EPA Certified High Efficiency Wood Burning Fireplace WCT6920WS
Superior EPA Phase III Fireplace, Traditional, White Stacked Brick WCT6940WS
Ventis HE350 Wood Burning Fireplace
Valcourt Arched Faceplate Waterloo Wood Burning Fireplace with Chimney
Fireplace Xtrordinair 36 Elite large catalytic wood fireplace
I have the Empire St Claire 3000 ZC, bought last July

Great stove, heats 2400 sq ft easily; probably can heat 3,000 sq feet too.

Longest burn time so far was 10 hours.

Quality build & radiates a huge amount of heat. I rarely use the blowers.
Includes two knock-outs if you want to pipe the heat using an in-line fan.

I looked at some of the ZCs you have listed. Also checked out a few sites dedicated to wood burning that had reviews.

In the end it came down to what the dealer had in inventory and his reputation as installer/standing behind the product.
 
Do you have to be careful loading to not break the porcelain refractory?
I'm always careful. I never throw wood in the box. I've seen a few YT vids where the guy heaves the wood in:dizzy:

The Empire refractory is made from a ceramic mix I believe. It's more chip resistant than the refractory in my old ZC unit,
a BIS Ultima.
 
We have the Magnum ZC. It got installed when we built in '08. So far, so good.

http://magnumheat.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/magnumzcbrochure.pdf
That pamphlet is dated 2004

EPA regs started in 1988, revamped in 1998, then 2015 & the latest in 2020.

Many stoves could not make the required emissions cut for 2020 and are no longer sold.

The latest EPA list can be found at https://www.epa.gov/burnwise/choosing-right-wood-burning-stove

Scroll down to EPA Database
 
I use to work for quadra-fire in Colville Washington! I hung all the pieces of the pellet stoves on an assembly line chain running the parts through a furnace that baked the porcelain on to the parts! Wow! What a hot job that was in the summer standing beside that furnace!
 
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