Corn & Wood Pellet Stoves?

[max2cam]

I've been burning wood for some 30 years now and wouldn't have it any other way. But a friend of mine was told by a local contractor NOT to install a woodstove in her mobile home due to safety concerns but rather buy a corn & wood pellet stove. He said that the heat was also more constant and better than heat from a woodstove.

Now that all sounds somewhat bogus to me. Can't a woodstove be safely installed in a mobile home? Is corn or wood pellets a better fuel than firewood?

This is heavily forested country and she can have a load of split dry wood delivered. But where is she going to get the corn or wood pellets? The guy who talked to her made it sound like these wood pellets were magic or something. How can they have any more heating value than wood itself?

Anyone with experience about corn/wood pellet stoves vs. regular woodstoves? Comments welcome...

 

[wobdee]

There are wood stoves out there that are listed for mobile home installs.

I looked into pellet and corn stoves and they were all way more expensive than wood stoves. Also the cost of pellets/corn run around $200 per ton, and you can figure going through 3 or 4 if you use it as a primary heat source. Then you have to figure if the power goes out your screwed unless you have some kind of battery back up.

The only advantages I see is less mess, less labor, and a more even heat.

 

[ktm rider]

There are wood stoves out there that are listed for mobile home installs.

I looked into pellet and corn stoves and they were all way more expensive than wood stoves. Also the cost of pellets/corn run around $200 per ton, and you can figure going through 3 or 4 if you use it as a primary heat source. Then you have to figure if the power goes out your screwed unless you have some kind of battery back up.

The only advantages I see is less mess, less labor, and a more even heat.

This is exactly why i got rid of my pellet stove. You are at the mercy of the pellet manufacturers. When I got mine pellets were $1.75 a bag. Now I think they are in the $3.00 range. And NO, a pellet stove DOES NOT put out the heat like a good ol' wood stove does. It just doesn't seem to have the radiant heat for some reason.

 

[logbutcher]

Say No to Corn ...and Pellet

Ditto to the last posts. We've got more sustainable, renewable, harvest able, and other ables of wood growing in plenty all over North America.

Corn is for feed and food, not fuel. Repeat. :chainsawguy: Not much excess corn grown in the Northeast anyhow. It is diffuse for Btu's unlike wood, hard to store ( you can't stack corn , and the rodents love it. Besides how can you drool over your corn bin like a real wood pile . .
Pellets are manufactured with a high fuel (sic) cost, with a variability in pricing and availability. Also : no stack compulsion as with the wood pile sysndrome. Pellets are clean burning, easy to handle without debris.
Now the stoves: remember they are a continuous running machine needing power, producing noise. Power out, no heat. Those cranking cylinders in corn and pellet stoves do break down, then no heat.
Yes, I am powerful opinionated. But those corn and plellet manufacturers are good marketers.

 

[046]

thanks for verifying exactly what I thought of corn/pellet stoves.

you're exchanging electric/gas companies bills for pellet supplier bills. you have no control over pricing. VS wood stoves allows you to trade your labor for fuel bills.

wood may be free, but labor and machinery required to harvest is not. still that a much better situation than no control of your fuel bills.

 

[Locoweed]

Maybe the contractor sells pellet stoves?

Availability of pellets has been a issue in parts of the country.

 

[hogjaws]

Pellet Cost

I read somewhere last year that 10 yrs ago pellets were cheap because they were all made from scrap material from sawmills and such.
Well after years of selling these things there are so many of them (stoves)
now that the manufacturers are having to grind up whole trees to
produce enough pellets to meet demand. Here in central md they used to be
less than 100.00/ton last winter they were hard to find at 225.00/ton.
My sister has one for secondary heat source and goes through 4 ton a yr
and as noted if the elec is out=no backup heat source.
I have a cast iron fireplace insert for primary heat, love it, and have not paid for a stick of wood ever. Labor to cut and split is a joy to me, and keeps me in shape.
Can not go wrong with the new efficient wood stoves.
Wood warms you up several times.
When you cut it.
When you split it.
When you stack it.
When you bring it in to put in the stove.
What more could you ask for.

 

[logbutcher]

Ditto

Well after years of selling these things there are so many of them (stoves)
now that the manufacturers are having to grind up whole trees to
produce enough pellets to meet demand. Here in central md they used to be
less than 100.00/ton last winter they were hard to find at 225.00/ton.
I have a cast iron fireplace insert for primary heat, love it, and have not paid for a stick of wood ever. Labor to cut and split is a joy to me, and keeps me in shape.
Can not go wrong with the new efficient wood stoves.
Wood warms you up several times.
When you cut it.
When you split it.
When you stack it.
When you bring it in to put in the stove.
What more could you ask for.

The skinny on firewood A Convenient Truth warming :
1. Fell tree
2. Limb fallen tree
2A: Burn or remove unusable smaller branches
3. Buck or skid
4. Hump buck/butts (or whole tree bucks) to pile
5. Split butts
6. Carry splits to future PILE
7. Stack splits so that you can observe the pile later:rockn:
8. Carry splits to stove

None of the above includes the maintenance of the harvesting tools: saws, skidders/ATV/tractor, splitter, etc.....Or opening the brew for a break or leering or observing the PILE.
No health club people hereabouts

 

[slowp]

There are wood stoves made specifically for mobile homes and super insulated, air tight homes. The stoves are vented from outside the home. Out here, the stoves and mobile homes are quite common, as is heating with wood. I had a stove installed in a mobile home quite a while ago--1985. A hole was cut in the floor of the mobile home for the stove vent. I see the home is still standing so it hasn't burned down...

 

[max2cam]

Thanks for all the replies.

Maybe the contractor sells pellet stoves?

That was the first thing I thought too, but apparently he isn't a pellet stove dealer. But who knows; maybe his cousin is.

My thoughts are these: My forested property still looks completely wild and natural after being constantly cut for firewood nonstop for the past 27 years. But how natural and fossil fuel energy intensive is a corn field or a wood pellet manufacturing plant?

My conclusion is that there are severe NEGATIVE environmental impacts to a corn/pellet stove.

 

[spike60]

I read somewhere last year that 10 yrs ago pellets were cheap because they were all made from scrap material from sawmills and such.
Well after years of selling these things there are so many of them (stoves)
now that the manufacturers are having to grind up whole trees to
produce enough pellets to meet demand.

Yup, and the same thing will happen as the corn stoves get more popular. Even sooner with all of this E85 nonsense. It might be good for big agri-business, but in the end your just spending money somewhere else for your energy. It seems like a good idea initially, but then as the supply/demand equation changes you quickly find that you aren't saving any money at all. The funny thing is that some people are switching from pellets to corn, but they'll end up in the same boat in a few short years.

Like most members I enjoy my wood cutting, and have never had to pay for wood. And that is where the real freedom is with wood. You can go out and get your own. You can't really make your own pellets or grow enough corn to heat your house.

 

[max2cam]

You can't...grow enough corn to heat your house.

That is a really good point.

Think of what a BIG cornfield you would need to grow enough corn just to heat one home!

Plus you would need to apply chemical fertilizers and pesticides to successfully grow that corn not to mention the special equipment to harvest and process it plus the rodent problems of corn.

Really, these corn stoves are "evil doers" and the wood pellet industry ain't much better!

Meanwhile, all the humble woodcutter needs is a chainsaw, maul, and an old pickup truck and he usually just cleans up or rejuvenates the woods by taking the dead or cull trees and releasing the smaller ones to the sun. Plus (if you buy wood) he's probably your neighbor and trying to feed his kids.

 

[Al Smith]

Now I don't if this story is accurate or not but here goes.As I am to understand it during the last big insurgence of woodburning,late 70's early 80's Buck stoves were a big seller.Built like battle ships would likely last a century.

The owner of the business could see a down turn in the market and sold out.The terms of the sale stipulated his company could not engage in the business of selling wood stoves for a set period of time.He did not,he built corn burners,sly old fox was he.

My personal feeling about pellet /corn stoves is that they are an option about like a kerosine heater was at one time.The corn would be costly weather you raised it or bought it.The wood could come from number of sources depending upon how resourcefull a person is and the geographical location.Obviously the need for larger amounts would be greater in northern Ohio than northern Georgia or South Carolina.

 

[jags]

That is a really good point.

Think of what a BIG cornfield you would need to grow enough corn just to heat one home!

I'm not a corn/pellet head but in all fairness, it only takes about 3 acres of corn on an average year, and 2.5 in a good year (harvest @ 220 bushels an acre). Once again, I don't burn corn, but my understanding is anywhere from 400 to 600 bushels will heat a home.

 

[dimanager]

I'm not a corn/pellet head but in all fairness, it only takes about 3 acres of corn on an average year, and 2.5 in a good year (harvest @ 220 bushels an acre). Once again, I don't burn corn, but my understanding is anywhere from 400 to 600 bushels will heat a home.

That's what I was thinking.

Sam

 

[redprospector]

Sounds like the contractor was trying to sound knowledgable about something he knew little about (baffel em with BS).
I prefer wood, but....before my Dad died he got a pellet stove. He wasn't able to deal with the wood anymore. It worked great for him, and he had propane backup. I lived in his house this last winter and I'll have to say pellets are high dollar, I was giving almost $5 for a 40 lb. bag. I'll also have to say that I have never had a wood stove that I could regulate to put out constant heat and only burn 40 lbs of wood in 24 hrs.
There are pro's & con's to everything. If a person isn't able to or doesn't want to deal with firewood then a pellet stove is a good option.


Andy

 

[dimanager]

Rural King just put out an ad to pre-book your wood pellets for $195.00 pre ton.

Sam

 

[max2cam]

I'm not a corn/pellet head but in all fairness, it only takes about 3 acres of corn on an average year, and 2.5 in a good year (harvest @ 220 bushels an acre). Once again, I don't burn corn, but my understanding is anywhere from 400 to 600 bushels will heat a home.

I see that you live in northern Illinois. That's corn country and the farmers are loving this corn-as-fuel mania and I don't blame them.

Up here it's sand and early frost country and you can't grow corn here worth a damn. If people here want to burn corn those 400 to 600 bushels will have to be grown down in the banana belt and trucked some distance.

But this same sand country naturally grows trees without any chemical fertilizer, pesticides, erosion problems, or destroying the natural landscape as was done to the prairies and oak openings of northern Illinois to obtain all those cornfields.

If a person lives in corn country these corn/pellet stoves might make more sense (altho corn is foremost a food and not fuel), but in a heavily wooded country like this they seem insane.

 

[jags]

I see that you live in northern Illinois. That's corn country and the farmers are loving this corn-as-fuel mania and I don't blame them.

Up here it's sand and early frost country and you can't grow corn here worth a damn. If people here want to burn corn those 400 to 600 bushels will have to be grown down in the banana belt and trucked some distance.

But this same sand country naturally grows trees without any chemical fertilizer, pesticides, erosion problems, or destroying the natural landscape as was done to the prairies and oak openings of northern Illinois to obtain all those cornfields.

If a person lives in corn country these corn/pellet stoves might make more sense (altho corn is foremost a food and not fuel), but in a heavily wooded country like this they seem insane.

Very true and no argument here, but that is also the same logic of why I don't burn coal. Not all fuel sources work in all places. IF I were a corn/pellet head, I can by a ton of corn from my neighbor for about $130, but I still choose wood.

p.s. I am not familiar with too many places where trees were taken down to make large expanses of fields. They simply didn't have a way of getting rid of the stumps in that era. But in all fairness, I live at the original homestead and we have only been here for 130 years. Oh, off topic, I love that area up there, going up next week. Been going for so long, I am a honorary cheese head.

 

[rguseman]

Jags, I'm sorry but "honorary cheesehead" is only bestowed upon those who are fans of the "right" NFL team. Therefore, lifetime cheeseheads like myself require a show of credentials.:hmm3grin2orange:

P.S. Sorry to stray off topic.