Educate me on pellet stoves...

[steved]

The Wife and I were at the local stove store Saturday for a seven inch poly brush (the golden unicorn of chimney brushes) and the wife was looking at a pellet stove that caught her eye. There was another guy looking for pellets and the consensus was three tons was sufficient for our area per season. Hmmph, that sounds too easy.

Now, this would be a down the road thing...probably five years or so. I would probably put it in the corner, next to the wood stove. We have a good location that will get heat through the whole house in that room.

How much does a higher end pellet stove run? We didn't ask at the time, then got thinking after we left. The Wife would want one with a glass front. Do they even make one that doesn't need electric?

How hard are they to vent? I assume just through the wall with a collar and insulated pipe, and a short stub up? So they need a full stack?

How hard are they typically on pellets? What is the average price of a ton of pellets? Does three tons per heating season sound realistic?

Thinking this would be a little easier for Wife than firewood...cleaner too.

Thoughts?

 

[stihly dan]

A lot of maintenance are there down fall IMO, and a steady source for pellets. Seems like every year some sort of shortage.

 

[Cheesecutter]

Some guys love them and others not so much. Seems like $2000 gets into the better ones. With most things, quality costs more up front, but pays off in the end. Buyers from big box stores as a whole aren't as happy as the ones that buy from dealers mainly from a service/advice standpoint. 3-4 tons of pellets seems to be a reasonable amount in an "average" house. The quality of the pellets also makes a big difference in satisfaction.

 

[CTYank]

Pellets are essentially recycled mill waste- sawdust & mill trimmings, and bark. Big variable with pellets is the percentage of minerals- the ash content, which can quickly clog the burn pot. Pellet producers in this country have had probs keeping up with demand, so Aug. is kinda late to be stocking up.

Pellet stoves require pretty serious electronics, on their controller circuit board. During a power outage that won't work unless backup power is provided. Many such stoves have pretty small pipe connections, with exhaust having concentric fresh-air connection surrounding it. That obviously helps with their high efficiency.

Some folks really like being able to load a bag or two of pellets into the stove hopper, set the thermostat, and go. Electric igniter and pellet feed start when the controller closes the contacts.

With all that, they can be expensive, especially for the good ones.

 

[Arnett95]

my friend and his family heated with pellets for years, of course it was only a trailer but they done pretty good it kept the whole house warm. here in ky where I live not a lot of people use the pellets but if your wanting to go on an easier route to heat your home then id say it would be alright

 

[cat10ken]

The cheapest pellets around here are about $200/ton and up to $250. I think you can also use corn as a replacement for pellets. Corn will be cheap this fall so that might be an option.

 

[Arnett95]

The cheapest pellets around here are about $200/ton and up to $250. I think you can also use corn as a replacement for pellets. Corn will be cheap this fall so that might be an option.

your right I believe corn will work in most the stoves it did in my friends and pellets down here are a little cheaper 150 a ton in the summer

 

[066blaster]

You have to stockpile a lot of pellets. Most places ran out or jacked the price up last year. If you still got your wood stove you should be good.

 

[esshup]

Mom & Dad are in their upper 80's and when they moved into their house they changed the wood burning fireplace to a pellet insert. House is on propane. We ran the numbers and found that if propane was over "X" per gallon, it was cheaper to heat with pellets. The local place will deliver pellets and stack 'em in the pole barn, so they order 2 to 3 tons when they are on sale, usually in late July. Their house is 2400 sq. ft with cathedral ceilings and a basement with 9' ceilings. They have a propane water heater, electric stove and dryer. They will go thru about 3,000# of pellets a year, and around 800 gallons of propane. They have 2 propane tanks, each 1,000 gallons and fill 'em up in August. They cracked the 2nd one open a week before the guy came to fill the tanks. If it's cold and windy out, they'll go thru a bag of pellets a day. They like them because of the less mess, and carrying the pellets is easier than humping wood.

2 years ago they went thru about 3,000# of pellets, last year was about 4,500#, maybe a bit more. But, like most older people they have the house warmer than many younger people keep it. Oh, they DO have a propane fired auto on back-up whole house genset.

 

[046]

The Wife and I were at the local stove store Saturday for a seven inch poly brush (the golden unicorn of chimney brushes) and the wife was looking at a pellet stove that caught her eye. There was another guy looking for pellets and the consensus was three tons was sufficient for our area per season. Hmmph, that sounds too easy.

Now, this would be a down the road thing...probably five years or so. I would probably put it in the corner, next to the wood stove. We have a good location that will get heat through the whole house in that room.

How much does a higher end pellet stove run? We didn't ask at the time, then got thinking after we left. The Wife would want one with a glass front. Do they even make one that doesn't need electric?

How hard are they to vent? I assume just through the wall with a collar and insulated pipe, and a short stub up? So they need a full stack?

How hard are they typically on pellets? What is the average price of a ton of pellets? Does three tons per heating season sound realistic?

Thinking this would be a little easier for Wife than firewood...cleaner too.

Thoughts?

useless if reason for getting is control of your utility bills .. it's a fact pellets are more expensive to run than propane. which skyrocketed last season along with price of pellets. zero effect for us wood burners .. sure you do more work for wood but it's the single place where we have a hope of controlling our heating bills.

with modern cat or secondary burn stoves .. wood consumption goes way down .. less wood means less labor to support.
wood is free but labor to process is not.

 

[steved]

useless if reason for getting is control of your utility bills .. it's a fact pellets are more expensive to run than propane. which skyrocketed last season along with price of pellets. zero effect for us wood burners .. sure you do more work for wood but it's the single place where we have a hope of controlling our heating bills.

with modern cat or secondary burn stoves .. wood consumption goes way down .. less wood means less labor to support.
wood is free but labor to process is not.

Considering my neighbor spent $1300/month on propane during the cold spell last winter; that would be a lot of pellets. I know wood is going to be the cheapest choice, was looking for something a little easier for the Wife.

We have a 2850sqft house, average insulation, and a good layout for central heat. Its sounding like the pellets are better for heating the smaller areas, not for the larger ones? I don't mind sinking $3k into something if its going to provide decent return.

 

[slowp]

I've had a couple of pellet stoves. They require power, although I seem to recall some sort of thing made for elk camp that might not? Hmmmm. Some are made to run for a while on a battery if the power goes out.

The price is similar to a high end woodstove. They do come with glass fronts. The ash pan is easy to clean, and must be cleaned once a week--or more depending on the quality of the pellets. Cleaning it is simply turning off the stove, cooling, dumping out ash and wire brushing the removable little grate thing so the holes are not plugged.
How much fuel you use depends on the usual variables and the quality of the pellets. When I had the stoves, the quality pellets were mostly Doug fir. There were also locally made pellets which were mostly pine, and those burned faster and created more ash.

I came home from work one day and the stove was out, and the house had ash floating around in the air. Apparently the chimney had clogged up and ash poofed out. I guess you do need to sweep out the chimney, especially if it has a bend in the pipe. An indicator of that would be the flame looking oranger and the glass getting smokier.

Starting them up isn't that hard. You have some sterno type stuff to pour on pellets in the ash pan. Those start smoldering and you turn on the power and off it goes.
I think. It's been a few years since I had one. The last one was the only heat in the house, so I saved up, had it removed, and replaced it with a gas stove. That way I could go on trips in the winter without having somebody come by to load up the stove with pellets.

 

[Fred Wright]

Pellets have the distinct advantage of heating while you're away for the day. Unlike conventional wood burners, pellet stoves don't require someone be there to feed 'em every hour or so.

That's about the only advantage of pellet stoves I'm aware of. Pellets are a manufactured commodity and thus subject to market swings. And as far as I'm aware, there's no industry standard or set recipe or regulation of ingredients for pellet manufacturing. They could be made of pretty much any wood byproduct and there's no way of knowing what's in there. The only requirement is that it burns ~ and shredded stale cigars or cardboard will burn.

The main drawback to pellet burning is the need for dry, convenient pellet storage space. A skid of pellets takes up a lot of room and, unless you have a fork attachment for your tractor or loader and a door large enough to accommodate it you'll have to load and stack the sacks by hand.

If your aim is to make life easier for the missus, here's what we've been doing: Split your wood so the missus can handle it easily. Bring in sufficient firewood before leaving for the day. Park it close enough to the stove where it's safe and convenient to load.

Either way, you'll be carrying your fuel in every day. Not trying to talk you out of pellets, just sayin'.

 

[3fordasho]

I started wood burning with a Quadrafire castile pellet stove but now only burn cord wood. The pellet stove was replaced by a woodstock fireview and then a progress hybrid.

Pellet stove pros:
thermostat control
load upto one bag a day
automatic operation
somewhat cleaner than a cordwood stove
simpler and cheaper vent system
easier/cleaner to store pellets inside than cord wood

Pellet stove cons:
convective heat not nearly as nice as radiate heat from cord wood stove
blower, auger, pellets dropping into burn pot all make noise
once a week cleaning of burn pot, more if mixing in corn, more intensive cleaning about every 2 months of use.
many more parts and electronics to go bad - fairly expensive (from quadrafire)
pellets must be stored inside
no control over pellet availability or price
No automatic start if 100% corn, must have at least 50% pellets - at least with the stove I had.
Fire viewing not nearly as interesting as a cord wood stove

No regrets going to cordwood, but I am 54, healthy and enjoy processing firewood. Things would change if I couldn't process my own....

House is able to be kept much warmer on cordwood. (more capacity) but I guess this more a question of sizing the pellet stove to your space.

 

[CTYank]

I started wood burning with a Quadrafire castile pellet stove but now only burn cord wood. The pellet stove was replaced by a woodstock fireview and then a progress hybrid.

Lest anyone missed what you said re woodstock stoves, you sure know how to pick 'em. Some really great stoves.

 

[Highbeam]

useless if reason for getting is control of your utility bills .. it's a fact pellets are more expensive to run than propane. which skyrocketed last season along with price of pellets. zero effect for us wood burners .. sure you do more work for wood but it's the single place where we have a hope of controlling our heating bills.

with modern cat or secondary burn stoves .. wood consumption goes way down .. less wood means less labor to support.
wood is free but labor to process is not.

On your first point, pellets more expensive to operate than propane, you are very wrong at least in my area. Pellets are 199$ per ton and LP is 2.5$ per gallon. This makes pellets less than 50% of the cost per btu of heat than propane. Pellets are a cheap heat as any solid fuel is.

I have wood stoves and now that I have a BK catalytic stove with honest 24 burns it is very easy to heat the house with wood. If I had to pay the market value for split firewood which is 250$ per cord, I would actually be better off to heat with pellets.

 

[slowp]

On your first point, pellets more expensive to operate than propane, you are very wrong at least in my area. Pellets are 199$ per ton and LP is 2.5$ per gallon. This makes pellets less than 50% of the cost per btu of heat than propane. Pellets are a cheap heat as any solid fuel is.

I have wood stoves and now that I have a BK catalytic stove with honest 24 burns it is very easy to heat the house with wood. If I had to pay the market value for split firewood which is 250$ per cord, I would actually be better off to heat with pellets.

Yes. Things are different. It depends where you live. Also, how close are you to the pellet maker? We certainly wouldn't be burning corn in our area. You'll need do localized research.

In fact, I believe that if I heated totally with electric heat, it would probably be the same as heating with wood when saw price, fuel, labor, wood stove, etc. are factored in. But that is just for here. Our hydropower is pretty cheap. Don't move here.

 

[steved]

A place to store pellets is not a problem...I have around two cords of firewood under roof now, and could easily get three pallets along side. And I would have no issues buying a season's worth of pellets in the middle of summer.

Propane was running around $2-ish/gallon last I checked...when the shortage happened last spring, the neighbor paid $4-something/gallon and could only get half a tank at that. There is nothing as expensive as propane or oil around these parts.

If pellets are around $200/ton, and three ton would heat a season; I would be cheaper with wood even buying by the triaxle. Although the time spent processing would not be involved...some of us work out of town and lose an entire season of time at home. That's where the pellets would have an edge in my situation...just order and they get delivered.

Well, it gives me something to think about over the next few years. Thanks for all the insight.

 

[zogger]

Where you are, isn't coal an option as well?

 

[flotek]

Expensive to operate
Poor radiant heat
Does nothing when power is out
High initial cost
At mercy of retailers for pellets
Pellet shortages in coldest months
Fire looks fake
Need ashes and debris cleaned out
Electronic boards can fail over time