pellet stoves..... who did it??

[bassman]

I have seen them sell for $1000 to $4000 and I even bought one used for $500 and tried it out to see what the fuss was all about.

Like most every heat source it was sounding like a good idea untill a few hundred people buy and the fuel source is in demand and boom bad idea.

mine is in the shed beside 8 bags of pellets and I may use it as a backup in the greenhouse but it really dosent put out alot and the 40000 btu rating does nothing in a cold greenhouse so its really just a goofy looking stove with a small firebox and a bunch of fans...

I do borrow it to my buddy for his hunting trips but other than that its taking up space.

I wonder if any of you have one and if it has been all that you thought it would be.

I did notice that the 6 guys that sell them at the yearly trade show has died down to 1 that has them along with his wood stoves .

one guy that was selling a big ugly one that claimed 110000 btu and had a water coil has moved away from all the pissed off people that bought them as his stove eats about 5 40lb bags a day!!! 5 bucks a bag!!!
not to mention his controll boards last about 3 months and make a nice pretty blue purple smoke that ends up in 2 hours of soldering and hooking and unhooking wires!!

I like my wood stove it has a science fiction fan that runs on fly poop and has no power requirements.

 

[Dok]

They lost some of their popularity here when a couple winters back you couldn't get pellets anywhere at any price. If you purchase pellets in the off season by the pallet they can be cheaper than gas and electricity. A lot of the older folks use them.

Pellet stoves don't put out the heat of a wood stove. Besides that, I love the whole process of cutting, hauling, splitting, stacking and burning wood.
Dok

 

[coostv]

I wonder if any of you have one and if it has been all that you thought it would be.

I had an Englander brand pellet stove and used it as the only heat source in our house for one season. I forget the BTU rating and am too lazy to look it up at the moment, but I think it was rated in the 50K range. This model was noisy too.

We have a 2 story house and it was located on the main floor, so it was only heating 2 floors and the basement stayed at about 55 degrees. It ate a bag a day and kept the 2 floors comfortable. When we (my wife) decided to complete the 2 bedrooms in the basement I had to come up with a way to heat that space, so in came the OWB. I sold the pellet stove to a friend and wish I would have kept it for the rare occasions I have to do some work in the attached garage... Oh well, at least I hung on to my torpedo heater for that.

Do I recommend it? I don't know that I would, at least not for a sole heat source. For their intended purpose heating smaller spaces such as a family room while movie watching they are great.

Pellets... I had little trouble finding them. I paid $185 for a premium brand ton from Menards and they worked great, I then bought some cheap ones from somewhere else and they sucked. Premium brands are the only way to go.

I installed the OWB in '06 and now heat the house and my 24x40 shop for about the same money as the pellets cost me.

Chris

 

[Ductape]

I bought a pellet stove this past summer to use as my secondary heat source. I heat with wood primarily, and in the past let the oil fired furnace kick on in the coldest months to keep the house comfortable. So far this year, i've used only the pellet stove to heat our whole house, since we have a few odds and ends to tie up after getting a new liner installed in the wood stove's flue. I hope to have to woodstove going within a couple weeks. It is my intent to burn zero oil this year....... even as it gets cheaper. I have to say i'm perfectly content with my pellet stove. You must realize they are not radiant heaters, they are space heaters. Of course the recent spike in oil prices led to the masses seeking alternatives...... so pellets can be a challenge to find right now, especially affordable pellets. I bought five ton back in July, so i'm all set. I think if your expectations are reasonable, and you can find pellets at a reasonable price (200-250/ton ... or less), they are a viable option.

P.S. As someone who does not own enough land to cut my cordwood off of for my heat........ i must add that the all the free (about ten cord/year) firewood i used to acquire has completely dried up. Finding free firewood for my woodstove this year is the same as finding pellets @ 200/ton..... NONEXISTANT.

 

[ktm rider]

I also had an Englander a few years bac. I used it for two years. it worked O.K. I guess but it just didn't have that radiant heat that a nice wood/coal stove puts out. Not to mention it was worthless when the power went out which happens frequently in my area.
A 40lb. bag of pellets were $1.50 in 2002. Now I believe they are at $5.00 a bag if you can find them at all...

 

[Haywire Haywood]

Not to mention it was worthless when the power went out

This is why when my wood heater goes in this spring, I'm having the electrician wire it up so that I can flip a switch if the power goes out and run the fans and one outlet for lights, coffee pot and such from a small generator outside. I'd love to have the big 10KW whole house generator that turns on automatically but that's way outta my price range. I'll be looking for a small generator that will handle 20amps or so.

Ian

 

[046]

primary wood heaters that depends on a fan..... mine does...
last year during the HUGE ice storm, power was off for almost 3 weeks.

operated on gensets... smallest generator that would do the job is the pick. used a Yamaha 1,000 when only thing running was wood insert's fan, lights and PC.

Honda 2500 would run fridge and freezer at the same time.. just barely. or fridge, lights, PC combo, but not all at the same time.

5000 watt Honda would easily run everything, but was a gas hog. that's the unit I would wire into my main box. underground electric service will be installed within 2 years, so may hold off on spending $$ on a transfer box.

just purchased a Honda 3500 watt genset... this should just big enough to operate everything without being a gas hog.

we've had major power outages every year... so odds are I'll be rolling out the gensets sometime this winter.

opsss... back on topic, recently purchased a Lopi pellet stove off craigslist. have not figured out what I'm going to do... plumb it in and try it out or send it down the road.

 

[Haywire Haywood]

If I was going to have a big one like that, it would be propane powered so I could run it off the 400 gal tank that supplies the house furnace. No messing around with gas cans.

Ian

 

[Coldfront]

P.S. As someone who does not own enough land to cut my cordwood off of for my heat........ i must add that the all the free (about ten cord/year) firewood i used to acquire has completely dried up. Finding free firewood for my woodstove this year is the same as finding pellets @ 200/ton..... NONEXISTANT.

If you don't have access to free or cheap wood it is not worth the hassle to burn wood. But where I live it would be stupid not to burn wood. It all depends on where you live and have access to wood, whether it is worth it or not to burn wood is up to you.

 

[wkpoor]

I tell people if you want to know what a pellet stove can do just point a 1500 watt hair drier at your face and that is about how much heat they put off. And to me that is exactly what it is.....a put off. I know at least 4 people that bought them and the next spring sold em. By the time you buy the unit (big dollars) and feed it(big dollars) and then get disappointed with the heat output you'll kick yourself for not putting in a wood stove.
BTW Ian, 10KW is not a whole house backup. That is a miss nomer no doubt fueled by the industry. You'll need about 30KW to run your whole house. 10KW will supply a few select circuits. And you had better have a full tank of propane (unless your on NG) when the power goes out. Otherwise its a big boat anchor sitting beside the house. With my luck I would be down to 25% in the tank when the power decides to go out for a week.

 

[ducati996]

I tell people if you want to know what a pellet stove can do just point a 1500 watt hair drier at your face and that is about how much heat they put off. And to me that is exactly what it is.....a put off. I know at least 4 people that bought them and the next spring sold em. By the time you buy the unit (big dollars) and feed it(big dollars) and then get disappointed with the heat output you'll kick yourself for not putting in a wood stove.
BTW Ian, 10KW is not a whole house backup. That is a miss nomer no doubt fueled by the industry. You'll need about 30KW to run your whole house. 10KW will supply a few select circuits. And you had better have a full tank of propane (unless your on NG) when the power goes out. Otherwise its a big boat anchor sitting beside the house. With my luck I would be down to 25% in the tank when the power decides to go out for a week.

Its a math equation - not a myth perpretrated by the industry. 10kw powers a good amount of items - using a transfer switch gives you control over the items you need at any given time. Water heaters, furnance blowers, and well water pumps demand high surge ratings. If you have city water (one less thing to power), and your furnance heats your water, then a big savings in output requirements is saved. You will have enough to power a number of things. Just know their ratings and add it up to see where you stand.

Whole house generators can start at 15Kw on up and 20 Kw will power a 4 -5 ton central a/c unit along with everything else.

Again its a math equation - you cant exceed what you produce

 

[KsWoodsMan]

10KW would power my whole house. That includes the 4500 watt hot water tank.

I can run a few lights and a TV on a 500 watt inverter during a power outage and feel like nothing happened.

 

[logbutcher]

Forget pellet stoves, they're a marketing hype like the Swivel Sweeper "AS SEEN ON TV !!! "

Right about noisy--try romance with that grinding in the background.

Pellets supply- sometimes on, sometimes off, and $$$$.

Power outage--yeah sure, how many have the 10kw backup ?

Maintenance: whattya do when it will jam ?

And finally ( drum roll please ) : they put out the heat of a 60w bulb:jawdrop: .

Get a real wood stove, furnace, or boiler. The BS about "free" wood is that. BTU for BTU you can pay up to $600./cord ( real cords CSD ) to get the equivalent heat for oil, propane, electricity. Nat'l gas comes closer to even since it's cheaper.

Yes, I am a Pellet Stove bigot.:spam:

 

[coostv]

--logbutcher
--Right about noisy--try romance with that grinding in the --background.

--Pellets supply- sometimes on, sometimes off, and $$$$.

So, that is just like romance too, huh.:monkey:

--And finally ( drum roll please ) : they put out the heat of a 60w --bulb:jawdrop: .

Bah, they work ok. But people have to realize their intended purpose is extra heat, not complete heat. Now a pellet furnace is a different story.

--Get a real wood stove, furnace, or boiler. The BS about "free" wood is --that. BTU for BTU you can pay up to $600./cord ( real cords CSD ) to get --the equivalent heat for oil, propane, electricity. Nat'l gas comes closer to --even since it's cheaper.

Bah to this too. I pay for my wood. No big deal, I still come out ahead on the deal versus paying for propane even when it was cheap. I would be paying a lot more for propane if I had to use it to heat my garage. I have no time to look for wood and it seems bothersome for me to do so. I would rather pay the $80 or so a log cord than beg for wood.

--Yes, I am a Pellet Stove bigot.:spam:

They have an application, they are not the answer.

 

[cord arrow]

This is my rig...

TRANSFER SWITCH

Have a grand total of about five clams in the wiring and hardware...all copped on fleabay.

Powered by an ES6500 Honda...older water cooled model, quiet as a mouse.

Everything on it except the AC, stove and clothes dryer.

Furnace and water heater are oil fired...well pump is the only 220 circuit.

Couple this with ol' Buck and my 250 Gallon Ag tank...ready for anything.

 

[cord arrow]

As a sidebar....this generator never labors...UNTIL the coffee maker's heating element switches on...tremendous draw...

Wife asks "what's with the generator?"...well...it's heating your coffee...

Microwaves are also notorious for munching generators...takes my water cooled, twin cylinder, 13 horsepower to nearly a stall...

Make your coffee...set the carafe on your wood stove.

 

[treemandan]

toss another LOG on, its down to 80 in here.

 

[Austin1]

Silly idea here,can it be converted to a normal wood stove? I have never seen a pellet stove but read this post and was thinking cutting torch, grinder, welder and some plate steel.Are they constructed heavy enough to try something like this?

 

[logbutcher]

Bah[/B] , they work ok.
Bah to this too.

WTF is "BAH" ???:monkey: :monkey:

 

[cord arrow]

BAH! to your quoting skills as well...LOL