Wood stoves in a pole barn

[Scaper]

I have built a new 30x52 pole building and am considering a wood stove for heat. I have a good friend that tells me a double barrel stove puts off great heat for a pole building and would be cheap to build.. I'm concerned about safety and how high the the pipe has to be run outside. I am looking at three options, wood, pellet and coal. I have the ability to get all the wood I need for free from state wildlife land. I was told that if it's down I can have it all. I just need to cut it and remove it. Hardwood pellets in my area of Delaware are running 225 a ton. I have been told that coal puts out the highest BTU's of all three and I'm not far from the area in P.A. where I can get anthracite cheap bagged buy the ton. I know that folks here must use these three types of fuel so how about some feedback. My building has insulation on the walls and I'm in the process of putting 2inch poly iso aluminum backed both side in the ceiling. 28' section is 15"11' to the peak and 24" is 12" to the bottom of the truses. Any thoughts you can give wil be helpful. Thank's Scaper

 

[Looking4new]

IF you put in a wood stove, then you need your double wall insulated chimney to clear the peak of the roof. That stuff costs about $50.oo/foot.
I can't say anything good about pellet stoves as the one I had just about killed me and my family.
I can't say anything at all about coal, I was too young to remember anything about it when we had it.

 

[charlz]

Pellet stoves don't have a high BTU output. If you plan on keeping it heated all the time then they are great as you can set the thermostat and it will maintain that temp. If you plan on only warming it up once in a while from 'frozen' to 'comfortable' than a pellet stove is not as good because it takes a while to 'catch up'. Since you have a 'free' source of firewood I would probably look at a good size wood stove. Fans also help push the warm air around and make it more evenly heated as you bring it up to 'comfortable'.

 

[KennyG]

If you have wood available free, that's kind of a deciding factor, unless you want to heat it all the time, unattended. The chimney height is easy - minimum of three feet above the roof surface where it penetrates and two feet higher than any roof surface within 10 feet. Let's say you have a 1/4 slope roof and the chimney is low (near the eaves). Then the roof is 2.5 feet higher 10 feet away. Add 2 feet and you should have at least 4.5 feet exposed above the roof. On the other hand, if you come through (or past, if you have an outside chimney) just 1 foot from the peak, you are only 3 inches below the highest point on the roof and the three foot criteria takes over and the chimney needs to be 3 feet above the roof. Search on line and you will find lots of diagrams that make this clearer.

I installed my chimney vertically straight through the roof. This minimizes the amount of double wall pipe required and maximizes draft. However, it may be a lot easier to run it through the wall and then up the side of the building. As noted you have to use a rated thimble to penetrate the building and use double wall pipe outside. Go as high as you can with single wall pipe inside the building because it gives off a lot of additional heat.

Barrel stoves seem to work OK if you build them right but they aren't heavy duty. You have to be careful to keep them from burning though. I would suggest a heavy old stove. You can find them used pretty easily. Put the stove in the area where you will be working most because, even with a fan it won't heat evenly.

If you just heat the building intermittently, consider getting a torpedo heater in addition to the wood stove. Again, available used. I crank up my 70,000 btu heater on diesel fuel for about 15 minutes while I build the wood fire and get it up to temperature.

 

[KennyG]

Oh yes, double wall pipe is expensive, but not that bad. At Menards, the straight sections are about $25 per foot. Fittings and elbows run your cost up.

 

[Notforhire]

Pellet stoves don't have a high BTU output. If you plan on keeping it heated all the time then they are great as you can set the thermostat and it will maintain that temp. If you plan on only warming it up once in a while from 'frozen' to 'comfortable' than a pellet stove is not as good because it takes a while to 'catch up'. Since you have a 'free' source of firewood I would probably look at a good size wood stove. Fans also help push the warm air around and make it more evenly heated as you bring it up to 'comfortable'.

Agree! Lots has to do with how long a period you intend to heat it.

I heat my house with coal. Start up time for coal is longer than wood, but has less tending. My 130,000 BTU stove needs a shake down twice per day, fueled every two days, and the ash pan emptied every day. No smoke, no creosote. This works great for continuous operation, but not so great if your only going to occupy the building for 4hrs. For short term, I would vote wood. For long periods coal. Most pellet stoves don't have the BTU output.

Bill

 

[Looking4new]

Oh yes, double wall pipe is expensive, but not that bad. At Menards, the straight sections are about $25 per foot. Fittings and elbows run your cost up.

Up here, I think I paid about $100.oo/3' section. I say 'I think' because I just paid someone else a handfull of money and they did the whole thing. I DO NOT climb on steel roofs.

The way I look at it, DW might be expensive, but not as expensive as replacing the barn.

 

[radioman]

listen to kennyg .. good advice there. If I were in your shoes- I would not buy my heat. Its cheaper to get free wood and pay the fuel and time to get it. with pellet - you gotta spend time getting it. Coal - you need a huge covered bin and shovel it in all the time. With wood - You can use it anytime you want and if some of wood gets wet from rain or snow , just leaving in shop will dry it out in a day or less while starting up fire with other dry wood. If you can source free metal barrels all the time- you can replace it every 5 years or so since the metal is thin. My neighbor had one in his garage- double barrel type for 10 years then switched to coal since he too old to get wood and already heats house with coal. I like the barrel stoves since you can cut the smaller limbs in 2.5 - 3 ft sections and its faster to carry and load up. less work and more usable wood.

 

[leveled]

I have a multifuel it burns coal and wood, but have never burned coal. I have a good source of wood. I bought my unit from tractor supply.





United States Stove Hot Blast Warm Air Furnace, 2,500 sq. ft. - Tractor Supply Co.

 

[MossRoad]

The wood is only free if you don't value your time.

For example, if you'd pay yourself $20 per hour and it takes you 10 hours to gather enough wood to equal the heat output of $225 worth of coal, you only saved 5 bucks and lost 10 hours of your life, too. Just something to think about....

Personally, I heat with wood. We have a free source. I enjoy the activity of cutting wood. And I have to remove it from my forest anyway as part of my timber management program. So, since it has to go anyway, I might as well burn it and not let it go to waste. We broke even on our woodstove installation this year. Anything after that is just money I don't spend on natural gas. :thumbsup: