Happy Heat! Wood Stove Help

[dave1949]

That osage orange/hedge is some hot stuff. I wonder if it would be worthwhile looking for a stove that can be had with a coal grate as an option, or a straight coal stove.

I cut up some 40 year old hedge fence posts for fire wood years ago. I could see occasional sparks coming off the saw chain in the evening light.

 

[joshuabardwell]

Blaze King manufacturers the top 2 most efficient wood stoves in North America. The King being #1 at 88% LHV an 82% EPA Listed Efficiency and #2 is the Princess at 88% LHV and an 81% EPA Listed Efficiency.

That is pretty extraordinary! My F500 is around 66% efficient. I guess those catalytic converters are good for something after all!

 

[Tollster]

it may not be the (optimum) temp but it does allow the stove to keep a house heated when you have to be somewhere else for a day.
You can return home - re stoke and yet never have to strike a match... and most times the stove temp is reading around 1/3 ( in the normal operating range) or it could be this


Blaze King manufacturers the top 2 most efficient wood stoves in North America. The King being #1 at 88% LHV an 82% EPA Listed Efficiency and #2 is the Princess at 88% LHV and an 81% EPA Listed Efficiency. We also build 5 of the top 8 most efficient wood stoves listed on the US EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) web site. The true efficiency for a wood stove is the measured efficiency number published by the US EPA on its web site. When comparing efficiencies of different brands you should always compare the EPA measured efficiency. This number is a true reading of how your stove performs in the real world. Follow this link to the EPA web site for confirmation. Here you will see most other wood stoves listed at 63% while the Blaze King stoves are listed as high as 82%. Our efficiencies keep the heat in your home and saves you up to 33% on your wood use.
From Blaze kings site

One other thing -as for stove and pipe cleaning , from late August thru May, we run our (Princess 24/7) and never have to clean the stove/pipe more often than every 3 1/2 months, I find this acceptable.

The Op may not want or need one that has the burn time abilities of these stoves, but for myself this is a feature that I find a necessity.

I find your numbers differ from those on the EPA website. Perhaps its a different chart and graph formula?
http://www.epa.gov/oecaerth/resources/publications/monitoring/caa/woodstoves/certifiedwood.pdf

 

[KennyG]

I find your numbers differ from those on the EPA website. Perhaps its a different chart and graph formula?
http://www.epa.gov/oecaerth/resources/publications/monitoring/caa/woodstoves/certifiedwood.pdf

If you notice, the values in that table are default values based on the design (non-catalytic, catalytic and pellet). That's why there are only three numbers. These represent the minimum efficiency one could expect. For example, the table shows my non-cat Osburn as 63% but Osburn says it's 75%. Blaze Kings are probably really good stoves, but using that EPA table to rate other stoves is not correct.

 

[sd455dan]

I find your numbers differ from those on the EPA website. Perhaps its a different chart and graph formula?
http://www.epa.gov/oecaerth/resources/publications/monitoring/caa/woodstoves/certifiedwood.pdf

I used your link and you need to look at the (ACTUAL)
Measured
Efficiency
(CSA
B415.1) not the default estimated #

Jotul and some others have some stoves rated by this standard

I agree that without more companies having their stoves subjected to established test standards it is difficult to make apples to apples comparisons -but I would also think that there would be wood stove companies lined up to beat out Blaze Kings (and a few others) stove designs, for efficiencies, if they knew their products were able to do so. Blaze King has had these models out for several years...

 

[Tollster]

I was wondering how that applied.. I kind of gave up on many of the tables simply because every time ones is made, there seems to be a spin off of another..

Most people up here seem to be going to the outside stoves and they also claim 40 hour burn with many of those. I often wondered if they make a wood/coal outside stove? I would imagine with the prices of non renewable fuels, that would be something to consider.. I believe coal is around 100 a ton up this way.

Thanks

 

[MossRoad]

Outdoor wood boilers are what are giving wood burning people a bad reputation. They get damped down until hot water is called for. So they sit there and smolder for long periods of time, then belch a ton of smoke, then stop and smolder, then belch.... and that cold smoke hangs low to the ground and ticks off the neighbors. And unfortunately, "those wood burning people down the street" are what gets reported to lawmakers, and folks with efficient wood stoves and inserts get lumped in with them. Outdoor boilers in unpopulated areas are fine. But I see these things installed in dense cities behind businesses and homes belching away. It won't be long before they are outlawed. Hopefully it won't affect clean burning stoves.

 

[IXLR8]

Outdoor wood boilers are what are giving wood burning people a bad reputation.

You described my neighbor with his wood boiler exactly. He goes thru about 15 cord of wood a year, compounding the problem he has moved his wood boiler into his garage and the prevailing winds put us DIRECTLY down wind of it. Making it even worse he uses used diesel motor oil to start it and he burns construction debris in it... all year long. I called our state EPA, their response was basically, "to bad, so sad, nothing we can do about it". I quoted the 4 state laws that I knew he was violating, their response was the same. With our EPA rated Vermont Castings stove, 98% of the time you can't tell if we are burning or not.

 

[sd455dan]

`15 CORDS ! wow that must get old, being down wind from that much smoke, i bet your windows and vehicles end up with a film on them sometimes- then there are lungs to worry about... sometimes it makes you wonder if some neighbors enjoy ticking off the people living next to them...

 

[IXLR8]

`15 CORDS ! wow that must get old, being down wind from that much smoke, i bet your windows and vehicles end up with a film on them sometimes- then there are lungs to worry about... sometimes it makes you wonder if some neighbors enjoy ticking off the people living next to them...

He used to burn 20 cord/year until he got the new wood boiler, he keeps his house between 75-78 in the winter. Yes it gets old and frustrating, having to close up the house in the summer when he is burning. Wife has asthma and it has almost sent her to the hospital a few times. I have talked to the neighbor about it numerous times, he acts clueless that he is putting out all that smoke, he apologizes profusely and is doing it again 2 weeks later... he just doesn't care. He is 78 years old, failing health and I keep waiting for his health to fail to the point he can't load the wood any more. His dad is 106 and still going strong so I think I might have a while to wait.