Wood Burner

[jerrob]

It would be very easy to add this feature to your stove or the area it is installed in. Very easy.

I'm sure it would be, however, Im positive my self confidence will wain a bit when it comes time to drilll a hole in the bottom of the firebox of a $3k Kitchen Queen.................got a chill just typing it.

 

[churchmouse]

I'm sure it would be, however, Im positive my self confidence will wain a bit when it comes time to drilll a hole in the bottom of the firebox of a $3k Kitchen Queen.................got a chill just typing it.

My thought was a metered out door air source that came close to the air adjustments on the stove. Maybe not a direct attached device. I had thought about this with our wood stove but heck its too easy to crack the window close to it. With the stove rolling along the only way we know the window is actually open is to......."Look"....

But in this age of saving energy I get it fellas I really do. But I am dead sure there is a way to do the Kitchen queen without actually drilling a hole in it. Would need to see the design 1st but yeah there is always a way.

 

[maxwelhse]

Yep. You are both right. Stoves dont take as much air once rolling as a fireplace, but I'll take every last drop of efficiency I can take. I can seal up the intake pipe easily. Yes, doors and windows will still leak air, but I dont need to ENCOURAGE it by creating a vacuum.

Adding an extra hour and maybe $50 in parts to the install is no big deal in the long run and should pay for itself.

Ultimately CM's point on this is the better one... It's going to cook you out of there regardless so gaining every drop of efficiency isn't likely to be a huge issue, IMO.

That said... I seldom see any hole on any house that is sealed up at all, so, I'm not generally a fan of extra holes. I don't like sunroofs on cars either...

Some of these modern, well built homes are so airtight with the housewrap, windows and doors, that keeping a fire lit can be an issue when closed up.
A lack of oxygen to keep a woodfire going, while sleeping, could potentially be the last health issue you deal with.

Is this actually a thing, or is that some people on the internet think it's an actual thing? I didn't dig all that deep, but what I mostly saw are people building what they're referring to as "tight houses" that all struck me as worrying a lot about not much of anything. It seems all of them defaulted to adding make-up air as that was the more energy efficient option to begin with.

If builders are actually able to get houses so tight that fires can't burn and oxygen deprivation is a serious risk, I would think cooking a turkey in a gas oven would also be a death sentence. On the plus side, house fires should pretty much become self-extinguishing.

I'm wondering what they're doing about bathroom venting too.

 

[churchmouse]

Ultimately CM's point on this is the better one... It's going to cook you out of there regardless so gaining every drop of efficiency isn't likely to be a huge issue, IMO.

That said... I seldom see any hole on any house that is sealed up at all, so, I'm not generally a fan of extra holes. I don't like sunroofs on cars either...



Is this actually a thing, or is that some people on the internet think it's an actual thing? I didn't dig all that deep, but what I mostly saw are people building what they're referring to as "tight houses" that all struck me as worrying a lot about not much of anything. It seems all of them defaulted to adding make-up air as that was the more energy efficient option to begin with.

If builders are actually able to get houses so tight that fires can't burn and oxygen deprivation is a serious risk, I would think cooking a turkey in a gas oven would also be a death sentence. On the plus side, house fires should pretty much become self-extinguishing.

I'm wondering what they're doing about bathroom venting too.

In the manufactured housing industry those units are so tight that they actually require an out door air make up on the HVAC system. At least the ones I have seen and I have seen a few doing HVAC upgrades and installs. If you doors are leaking fix the damned things. Seriously. If your windows are leaking....same thing, fix them. I have done a sweep of the house every winter looking for intrusion. And I find something every year. I want to choose how we control the house and no it is not as tight as described above. Its to old. But hey, we can split hairs all day on this one.

An outdoor air source should be well adjusted for the house. A positive pressure measured on a manometer. is not a bad thing. It is not all that spendy on a balanced system. We considered this when I put in the new furnace and duct last year. Just to many other real world things to deal with. But now that this thread has re-opened that can of worms.....

 

[maxwelhse]

In the manufactured housing industry those units are so tight that they actually require an out door air make up on the HVAC system. At least the ones I have seen and I have seen a few doing HVAC upgrades and installs. If you doors are leaking fix the damned things. Seriously. If your windows are leaking....same thing, fix them. I have done a sweep of the house every winter looking for intrusion. And I find something every year. I want to choose how we control the house and no it is not as tight as described above. Its to old. But hey, we can split hairs all day on this one.

An outdoor air source should be well adjusted for the house. A positive pressure measured on a manometer. is not a bad thing. It is not all that spendy on a balanced system. We considered this when I put in the new furnace and duct last year. Just to many other real world things to deal with. But now that this thread has re-opened that can of worms.....

Fully understanding my own ignorance here, don't gas furnaces almost always have an outdoor make up for the flame box? Or are you talking about something else?

 

[churchmouse]

Fully understanding my own ignorance here, don't gas furnaces almost always have an outdoor make up for the flame box? Or are you talking about something else?

Yes there has to be a combustion air source near the water heater and the furnace. The new Hi-eff units are piped to the outside for this purpose.

I am referring to a piece of flex with a damper in it attached to the return air of the furnace. It will allow air to be changed over at a controlled rate if you use the damper to do so. Air will be pushed out the bathroom exhaust to relieve the static pressure inside the house. IO believe new construction in Arizona (I believe) requires this. I read that in another forum and have heard it around the industry. If you use spray on expanding foam to insulate it is so tightly sealed.

The drawback is any high humidity experienced in the summer will put a bit more load on the A/C system so properly sizing it (something so very rarely seen in the editions around the city and beyond) is an important factor. But the quality of air in improved unless you live close to a plant or other stink source...

 

[maxwelhse]

Interesting. I didn't know that was even a thing. INGO delivers again!

 

[Tryin']

I considered a wood stove several years ago. After figuring the installation parts cost for a two-story house and giving consideration to not owning my own woods, we went with a pellet burner.

Short flue, direct-piped air intake, forced air blower, easy heat control, almost zero mess.

You do have to have a place to store the pellets. We use 1.5 - 2 tons per year and by the time you are ready for the second pallet they can be hard to find.

It provides 85%+ of our total heat. The first year we had it, Vectren came out to "check our meter" because our usage was barely a blip above summertime levels

 

[hoosierdaddy1976]

A couple places we lived in when I was a kid, the wood stove was our only heat. Lots of weekends spent in the woods with my stepdad back then.

 

[IndyIN]

Interesting. I didn't know that was even a thing. INGO delivers again!

I have a new home in Central Texas, and this is what I have installed for fresh air. I was actually concerned about indoor air quality and didn't realize that this was installed (I posted a forum question about them not long ago).

Essentially, you set a cut off outside humidity level and a max outside temp. You also configure how many minutes per hour it runs when the criteria are met.


https://www.aprilaire.com/whole-house-products/ventilation/model-8126X

 

[churchmouse]

I have a new home in Central Texas, and this is what I have installed for fresh air. I was actually concerned about indoor air quality and didn't realize that this was installed (I posted a forum question about them not long ago).

Essentially, you set a cut off outside humidity level and a max outside temp. You also configure how many minutes per hour it runs when the criteria are met.


https://www.aprilaire.com/whole-house-products/ventilation/model-8126X

I had heard of this but never actually saw one.

 

[Leadeye]

I took a different approach when having the house built as far as wood heat, having grown up with Franklin type stoves. The insert pictured is a Quadrafire 5500 and heats the entire house. Combustion air is drawn from outside and two fans blow air around the firebox, one lower floor and one upper. I use seasoned wood and a lot of air when burning, which consumes the wood quickly, but the blowers get that heat into the house quickly as well. Cold air is returned at floor level downstairs. Lots of combustion air and seasoned wood mean less problems with creosote, which was a bane of the stoves from my youth.

 

[churchmouse]

I took a different approach when having the house built as far as wood heat, having grown up with Franklin type stoves. The insert pictured is a Quadrafire 5500 and heats the entire house. Combustion air is drawn from outside and two fans blow air around the firebox, one lower floor and one upper. I use seasoned wood and a lot of air when burning, which consumes the wood quickly, but the blowers get that heat into the house quickly as well. Cold air is returned at floor level downstairs. Lots of combustion air and seasoned wood mean less problems with creosote, which was a bane of the stoves from my youth.

Run the box hot when you can. Keeps the buildup under control.

 

[churchmouse]

In the family room which is an add on we heat with this gas log. It has adjustable flame a nd adjustable dual speed blower. It will keep that area down to around 10* outside temp. After that the electric baseboard will cycle to supplement.

 

[patience0830]

I grew up in an old (130+ yrs) 2 story farm house that had a coal/wood burning furnace as the only heat source. I've cut, split, and hauled enough wood to bury us all several feet deep. I remember a few loads of coal coming to the house and shoveling a little bit of it off myself as I was yet not as big as the shovel. I remember more vividly being sick of spending every weekend listening to my Dad urging me to move faster if I was cold. That old 35# Lime green Poulan monster of a saw he ran for years would have killed lesser men. Pop was 5'8" and about 150# until his 60's and he could cut wood so fast with that thing that 2 of us boys could not keep up with him.

 

[foszoe]

I will be doing the same thing. Have a source for free firewood now.

Been looking at Fire Chiefs. I was raised on cola wood furnaces so I'd like that flexibility. Put the Coal in overnight. These days furnaces are much more efficient though which could make the coal flexibility unnecessary

 

[DoggyDaddy]

I will be doing the same thing. Have a source for free firewood now.

Been looking at Fire Chiefs. I was raised on cola wood furnaces so I'd like that flexibility. Put the Coal in overnight. These days furnaces are much more efficient though which could make the coal flexibility unnecessary

Dad was friends with a lot of the old German greenhouse owners near us that had coal fired boilers to heat the greenhouses, so he would occasionally get a small load of coal to burn in our fireplace. I looked into getting some one time but I think you had to order at least a ton and I didn't want that much. Like you say though, he would put in a few big chunks overnight.

 

[DeadeyeChrista'sdad]

Blaze King is my pick. Drolet, Dutchwest,. V.C. Defiant,. Quadrafire, Hoosier made Hitzer's, all good stoves. The wood and your chimney is just as important. Harbor freight sells a moisture meter for 13 bucks or so. Get one and use it. Do NOT burn wood over 20%. Just refuse to do it. It'll creosote up your chimney, plug a catalyst, and burn your house down.

Firewood Hoarders Club .com and Hearth.com are both good resources. I prefer FHC. It's more INGO community like, minus some of the snark.

 

[Airtevron1]

Lots of good discussion here. This is what we are looking at - https://www.quadrafire.com/products/discovery-ii-wood-stove

Ive read a lot of bad reviews about the brand now, complaints of front glass sooting up etc, very confusing process. This one installed about 5000.00 which is nothing to sneeze at.

I dont have a supply of free wood so I'll have to but it, which takes be back to pellet/corn.

Not many places to shop in Porter county unfortunately.

 

[Cameramonkey]

Lots of stoves soot up the glass. When I was a kid that was one of my weekly chores in the cold months. use a razor blade scraper to get the worst of it off and then finish with a wet rag. Dont see what the big deal is.