wood stove

[MOhillbilly]

need a new wood stove. big enough to choke out and let burn while im at work. prefer a blower with 6in flue pipe.

open to any suggestions on brands or places to hunt. been to craigs list and local google search.

also need advice on flue kits. the chimney my granddad built has a crack in it.
like to stay under a 1000$ on the stove.

[PastorMikH]

This is the ONLY style wood stove I'd consider.



Had 2 in 2 different houses. In one house we heated with wood only - I started 1 fire and kept it burning for 3 months 'till I had to let it die so I could clean out the chimney, then lit another fire that lasted until spring. The beauty of the design is you have a tray underneath the grates that catches ashes and can be dumped while the fire is going.

The second house had a bad chimney so I ran a 6" piece of stove pipe down the brick chimney as a liner to keep sparks from leaving the chimney.

This pic is from NorthernTool.com but you should be able to pick up a stove like this from most farm stores.

[BigOlChiefsfan]

They cost more up front, but if you buy a stove with baffles (that slow gases so they burn completely) you'll save firewood over time, and that will save time and money. They're designed to burn a long time on one load of wood. I like Jotul. Their webpage will find nearby dealers. They're from Norway, and while the price isn't cheap when you figure the price of firewood there's a payback point. Plus, their rep. is good.

This model is the one I like - that 'extra' box on top lets the gases burn completely. When you toss in a log (up to 24"...longer is better) it'll burn completely, from one end to the other like a cigar. Pretty efficent little wood stove. You can 'see' the fire thru the door, which is kind of nice, but low on my list.


Jotul

[boogblaster]

Yea most farm stores like Orchlines or Sutherlands has decent stoves ... and like MikH I've ran pipe inside lots of old chimneys safely ... Those corn and pellet stoves are decent too ..

[MOhillbilly]

the problem with running a new flue down my old chimney is the i exhaust my gas heater and water heater out the same chimney.


what about heat exchangers? my house is 1200 sq ft. and was built in 27'. i have good storm windows but its still fairly drafty.

[PastorMikH]

Originally Posted by MOhillbilly

the problem with running a new flue down my old chimney is the i exhaust my gas heater and water heater out the same chimney.


what about heat exchangers? my house is 1200 sq ft. and was built in 27'. i have good storm windows but its still fairly drafty.

How hard would it be for you to fix the crack with fresh mortar? Can you get to it from the attic? Mortar really isn't hard to mix and work with. I bought a 60# bag this spring when I did my roof and had to flash the chimney - it was something like $4 for the bag - if you don't want to spend the $ though, I still have about 55# of it left over, you can have it if you want to come out and get it.

The chimney in the house we were in was so bad that the bricks had actually come apart and fallen off the house above the roof line. Inside most of the mortor was gone and bricks in the attic were loose. It was well beyond repair thus the reason why I put in the pipe.

If the crack can't be fixed, how dificult it would be to run the water heater and furnace through new pipes going through the roof? If they are in closets, you could run the pipe and no one would see it. The gas multi-wall chimney pipe isn't to exepnsive and with furnace and water heater gasses doesn't get hot enough to pose a threat to building materials on the way up and out. That way, the existing chimney would be soley for the fireplace and the pipe liner would still work.

The other option would be to put a new chimney through the roof that is rated for a wood stove (triple wall), though these are a bit more expensive - but would probably still pay for itself in the first winter or two over a gas furnace.

With 1,200 sq ft to heat, a stove like I put up can make you appreciate the drafts. In our old house, we had a thermometer in the kitchen where the stove was. There were times that the thermometer would read 75-80 degrees at eye level, 85-90 degrees at the ceiling, and 60-65 degrees at the floor.


The house we are in now has a fireplace with an air chamber that the furnace draws from. I can heat my entire house by funning the fan only on my furnace and pull air from around the fireplace through the ductwork. Its hard on wood and easy to get carried away with (nieghbors think we've lost it when it's 15 degrees out and we have the doors open) but we cut our gas bills by about 2/3 over the first winter we were in the house.

[PastorMikH]

On the drafts, we've lived in several old houses and have fought those quite a bit. I went beyond storm windows to plastic. We ran plastic past the window trim over the wall surface just under the curtains on every window. We got some kits from wall mart that had the clear plastic you could actually see through with a plastic molding that stuck to the wall with another plasitc piece that would snap in holding the plastic. You could then take a hair dryer, run it over the plastic and shrink it so that you couldn't see wrinkles or folds. Those worked pretty good for us.

Also, on the house with the bad chimney, it had been built 1890-1900 and had a rock foundation that had lots of air leaks causing major drafts. We put hay bales around the house.

Those two measures cut down most of our draft problems.

[Pablo]

Originally Posted by PastorMikH

On the drafts, we've lived in several old houses and have fought those quite a bit. I went beyond storm windows to plastic. We ran plastic past the window trim over the wall surface just under the curtains on every window. We got some kits from wall mart that had the clear plastic you could actually see through with a plastic molding that stuck to the wall with another plasitc piece that would snap in holding the plastic. You could then take a hair dryer, run it over the plastic and shrink it so that you couldn't see wrinkles or folds. Those worked pretty good for us.

Also, on the house with the bad chimney, it had been built 1890-1900 and had a rock foundation that had lots of air leaks causing major drafts. We put hay bales around the house.

Those two measures cut down most of our draft problems.

My grandma's house is old as hell with a rock foundation as well and had similar issues you talked about. She did both of these things as well and it cut down on the drafts significantly.

[MOhillbilly]

i would repair the chimney but theres creosote inbetween the studs to the rafter. not alot but enough i dont wanna screw with running a new flue through the old chimney just in case.

so triple walled is the way to go. i want it to be safe. doesnt really matter how much it costs cause im not heating with gas anymore. plenty of lumber to be had and ive got all the tools saw,spliter,trailer,truck ect.

[MOhillbilly]

Originally Posted by PastorMikH

This is the ONLY style wood stove I'd consider.



Had 2 in 2 different houses. In one house we heated with wood only - I started 1 fire and kept it burning for 3 months 'till I had to let it die so I could clean out the chimney, then lit another fire that lasted until spring. The beauty of the design is you have a tray underneath the grates that catches ashes and can be dumped while the fire is going.

The second house had a bad chimney so I ran a 6" piece of stove pipe down the brick chimney as a liner to keep sparks from leaving the chimney.

This pic is from NorthernTool.com but you should be able to pick up a stove like this from most farm stores.

ordered my stove today. got it from NorthernTool.com. looked around for about a week or so and even went to acouple places that sell that brand of stove. not only did they tell me that the mfg. was out till jan. but they couldnt even get close to that price.

when you say you ran stove pipe inside the chimney was it single or double walled? im going this route till next year.

thanks again Pastor. you were a bigtime help in this.

[Gonzo]

Mohillbilly's wood stove is leaving forever!!!! Noooooooo!!!!

[PastorMikH]

Originally Posted by MOhillbilly

ordered my stove today. got it from NorthernTool.com. looked around for about a week or so and even went to acouple places that sell that brand of stove. not only did they tell me that the mfg. was out till jan. but they couldnt even get close to that price.

when you say you ran stove pipe inside the chimney was it single or double walled? im going this route till next year.

thanks again Pastor. you were a bigtime help in this.

Glad to be of help. I've had two of those stoves at two different houses and loved them.

On my chimney, since it was already brick, just loose mortar, I ran a single wall pipe up it. Any chance you have room to run a 6" pipe up for the stove and still have room for a gas pipe for the furnace/water heater out of? Ours didn't but yours might be bigger.

[BIG_DADDY]

Originally Posted by PastorMikH

Glad to be of help. I've had two of those stoves at two different houses and loved them.

On my chimney, since it was already brick, just loose mortar, I ran a single wall pipe up it. Any chance you have room to run a 6" pipe up for the stove and still have room for a gas pipe for the furnace/water heater out of? Ours didn't but yours might be bigger.

I took the information too. Thanks pastor.

[MOhillbilly]

Originally Posted by PastorMikH

Glad to be of help. I've had two of those stoves at two different houses and loved them.

On my chimney, since it was already brick, just loose mortar, I ran a single wall pipe up it. Any chance you have room to run a 6" pipe up for the stove and still have room for a gas pipe for the furnace/water heater out of? Ours didn't but yours might be bigger.

yes and yes. slick. you didnt have any problems with the single walled though? cleaning, build up ect?

[PastorMikH]

Originally Posted by MOhillbilly

yes and yes. slick. you didnt have any problems with the single walled though? cleaning, build up ect?

I had problems at one angle point getting buildup of soot. (My setup was verticle from stove, 90 degree turn, horizontal to next 90 degree in chimney, then verticle all the way up and out.)

I was burning green wood though when it was bad. When the chimney got to where it wasn't drawing good, I knew it was time to clean out. With the green wood (burned it the first 2 years) I was having to clean the chimney out every 2 months or so. With seasoned wood I was cleaning it out once during the winter season.

The first couple of times I would brush the chimney, then take the stove pipe from the stove to the chimney out and clean out the soot. Being the poor, but creative redneck that I was at the time though, I progressed to the point where I would let the fire go out, climb up on the roof, brush the chimney, then drop a 10' stick of PVC pipe down the chimney, hook the shop vac up to it and suck out the soot without taking the pipe apart.