# Ducted Pellet Stove Solution for Heating 2 Areas



## Wire12xu (Dec 27, 2014)

Hi Everyone,

I'm a new member; hope you all had a good Christmas and you can find some time to go over my post.

*Background:*
We live in Cortland county upstate NY. Winters here can get severe.
The pellet stove/s will be our primary heat source.
House has 2 levels.
Main floor 900 sq. ft. open plan, 9' ceilings, renovated, foam insulation, double glazed windows, electric baseboard heating, ceiling fans. 2 bedrooms and bathroom off the main open area. Access to the basement via stairs from open area, door at basement level
Walk-out basement 900 sq. ft., open plan, to be renovated with foam insulation, double glazing, electric baseboards. There will be a spare bedroom, shower room and laundry room.
We spend most of our time on the main floor.
We intend to use the basement as a work area (computers), gym and general crafts area.
My wife has weak wrists, so loading chunks of wood is a problem. We prefer to use pellet. 

*Solutions:*
1. To use 2 stoves, one on the main floor and one in the basement. 
This will involve maintaining 2 stoves and filling with pellet - lot of work. Plus 2 sets of exhaust piping. We have had a quote using 2 Regency stoves including venting and installation of $12k
2. 1 stove in the basement. Heat rises, cut ducts in main floor and use fans to pull the heat up.
Basement may become too hot for me to work from home in there. Main floor may not get hot enough.
3. 1 stove (ie. Harman XXV) on the main floor - which is where we spend the bulk of our time.
Use the electric baseboard heating in the basement, which could be expensive.
4. 1 stove on the main floor, which will use internal blowers and ducts to push hot air into the basement.
This is my preferred solution. One heat source... see below

*Questions:*
Has anyone used a pellet stove with internal blowers to push hot air via ducts into another area of their home?
From my research there are 4 brands - Piazetta, Wittus, Ekotech and Rika. Does anyone have any experience of these brands? Are there other manufacturers?
The stoves are not cheap, but are comparable in cost to using a 2 stove + venting solution. The warranties are not as extensive as say Regency and spare parts could be expensive. Any thoughts?
Why do manufacturers use Majolica cladding?
I am leaning towards the Piazetta P963M, which uses 2 internal blowers, can support ducting of 40', 66lb hopper, can provide enough heat for 1800 sq. ft. Cost of $6k - only for the stove though. We have a local (25 miles away) reliable dealer who can install as well.

I would really appreciate any feedback.
We don't have a time restraint and we'll wait until we can find the best way to heat our home.
Thanks and Happy New Year,
Mark


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## begreen (Dec 27, 2014)

Welcome. Mechanical code does not allow a return air duct to be within 10 ft of the stove. Also, it is usually easier to work with nature than to fight it. Hot air wants to go up, not down. It is easier, safer and more efficient to blow cool air toward the stove room and let warm air replace the displaced cool air. 

Have you considered instead a pellet furnace? This would allow you to duct heat to the upstairs while having less blow into the basement. That will keep both levels more evenly heated. Otherwise I would consider having the stove in the basement near an open stairway. Then put two large, registers to the basement, close to the outside walls on the opposite ends of the house. These should have fusible-linked dampers for fire safety. Setup correctly the outside wall registers will act as cold air returns and the stairwell, and perhaps another supply register will convect heat upstairs.


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## Wire12xu (Dec 27, 2014)

begreen said:


> Welcome. Mechanical code does not allow a return air duct to be within 10 ft of the stove. Also, it is usually easier to work with nature than to fight it. Hot air wants to go up, not down. It is easier, safer and more efficient to blow cool air toward the stove room and let warm air replace the displaced cool air.
> 
> Have you considered instead a pellet furnace? This would allow you to duct heat to the upstairs while having less blow into the basement. That will keep both levels more evenly heated. Otherwise I would consider having the stove in the basement near an open stairway. Then put two large, registers to the basement, close to the outside walls on the opposite ends of the house. These should have fusible-linked dampers for fire safety. Setup correctly the outside wall registers will act as cold air returns and the stairwell, and perhaps another supply register will convect heat upstairs.



... Thanks for the prompt reply 'begreen'.
A furnace is a great suggestion. But, we like the looking at a burning stove.. it's cozy and relaxing. We spend most of our time on the main floor, so that's where we would like to site it. Been advised that placing a stove in the basement (even by the stairs) doesn't guarantee a warm main floor.
What do you mean by ' Mechanical code does not allow a return air duct to be within 10 ft of the stove' ?


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## Skier76 (Dec 27, 2014)

I believe he's speaking about the return to a central unit; heat, AC or one that's a combo.


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## papa bears stove (Dec 27, 2014)

Drolet, Osburn and Enerzone all make stoves that are able to run two seperate ducts up to 25 feet. The flame is visible on some of the pellet furnaces that are available.


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## Bioburner (Dec 27, 2014)

Lake Girl has a dual ducted Elena Ecoteck


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## Wire12xu (Dec 27, 2014)

Thanks...
No return involved on the ducting.
Used to supply hot air to the basement.


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## chken (Dec 27, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> Hi Everyone,
> 
> I'm a new member; hope you all had a good Christmas and you can find some time to go over my post.
> 
> ...


Send Pascal Maertens a PM, private message, he may be able to give you some thoughts on the multifuoco models of Piazzetta. I would also stop in the boiler forum as anyone who is considering two stoves or ductwork should also think about a pellet boiler or furnace option.  So much depends upon your layout, but the size of your floorpan does not scream to me 2 stoves.


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## mithesaint (Dec 27, 2014)

I like the pellet furnace option as well.  If that doesn't work for you, then I'd go with two stoves.  I have a multifuel furnace in my basement, and a multifuel stove in my living area.  It's nice that I don't have to rely totally on one stove, and neither stove has to work too hard.  Then if one breaks, I'm not burning propane.  I don't love two extra holes in the house, but those are fixable.


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## ScotL (Dec 29, 2014)

If you are replacing an oil boiler with hot water baseboard heat, a pellet boiler in the basement would be ideal. That's what I use.


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## acammer (Dec 29, 2014)

chken said:


> ... but the size of your floorpan does not scream to me 2 stoves.



Agreed - 1,800sq/ft sounds very do-able with one good stove and some creative air handling.  I'd also agree with everyone else, moving warm air down is really like trying to swim against the current, instead of drift with it.  Solution #2 sounds like the most practical/least expensive.  If ambiance and more precise temperature control are really important, than two stoves is the way to go.  I too enjoy the look of the flame, but I have one simple stove in the basement doing the whole house quite nicely as it was by far the best value for doing primary heat on pellets.


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## moey (Dec 29, 2014)

All I saw was $12k for a non automated heating solution. If that is in fact a realistic price you may want to have someone quote a geothermal system. We paid about $20k for ours for a house about 3000sq/ft.


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## Lake Girl (Dec 29, 2014)

Enviro also has the Maxx which is a ductable stove.  There is also the Maxx-M which is a multi-fuel.   http://enviro.com/products/catalogue/?f=Pellet&t=FS

Ecoteck - now Ravelli - does not make the Elena Air anymore.  Not sure what Ravelli has for new stove line.  The dual fan does get loud, we haven't used it yet as ductable due to its location and the recommended 10' duct length.  When we finally get it to its new location, it will be in area where the noise will not interfere and the duct length will be in line with recommendations.  The majolica sides act as a heat sink... they do make cleaning a bit more difficult because of the strip tease required but they sure are pretty

SBI has a pellet furnace with an optional electric element as backup and A/C option - called the Alterna.  It is pricey with the extras ... 
http://www.psg-distribution.com/product.aspx?CategoId=28&Id=542

Try a search on the forum ... there are examples of all the stoves you mentioned ... some with pictures so you get a better idea of what you're getting.  The Piazetta multi-fuco units may have different # than the one stated above.

Keep us posted!  Welcome to the forum


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## Lake Girl (Dec 29, 2014)

Piazetta multi-fuoco stoves - owners don't seem to be posting much...  there is one P963 installed in Chile on another thread!
https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/piazzetta-961.125841/#post-1695626


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## Wire12xu (Dec 29, 2014)

Lake Girl said:


> Piazetta multi-fuoco stoves - owners don't seem to be posting much...  there is one P963 installed in Chile on another thread!
> https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/piazzetta-961.125841/#post-1695626



Thanks 'Lake Girl'
We really like the aesthetics of the Piazetta 963M .. we're looking into the possibility of ducting into the basement, 20 ft or so.
Putting a stove in the basement might be tricky because I'll work about 25ft from it.. would this be too hot for me? Especially when the stove has to provide heat to the main floor?
Would extractor fans on the duct exit help - if the stove is on the main floor?
Would you know if the fans are noisy.. you mentioned this on your other post?
Thanks....


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## Wire12xu (Dec 29, 2014)

chken said:


> Send Pascal Maertens a PM, private message, he may be able to give you some thoughts on the multifuoco models of Piazzetta. I would also stop in the boiler forum as anyone who is considering two stoves or ductwork should also think about a pellet boiler or furnace option.  So much depends upon your layout, but the size of your floorpan does not scream to me 2 stoves.



Thanks 'chkn'
Would you know the handle for Pascal Maertens.. I can't find his ma,e on the forums when I search?


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## Wire12xu (Dec 29, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> Thanks 'chkn'
> Would you know the handle for Pascal Maertens.. I can't find his ma,e on the forums when I search?



'chken'.. found Pascal's handle.
Cheers


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## Hi-Standard (Dec 29, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> *Questions:*
> Has anyone used a pellet stove with internal blowers to push hot air via ducts into another area of their home?
> From my research there are 4 brands - Piazetta, Wittus, Ekotech and Rika. Does anyone have any experience of these brands? Are there other manufacturers?
> The stoves are not cheap, but are comparable in cost to using a 2 stove + venting solution. The warranties are not as extensive as say Regency and spare parts could be expensive. Any thoughts?
> ...



Wire12xu, I have a cheap Timber Ridge model 55-SHP10 pellet stove made by England Stove works. I used to have a Drolet wood stove in my basement. In order to get heat to my main floor with the wood stove, I installed a grate in my dining room floor just over the wood stove, and it worked great since wood stoves radiate heat upwards. However, when I removed the wood stove and installed the pellet stove in the basement, due to the existing flu I could tap into without cutting another hole in my house, I couldn't get any warm air up to the next level. My pellet stove blows all of its hot air out through the front like most pellet stoves do. My solution was to go to a tin smith and have him fabricate a collector, for lack of a better term, that just fits over the vents of my pellet stoves convection blower. This "collector" is connected to a 4" aluminium dryer vent hose and is vented directly into my existing grate in my dining room floor. My home has three levels about 600 sq/ft each. The basement gets heated by the radiant heat from the stove to 25 to 28 degrees celsius, while the main floor is about the same heat from the forced air of the pellet stoves convection blower. Upstairs, the bedrooms are about 20 degrees. The stove with the ducting on it looks as ugly as hell but it works, and we spend very little time in the basement anyway. When I want to see a nice flame, I turn on my electric fireplace without the heat while I watch tv. Currently it's -2C outside and my living room is 25C. My dining room is at 28C and my pellet stove is set at heat setting 3(it goes up to 9) while the blower speed is set at 9.


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## Wire12xu (Dec 29, 2014)

Hi-Standard said:


> Wire12xu, I have a cheap Timber Ridge model 55-SHP10 pellet stove made by England Stove works. I used to have a Drolet wood stove in my basement. In order to get heat to my main floor with the wood stove, I installed a grate in my dining room floor just over the wood stove, and it worked great since wood stoves radiate heat upwards. However, when I removed the wood stove and installed the pellet stove in the basement, due to the existing flu I could tap into without cutting another hole in my house, I couldn't get any warm air up to the next level. My pellet stove blows all of its hot air out through the front like most pellet stoves do. My solution was to go to a tin smith and have him fabricate a collector, for lack of a better term, that just fits over the vents of my pellet stoves convection blower. This "collector" is connected to a 4" aluminium dryer vent hose and is vented directly into my existing grate in my dining room floor. My home has three levels about 600 sq/ft each. The basement gets heated by the radiant heat from the stove to 25 to 28 degrees celsius, while the main floor is about the same heat from the forced air of the pellet stoves convection blower. Upstairs, the bedrooms are about 20 degrees. The stove with the ducting on it looks as ugly as hell but it works, and we spend very little time in the basement anyway. When I want to see a nice flame, I turn on my electric fireplace without the heat while I watch tv. Currently it's -2C outside and my living room is 25C. My dining room is at 28C and my pellet stove is set at heat setting 3(it goes up to 9) while the blower speed is set at 9.



Hi Hi-Standard,
That's impressive. I like the lateral thinking.. smart.
We really want to see the stove flame and snuggle up near it.
Spend most/all of our time on the main floor, so putting the stove in the basement involves re-configuring the home (not out of the question though)
Plus, I'll need to work from home in the basement, heat of 25 - 28 celsius might be tricky.
All the same, appreciate the reply.


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## Lake Girl (Dec 29, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> Thanks 'Lake Girl'
> We really like the aesthetics of the Piazetta 963M .. we're looking into the possibility of ducting into the basement, 20 ft or so.
> Putting a stove in the basement might be tricky because I'll work about 25ft from it.. would this be too hot for me? Especially when the stove has to provide heat to the main floor?
> Would extractor fans on the duct exit help - if the stove is on the main floor?
> ...



Probably best to have that chat with Pascal ...  tried to find a youtube to determine loudness w/o luck.


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## Hi-Standard (Dec 30, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> Hi Hi-Standard,
> That's impressive. I like the lateral thinking.. smart.
> We really want to see the stove flame and snuggle up near it.
> Spend most/all of our time on the main floor, so putting the stove in the basement involves re-configuring the home (not out of the question though)
> ...



25-28C is a little warm for most folks, but my wife is from Ontario where the summers get pretty hot so if she was in hell she'd ask the devil to turn up the thermostat another degree. In the meantime, the reason for my post was just to let you know that ducting into another room is  no big deal, and with regards to heat, just turn her down. Temperature went down to -5C last night and I left the stove on heat setting 1, basically just smouldering, and I woke up this morning to a very comfortable 22C living room. You could put your stove on the main floor if you like to see the fire, duct a little heat in the basement and use a ceiling fan in the basement to force the heat down. Also I discovered that Drolet makes a pellet stove designed  specifically for ducting at a cost of about $2600. Puts out about 65000 BTU's. I believe the model number is ECO-65.


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## bogieb (Dec 30, 2014)

acammer said:


> Agreed - 1,800sq/ft sounds very do-able with one good stove and some creative air handling.  I'd also agree with everyone else, moving warm air down is really like trying to swim against the current, instead of drift with it.  Solution #2 sounds like the most practical/least expensive.  If ambiance and more precise temperature control are really important, than two stoves is the way to go.  I too enjoy the look of the flame, but I have one simple stove in the basement doing the whole house quite nicely as it was by far the best value for doing primary heat on pellets.



One really never knows how the heat will act (regardless of whether heat rises or not). I have 950 s/f main floor and about 550 s/f unfinished basement. Originally I was going to go with two smaller stoves, but let myself be talked into a Harman P61A. The Harman should easily heat that area plus some (don't get me wrong - I love the Harman).

I found in my house that heat does not rise. I have cut holes in the floors, placed fans going up, down, sideways and angled thru the stairs (tried both up and down), and managed to get the basement in the high 80's, the living room in the high 60's (except in really cold weather) and the bedrooms, well the bedrooms would be in the 50's or 40's depending on outside temp and wind. I slept in my living room all winter and still had to run the propane boiler to ensure that the FHW pipes to the bedrooms didn't freeze.

Now, the bedrooms are over the garage, which stays about 10 degrees warmer than the outside. All that cold air infiltrates the floor, cooling the rooms off immensely. Over the summer I did add insulation to both the garage ceiling (and re-sheet rocked the ceiling) and demolished the exterior walls to add insulation, vapor barrier and thicker rock (from 1/4 to 1/2). Shortly before Thanksgiving, I added a used smaller stove (St. Croix Hastings) to my living room. It is a nice looking stove, and I love watching the flames, and it is wholly capable of heating the main floor by itself if needed.

So far I have been letting the Harman do the heavy lifting; running in room temp mode (72-75 degrees) 24/7. The Hastings is now run with a thermostat and runs non-continuously thru the night (I think it runs a total of 4 hours between two firings) and may not fire at all during the day between the Harman and sun helping to warm the place. Of course we haven't had any really cold weather yet, However, the Harman isn't working nearly as hard, the upstairs is warmer (bedrooms are 69-72 with living room at 75-78), and it seems as though I am going thru less pellets than I did late last spring when I was using just the Harman. Next spring (shoulder season) I may just let the Harman rest and let the Hastings heat the upstairs only.

Keep in mind that my upstairs is not open concept. But, I thought I would share my experience with heat not rising nearly as much as all the experts I talked to expected. In fact, what I find, is that heat rises to meet heat much better than it rises to replace cold air. If I had done the two stoves to begin with, I would have had a much warmer winter last year (and my total $$ outlay would have been less as I could have gone with a smaller Harman). One last thought if you do go the 2 stove route - you may want to do the Harman downstairs as I have done. My experience so far has said that the downstairs stove does more work because some of the heat does rise. So, I am happy that I have a very easy stove to take care of down there. I would really hate it if I had the stoves reversed as the Hastings would require maintenance every day, where as the Harman requires only pellets and a swift scrape of the burn pot.


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## bogieb (Dec 30, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> Hi Everyone,
> 
> *Solutions:*
> 1. To use 2 stoves, one on the main floor and one in the basement.
> ...



I think you will find that maintaining two stoves is not necessarily twice the work of maintaining 1 stove. You should actually use a little less pellet-wise (neither stove works as hard), so the maintenance is spread out over more time (if use of one stove would mean weekly deep maintenance, the two stoves may make that every 10-14 days). Sure the actual stove cleaning time will be x2, but the daily maintenance and pellet feeding may not be on a linear scale. And if you can get a hopper extension for at least one of the stoves (like I have for the Harman), then the pellet feeding interval is extended and you can load up enough to last for 30-48 hours versus loading for 13-24.

Not trying to talk you out of ducted stove (which may be the best way for your needs and situation), just giving you my experience.


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## Tim_M (Dec 30, 2014)

Hi-Standard said:


> Wire12xu, I have a cheap Timber Ridge model 55-SHP10 pellet stove made by England Stove works. I used to have a Drolet wood stove in my basement. In order to get heat to my main floor with the wood stove, I installed a grate in my dining room floor just over the wood stove, and it worked great since wood stoves radiate heat upwards. However, when I removed the wood stove and installed the pellet stove in the basement, due to the existing flu I could tap into without cutting another hole in my house, I couldn't get any warm air up to the next level. My pellet stove blows all of its hot air out through the front like most pellet stoves do. My solution was to go to a tin smith and have him fabricate a collector, for lack of a better term, that just fits over the vents of my pellet stoves convection blower. This "collector" is connected to a 4" aluminium dryer vent hose and is vented directly into my existing grate in my dining room floor. My home has three levels about 600 sq/ft each. The basement gets heated by the radiant heat from the stove to 25 to 28 degrees celsius, while the main floor is about the same heat from the forced air of the pellet stoves convection blower. Upstairs, the bedrooms are about 20 degrees. The stove with the ducting on it looks as ugly as hell but it works, and we spend very little time in the basement anyway. When I want to see a nice flame, I turn on my electric fireplace without the heat while I watch tv. Currently it's -2C outside and my living room is 25C. My dining room is at 28C and my pellet stove is set at heat setting 3(it goes up to 9) while the blower speed is set at 9.



My situation is very similar to what Hi-Standard describes. I have 2 stoves - basement and main floor - but get by running just my basement stove down to about -2 C ( depending on wind, etc). I distribute the heat from my basement stove by way of 2 dryer ducts ( see pic). It's not pretty but it's fairly effective. The duct on the left side directs heat to a basement bedroom thru a vent cut out in a side wall, and is adjustable by sliding the stove-end of the duct to capture more or less of the air coming from that side of the stove. The one on the right directs heat to my living room on the main level thru a vent in the ceiling. This year I installed a small 4" duct-booster fan in the duct on the right side, which helps a bit in getting more air to the main level.

This set-up works well on my Invincible with its 2 smallish air outlets, one one either side. It would be more difficult to configure on a lot of stoves that just have one large outlet.


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## Arti (Dec 30, 2014)

I run a pellet Furnace in the basement to heat the house to 70 degrees F. I have a small pellet Stove in the parlor to keep that a few degrees warmer, also like to watch the fire at night. On warmer days I burn the parlor stove only. Both are on thermostat's I've found that doing it this way we really don't use much more fuel a little more time spent cleaning, like the idea that if something goes wrong with a pellet burner we have a backup.
Oddly enough we have had a couple of different stoves in the parlor and the heat distribution is different although they sit in the same place?


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## the cug (Dec 30, 2014)

sounds like 2 pellet stoves would be better unless u get a furnace with ducting.. I agree its hard to get heat up to the 2nd and 3rd floors especially in the northern regions. re-insulating goes a long way also.


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## bigdaddygrow (Dec 30, 2014)

I have 2 augers upper and lower yesterday the top one stopped working ..I cleaned out all the pellets and nothing .. I took the wires from the bottom motor and hooked them to to the top motor and it worked ... and of course the bottom one didn't ... any suggestions where to go from here ???<br/>


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## sportbikerider78 (Dec 30, 2014)

I'm just north of you in Jamesville...South of Syracuse.  Welcome.

To me, I would be looking only at a pellet furnace.  They are designed to be a primary heating source.  

I'm all about purpose built devices.  Figure out what you want and then buy the device that is designed to do that.  
Having 2 pellet stoves going all the time would be something I would not want to do.  It is just not something I would take on.


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## Wire12xu (Dec 30, 2014)

*Update....
*
Well, firstly I'd like to thank _everyone _for their feedback - marvelous, thank you!!

Having spoken (again) with our reliable dealer the Piazetta 963 is NOT the way to go.
It puts out 50,000 BTU which will not provide enough heat for the main floor and heating ducts into the basement. Plus this 'ferrari' stove will require more maintenance than others.
We live (by choice) in a very rural area, 15 miles from the nearest towns.. so servicing could become expensive.
Using a pellet furnace in the basement will heat the house but, doesn't give us the aesthetic of a real flame. So, we'll put this option to one side.

Now.. you may hate this 180 degree turn.
We're now looking to go with the 2 stove solution.
Not pellet, but wood - compressed wood bricks... _Any Thoughts?_
Due to our rural location, we think it'll be best to keep the stove simple, plus my wife will be able to handle the smaller sized bricks.
Delivery of the bricks doesn't seem to be issue, we can load up in summer and there's a few local heating shops that can provide them.

For our home size, 900 sq ft main floor and 900 basement. We're thinking of 2 Regency CS 1200 stoves, each with 55,000 BTUs. Regency also do a larger stove at 75,000 BTUs.. 2 of these (I think) will be over kill.. _What do think?
_
The more I look into this, the more I'm finding issues/snags with each solution I/the forum come up. But then again the forum is giving me great alternatives too.
I suppose it's a learning process.


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## chken (Dec 30, 2014)

I'm biased of course, as I have a Piazzetta, but, I think your house doesn't need 2 stoves given that it's 900sqft on an open main floor with redone insulation, etc. My Piazzetta is only 47k btus and it heats over 3000sqft of space in my home, and I think it would easily heat 1800sqft of space, including your basement.

As for maintenance, there are two dealers who have posted on Hearth who have P963 and love them, one is Pascal. I hope you got a chance to get in touch with him. My Piazzetta is super easy to maintain. There's a recent thread where I'm quite sure Pascal said his P963 maintenance routine is similar to mine. I only fill the hopper during the week, nothing else. I don't have any daily scraping routine. On the weekend, I shut it down and give it a thorough 20 minute cleaning. At this time of year it's about 10 bags between any cleaning. Once a month, I do the leaf blower trick. I just did it this weekend, since it was so warm, and there was literally no ash at all. That's it. It can't get any easier than that. Certainly a wood stove even with biobricks isn't easier.

I would do a search on P963 and contact both Pascal and the other dealer who posted here last season. They both were enthusiastic about the stove, enough so that I was wishing I had gotten that stove rather than my Sabrina.


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## Lake Girl (Dec 30, 2014)

bigdaddygrow said:


> I have 2 augers upper and lower yesterday the top one stopped working ..I cleaned out all the pellets and nothing .. I took the wires from the bottom motor and hooked them to to the top motor and it worked ... and of course the bottom one didn't ... any suggestions where to go from here ???<br/>



Should go to the main page of the pellet mill forum and start a new thread with your stove name and problem in the title ...


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## chken (Dec 30, 2014)

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/piazzetta-961.125841/

https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads...little-secrets-you-would-like-to-know.129833/

I realized that there are P961 and P962, so that you need to search for those as well as P963 to find others with a Piazzetta multifuocco stove, i.e. ones with ducting.


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## Lake Girl (Dec 30, 2014)

The bricks you refer to have a learning curve of their own.  About a month ago there were warnings on the news about the high heat output that is not as easily controlled as cord wood.  Not sure about overnight holding power either.  Good luck with your choices ... might want to start a new thread in the wood stove section.


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## Wire12xu (Dec 30, 2014)

chken said:


> I'm biased of course, as I have a Piazzetta, but, I think your house doesn't need 2 stoves given that it's 900sqft on an open main floor with redone insulation, etc. My Piazzetta is only 47k btus and it heats over 3000sqft of space in my home, and I think it would easily heat 1800sqft of space, including your basement.
> 
> As for maintenance, there are two dealers who have posted on Hearth who have P963 and love them, one is Pascal. I hope you got a chance to get in touch with him. My Piazzetta is super easy to maintain. There's a recent thread where I'm quite sure Pascal said his P963 maintenance routine is similar to mine. I only fill the hopper during the week, nothing else. I don't have any daily scraping routine. On the weekend, I shut it down and give it a thorough 20 minute cleaning. At this time of year it's about 10 bags between any cleaning. Once a month, I do the leaf blower trick. I just did it this weekend, since it was so warm, and there was literally no ash at all. That's it. It can't get any easier than that. Certainly a wood stove even with biobricks isn't easily
> 
> I would do a search on P963 and contact both Pascal and the other dealer who posted here last season. They both were enthusiastic about the stove, enough so that I was wishing I had gotten that stove rather than my Sabrina.




Thanks 'chken'
The important thing for me is to site the stove on the main floor - to enjoy the flame and heat.
That leaves the basement without heat - cost of the Piazatta is $6000, so I'll run out of funds to heat the basement.
I had the idea of using ducted heated from the Piazetta to heat the basement.. but with 5K BTU it may not work + not even sure ducting heat 10ft below the Piazetta will work... my dealer cannot assure me of this.
Piazetta looks stunning, maybe I can cope with the maintenance.. but for $6k must be able to have the Piazetta on the main floor and heat the basement.


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## chken (Dec 30, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> Thanks 'chken'
> The important thing for me is to site the stove on the main floor - to enjoy the flame and heat.
> That leaves the basement without heat - cost of the Piazatta is $6000, so I'll run out of funds to heat the basement.
> I had the idea of using ducted heated from the Piazetta to heat the basement.. but with 5K BTU it may not work + not even sure ducting heat 10ft below the Piazetta will work... my dealer cannot assure me of this.
> Piazetta looks stunning, maybe I can cope with the maintenance.. but for $6k must be able to have the Piazetta on the main floor and heat the basement.


I'd contact Pascal and the other people who have the ducted stoves, like Solarstar and P962man, to get their actual experiences living with the stove and its capabilities


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## p962man (Dec 31, 2014)

Hi Everyone,

It has been a very busy hearth season for us here in PA so I haven't been on the boards much, but I just stumbled across this thread and wanted to weigh in.

Mark- I am a Piazzetta dealer(among many other products) in Central PA and have a P962 installed my home. This is the second season this unit has been operating and I am very pleased with how it performs. I have a late 60's construction two story colonial approx. 2100 sq. ft. The two story portion of the house is the bulk of my square footage, however there is an attached one story garage in front/family room in back. It has original windows and lets just say it is apparent that insulating homes in that era was not a high priority. With that said, I have the 962 installed in my first floor dining room which backs up to the garage. The vent runs horizontally through that wall into the garage, then proceeds vertical through the ceiling into an attic space above the garage and out through the roof. This was all done with 4" ICC pellet vent. Since all the 96 SY series stoves have dual convection fans, I decided to leave one fan dedicated to heating the first floor with out ductwork and I ducted the second fan out to follow the vent pipe up into the attic space. I used old 3" Simpson Duravent pellet vent as the duct work inside the garage up into the attic at which point I split that into two separate insulated flex ducts back into the second story bedrooms on that side of the house and terminated each one with the Piazzetta wall registers. Both bedrooms are occupied by my sons (3yrs. & 19months) which was the reason for engineering a way to heat the upstairs. The stove does a great job of heating my house as best as it can in a "compartmentalized" floor plan. The ducts upstairs really keep the rooms nice and the stairs in the center of the second floor act as a great return air duct to the stove downstairs.

As far as maintenance, as long as your dealer has a good working knowledge of the operating systems and it is set up correctly at installation, they are no more needy than any other stove out there. I have intentionally neglected cleaning my stove recently as a test case and it ran for 6 1/2 days without shutting off before I turned it off to clean it. There was very little buildup in the firepot, I mainly shut it down because the flyash was starting to overflow down into the firepot. I should mention that I was burning Wood Pellet Co. pellets during that time, which as far as I know are a middle of the road pellet. I usually burn Greene Gold pellets but due to lack of supply, I have burning whatever is available. These stove are extremely easy to clean- no tubes, just remove the cast iron baffles plates and everything is accessible. The technology built into the software is great, all the parameters are adjustable (by your dealer  ) to adapt to different installations. 

I have a P963 installed in my showroom and I am equally as impressed with it, although I do not have ductwork installed with that stove (yet). As of this year, Piazzetta consolidated the pellet stove line from three different chassis in each size (P955,956,957 & P960,961,962) to one chassis in each size (P958 & P963) with several different ceramic choices for each. Otherwise, it is basically the same stove as the previous versions. 

Of course I am bias because I sell them, but I would highly recommend Piazzetta to someone interested in heating with pellets. I apologize to all the Ecoteck (Ravelli) owners out there, but I used to sell them and I cannot give the same recommendation. 

Hope this helps, feel free to PM with any questions. Happy New Year!

Justin


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## Highbeam (Dec 31, 2014)

Wire12xu said:


> *Update....
> *
> Well, firstly I'd like to thank _everyone _for their feedback - marvelous, thank you!!
> 
> ...


 
Bad idea. Burning biologs in a noncat regency is asking for trouble. The biologs burn hot, explosively so, in a noncat woodstove. If you got a better woodstove that was a cat model like a BK then you can get enough control to burn them safely and with long load intervals. I've gotten an easy 24 hours with biologs on mine but I would much rather burn cordwood. You can buy firewood? Is it not cheaper than buying biologs on a btu basis?

Woodstoves are great for burning wood, a couple of them are pretty good at burning biologs, but if you want an appliance to burn compressed sawdust then buy a pellet stove.

I think you have a dealer trying to sell you whatever he sells.


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## Wire12xu (Dec 31, 2014)

Highbeam said:


> Bad idea. Burning biologs in a noncat regency is asking for trouble. The biologs burn hot, explosively so, in a noncat woodstove. If you got a better woodstove that was a cat model like a BK then you can get enough control to burn them safely and with long load intervals. I've gotten an easy 24 hours with biologs on mine but I would much rather burn cordwood. You can buy firewood? Is it not cheaper than buying biologs on a btu basis?
> 
> Woodstoves are great for burning wood, a couple of them are pretty good at burning biologs, but if you want an appliance to burn compressed sawdust then buy a pellet stove.
> 
> I think you have a dealer trying to sell you whatever he sells.



Isn't a cat stove more complicated than a regular wood stove, more maintenance and more chance of going wrong?
You could well be right about the dealer..
Thanks.


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## Highbeam (Dec 31, 2014)

I have had both noncat and cat stoves. Still have a noncat in the shop, a very nice englander that only cost 800$ new, see if your regency guy can match that! The cat stoves are slightly more complicated to run since there is one more lever that you have to move when you open the door and before the fire gets hot but this is very minor and easily becomes routine. There are no less things to go wrong, the noncat has soft roof baffles that can break and the cat element has a 10 year warranty but I expect to replace it after 5 years. WAY less complicated to run or fix than a pellet stove.

If you expect to heat full time with wood then a cat stove from Blazeking or woodstock is far superior in efficiency and burn times than any non-cat.

For the record, I tested 240 lbs of biologs in my stoves last month in both stoves. I hated them. They were smokey and hard to light with a very non-linear heat output, they burst at the beginning and then burned much cooler for the remainder. They worked but they didn't work as well as cordwood.


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## Lake Girl (Dec 31, 2014)

Highbeam said:


> I have had both noncat and cat stoves.
> 
> For the record, I tested 240 lbs of biologs in my stoves last month in both stoves. I hated them. They were smokey and hard to light with a very non-linear heat output, they burst at the beginning and then burned much cooler for the remainder. They worked but they didn't work as well as cordwood.



Thanks Highbeam for hopping in here with your experiences ... I called my son who has a fireplace in the condo he rents and warned him about the biologs when I saw the news article.  He doesn't have much experience with wood stoves or fireplaces - just bonfires - and with those its always go big or go home


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## Lake Girl (Dec 31, 2014)

p962man said:


> ...Of course I am bias because I sell them, but I would highly recommend Piazzetta to someone interested in heating with pellets. I apologize to all the Ecoteck (Ravelli) owners out there, but I used to sell them and I cannot give the same recommendation.  ... Justin



My Ecoteck has been good to us ... but they don't make the Elena Air anymore.  Had the Piazzettas been around, especially the multi-fuoco, they would have had serious consideration as I like the easier cleaning routine they seem to have.

Have they sorted out the problem with baffle warp?


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## Highbeam (Dec 31, 2014)

Lake Girl said:


> Thanks Highbeam for hopping in here with your experiences ... I called my son who has a fireplace in the condo he rents and warned him about the biologs when I saw the news article.  He doesn't have much experience with wood stoves or fireplaces - just bonfires - and with those its always go big or go home


 
The directions say a max of two or three biologs. 9 is fine (safe) in a cat stove. That load smoked blue for 20 hours but made good heat. The last 10 hours were significantly cooler but burning smoke free. My goal was going smoke free with them and I've never been so embarrased to be a woodburner as a whole day of belching smoke.

The next day, back to cordwood and nothing but heat waves so everything was working well but the fuel source is weird. If it wasn't for the smoke I could actually get by pretty easily on these things cost isn't much different than buying prepared wood. Not sure if that constant smoke would muck up my chimney.

Anyway, sorry for the tangent. I am looking at pellets as a method of burning smoke free and stealth while also diversifying my fuel sources. Thought wood biologs in a good woodstove would be similar to pellet stove but it is not.


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## Lake Girl (Dec 31, 2014)

Highbeam said:


> The directions say a max of two or three biologs. 9 is fine (safe) in a cat stove. That load smoked blue for 20 hours but made good heat. The last 10 hours were significantly cooler but burning smoke free. My goal was going smoke free with them and I've never been so embarrased to be a woodburner as a whole day of belching smoke.



Bust on that goal....


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