Talk about simple, I was amazed today a barrel stove heating a large house

[drizler]

I got to looking at my neighbors basement and he showed me what he used to heat his house these days. Its a nice pretty one and well made but its nothing but a barrel stove. Best of all he has it encased in a tin walled room and above it is an old hot water heater around 30 gallons. painted black. He has that plumbed into his boilers super cell and it pretty much heats all his hot water. Using a hot water tank allowed him to put the pressure safety valve on top and plumb right in. What a simple rig. I will never laugh at a barrel stove again. Best of all he said he made the insurance company come out and it passed muster for them. I don't know if the hot water rig was on there at that time but it surprised me they were ok with a barrel stove in the basement to begin with.

 

[berlin]

you're in chazy, ny, of course the insurance guy didn't object, every other house is heated by a barrel stove, he'd have no business. lol, i've got a house on the lake in pt. auroche, ny, so i know chazy well.

 

[drizler]

No kidding Berlin .you must be just down the road from me . They have been catching on lately around here. When I first came here in 88 you could go get a building permit to build a garage with a hand drawn set of plans showing how far apart you are going to make the studs.. Nowdays they want a permit to put in a sandbox so don't ask don't tell is the word.. Tell me that you are burning coal over there and can get it at a decent price. I can't even find a place around here who sells the stuff besides in a bag of rice coal.. I haven't seen so many houses lately with smoking chimneys where I am along Lake shore.Rd.. We have had an explosion of big expensive houses going in and I am sure the oil companies are having a field day. I am glad to have a smaller place sitting in a cow pasture way off the road. A guy I work with just bought a place on the lake near the Landing. I told him that our favorite tax assessor will be paying him a visit with her micrometer in one hand and that famous camera she always carries in the other. Lots of places along the lake gone up for sale lately due to those monster taxes..

 

[crazy_dan]

barrel stoves are great at heating a place. Sometimes too good and catch the place on fire. they are not very safe, but I have heated with them before.

 

[drizler]

How long do they last anyways, his is pretty old? I thought they only lasted a few years.

 

[bcnu]

My BIL has had his current barrel stove in the house for 23 years. It's the main source of heat and it gets used. So, for about $100 bucks in parts etc he's gotten a pretty good return on his investment. Just visited them this weekend and that stove does a nice job of keeping the place warm.

 

[swestall]

I have two opinions on this and they are on opposite ends of the issue.

First: Being old school we uses to do a lot of things in the old days and seemed to get by just fine. We had base burners that had just a steel liner no thicker than a barrel, we had non air tight units made by companies all over the USA. People heated their homes with all these. "Yankees" don't much like being told they can't or shouldn't use much of anything and see it as a matter of personal choice.

Second: Stove design has come so far since the old days. Today's modern EPA approved efficient stoves use so much less wood and generate so much heat that they are really the only way to go. And, with the reasonable prices of the Englander stoves at HD and Lowe's it is hard to understand why someone would not install one and be totally safe.

When you are using something that has always been OK it may continue to be OK. Eventually, it is not going to be OK. We all just have to hope that when that happens the person that owns the property is there to get it under control and we don't have to hear another story of a family that is no longer with us.

The closest I have ever been to a barrel stove is my "FORCE" 200K/BTU that heats my shop. It only burns when I am there and always wide open so there is no smoke and no build up in the stack.

We used to burn in a barrel in the back yard in the 50's, but they outlawed that.

 

[chrisman34]

:roll: We used to insure a place with a barrel stove....the guy knew it was leaking hot coals on the floor... and well he came home to a barell stove and chimney I will see if I can find the pics...There was NOTHING but barell stove and chimney!

 

[Henz]

we had one in our work shop..We had to re-build the work shop...............

 

[Chell]

I knew a family in Montana that had a large house with a mobile home on top of it (partially into a hill), and they heated entirely with a barrel stove that sat in the entry. The home was toasty, and not in the bad, burned to the ground way. Not sure what insurance is like out there now, but that wouldn't go over so big with Minnesota insurance companies.

 

[Henz]

THATS WHAT OURS HAD, one 55gal barrel on top, one on the bottom