Lopi Revere vs Blaze King Princess

[RidgeHiker]

Hi folks,

This is my first posting.

I have lurked around a while, did searches, etc. and narrowed my selection to these two inserts. I would appreciate any insights. Our home is an older log house, about 1200sf in snow country - gets below freezing most winter nights and usually in teens and 20's (farenheit).

My advantages/disadvantages are:

Lopi Revere:
+ Has cook top for kettle, etc. (wife does not do well in dry air & can cook when power out).
+ Probably heavier built but may not matter (weighs extra 55 lbs. and I think thicker steel).
+ Takes 18" logs.
+ Seems simpler and more basic.
- Not much depth to collect ashes.

Blaze King Princess:
+ Long burn times.
+ Probably uses less wood (as per dealer) & higher efficiency rating .
+ Thermostat controls fire (may be advantage - ??)
+ Xlnt depth for ashes.
- No area for kettle.
- Must replace catalytic combustor in 5-7 years (hmmm, what if they are out of business and extra cost)

Any helpful comments would be much appreciated!

 

[Highbeam]

Have you gotten prices? The BKs are very expensive. You'll be burning softwood probably so the BK is the only one that will make it through the night. The efficiency rating of a stove is useless but you are probably right that the BK will use less of it.

I would honestly go with the BK if price was not an issue.

 

[RidgeHiker]

Thanks Highbeam,

The Lopi is a few hundred less expensive without the blower and about the same if I get one.

I am not going to do my own install and am still trying to get an idea of the costs there.

 

[RidgeHiker]

From my lurkings it does not seem that there are a lot of Blaze King owners on the forum. Is this true? Is there a reason? Is that why there have not been many responses to this topic?

 

[myzamboni]

Send a PM to North of 60. He went from a Napolean stove he hated to the Blaze King which he appears to really like (and his handle is his location and it gets friggin' cold where he is)

 

[KeithO]

If you have to burn softwood, there is no substitute for a CAT stove. Softwood can have a significant BTU rating because of the resin content, but you will never get a decent burn time in a non cat stove, since the coaling stage is so short. Furthermore, it is all to easy to overfire a non cat stove when burning a big load of dry pine, since all of the volatives are released at the start of the burn, which is too much for a non cat to deal with (lots of people will warn against loading up the firebox full of pine or dimensional lumber). The catalytic stove thrives on a smouldering fire, once the cat has been brought up to operating temp first (very important). From that point, when the cat is engaged and lit off, one can drastically cut back on the air supply and the cat will burn all of the smoke and provide a long clean burn.

The only better solution is of course a masonry heater with better efficiency and less work (once or twice daily burn), but a much higher investment. Cat stoves and masonry heaters suit softwood down to a T.

 

[d.n.f.]

I personally know two people with blaze kings (one five years, one two winters now). They both burn 24/7. They both love their stove and wonder why they didn't buy one years ago.
They do have a bigger following up here in Canada.
The stove is huge and you fill the box and come back 8 to 12 hours later to check it.
No idea what a cat costs as neither has had to replace.
We have a good dealer network out my way. Home Hardware even sells them.
Did I say they are huge? And ugly? My wife gave it the thumbs down.
I would buy one.
Oh, and out here everyone burns pine/birch/fir.

 

[RidgeHiker]

Thanks Keith O and d.n.f. Your feedback was very helpful. You both hit it - I will probably be burning softwoods, fir, pine, and some cedar. If I can I will also get some oak or madrone (I think you refer to it as arbutus in Canada - it is one of my favorite trees).

 

[KeithO]

DNF, there are 3 versions of the Princess. The usual god awful slightly rounded on the sides lump (has the longest burn times) and the other more rectangular and dressy version. I find the pedestal version to be less awful, provided you get a black door instead of the gold plated version (who the heck works in their styling dept ?).

 

[akhilljack]

there are tons and tons of them here. every other person has a blaze king. you dont see too many of them on this web site because they never have any worries because the stoves are so great and it gets realy cold here. they are just a little expensive but its worht every penny. i don t personaly like the asthetics though. they look big and blan. not very much style but they function very well.

 

[d.n.f.]

Well my friends have no taste obviously. I agree, they would sell more if they improved the look (or so says the wife).

 

[North of 60]

DNF, there are 3 versions of the Princess. The usual god awful slightly rounded on the sides lump (has the longest burn times) and the other more rectangular and dressy version. I find the pedestal version to be less awful, provided you get a black door instead of the gold plated version (who the heck works in their styling dept ?).

I dont call your kids ugly. :cheese:
The BK KE1107 and the Princess comes in all those layouts of those pics plus the princess has an insert model. The KE1107 is the 4cuft fire box.
Buckleys tastes bad but it works. I find the pedestal model attractive. The satin trim looks good on this one. I also
like the looks of tractors though.
Hiker I will PM you after my kids are fed. If you click on my N of 60 you can check out my posts and opinions for now.
Cheers.

 

[Todd]

DNF, there are 3 versions of the Princess. The usual god awful slightly rounded on the sides lump (has the longest burn times) and the other more rectangular and dressy version. I find the pedestal version to be less awful, provided you get a black door instead of the gold plated version (who the heck works in their styling dept ?).

I don't think they are any uglier than all the other steel box stoves, I kind a like the parlor model. If I wanted a steel stove Blaze King would be at the top of the list.

 

[d.n.f.]

Hey man, it don't bother me. I still think they could update it a bit. Like I said, the people I know that have one love it.

I am just quoting the wife.

 

[R&D Guy]

Few things I'd keep in mind is what restrictions you have with a cat stove, e.g; all the little No-No's like no color newspaper. On most models I've seen the bypass must be open when you open the door to keep the cat from exploding, and you have to keep the cat hot or it doesn't work etc.

Drawbacks with a non-cat stove; Unless the tubes are stainless steel, they'll also have to be replaced in 4 to 5 years too.

I am a little surprised at how often I see posts about which wood stove is more efficient as if there is a real big difference with wood, while the second part of the post is about adding heat shields and double walled pipe to get close clearances. Obviously the 2 work against each other and the mfg will always test/design best case efficiency which is exactly why some stoves need a bottom and side heat shields to be near a wall or sit on a hearth less than 2" thick. My concerns would be more in line with yours - is a cat worth it, and is the burn time really that long. Hopefully more BK owners can chime in.

 

[North of 60]

Few things I'd keep in mind is what restrictions you have with a cat stove, e.g; all the little No-No's like no color newspaper. On most models I've seen the bypass must be open when you open the door to keep the cat from exploding, and you have to keep the cat hot or it doesn't work etc.

????????????????????????????????????????????????
R&D;you need to do some more R.

 

[daleeper]

Few things I'd keep in mind is what restrictions you have with a cat stove, e.g; all the little No-No's like no color newspaper. On most models I've seen the bypass must be open when you open the door to keep the cat from exploding, and you have to keep the cat hot or it doesn't work etc.

Where have you heard or read about a cat exploding? I have never seen or heard of this happening.

Also, a non-cat also has to be up to temperature for secondary combustion to take place. If my research is correct, secondary combustion will take place at a lower temperature for a cat than a non-cat stove.

 

[KeithO]

Actually, the purpose most times of opening the bypass before reloading is to avoid pulling all that cool air through the cat, which would mean it would take longer to heat up afterward. Plus you generally disturb ash when reloading and you do want to avoid getting ash into the cat as much as possible. Finally, the stove and flue gasses do need to warm back up to operational temperature after reloading, before engaging the cat again, and that only takes a few minutes.

One does indeed need to consider that things like sulphur and heavy metals will poison the catalyst over time. Most people don't know that all glossy paper is coated with metal oxides, and that is before one gets into what the print houses then put on the blank paper in the form of inks etc. So the recommendation to avoid anything but newsprint on the paper side of the equation sounds grounded to me. But the comment regarding the cat exploding makes me laugh, since the ceramic used has been specially developed to have the lowest expansion coefficient possible, specifically to avoid issues relating to thermal shock. Now if the cat were glowing red hot at reload time (which it generally does not - I mean you typically reload because the fire has burnt down) and you immediately re-engaged it, there will be a lot of hydrocarbons (smoke) to burn and you might hear this fuel get ignited with a "womp" sound. But no cat exploding I'm afraid.

Few things I'd keep in mind is what restrictions you have with a cat stove, e.g; all the little No-No's like no color newspaper. On most models I've seen the bypass must be open when you open the door to keep the cat from exploding, and you have to keep the cat hot or it doesn't work etc.

????????????????????????????????????????????????
R&D;you need to do some more R.

 

[Highbeam]

The BK stoves, at least the big one, have a very impressive blower on tehm as I recall. High CFM to really help move the heat. As long as the thermostatic air control works I think it is a great idea to help even out the heat output which is one of the reasons I went with soapstone.

 

[RidgeHiker]

What if Blaze King went out of business. Would I be able to replace the catalytic combustor?

 

[R&D Guy]

Where have you heard or read about a cat exploding? I have never seen or heard of this happening.

Also, a non-cat also has to be up to temperature for secondary combustion to take place. If my research is correct, secondary combustion will take place at a lower temperature for a cat than a non-cat stove.

True - it's best when the secondaries are hot, but they will inject air into the flame whether hot of cold. That's all I'm trying to say.

 

[North of 60]

Where have you heard or read about a cat exploding? I have never seen or heard of this happening.

Also, a non-cat also has to be up to temperature for secondary combustion to take place. If my research is correct, secondary combustion will take place at a lower temperature for a cat than a non-cat stove.

True - it's best when the secondaries are hot, but they will inject air into the flame whether hot of cold. That's all I'm trying to say.

Why would you be opening the door when the secondaries are going?

 

[R&D Guy]

Actually, the purpose most times of opening the bypass before reloading is to avoid pulling all that cool air through the cat, which would mean it would take longer to heat up afterward. Plus you generally disturb ash when reloading and you do want to avoid getting ash into the cat as much as possible. Finally, the stove and flue gasses do need to warm back up to operational temperature after reloading, before engaging the cat again, and that only takes a few minutes.

......But the comment regarding the cat exploding makes me laugh, since the ceramic used has been specially developed to have the lowest expansion coefficient possible, specifically to avoid issues relating to thermal shock. Now if the cat were glowing red hot at reload time (which it generally does not - I mean you typically reload because the fire has burnt down) and you immediately re-engaged it, there will be a lot of hydrocarbons (smoke) to burn and you might hear this fuel get ignited with a "womp" sound. But no cat exploding I'm afraid.

Few things I'd keep in mind is what restrictions you have with a cat stove, e.g; all the little No-No's like no color newspaper. On most models I've seen the bypass must be open when you open the door to keep the cat from exploding, and you have to keep the cat hot or it doesn't work etc.

????????????????????????????????????????????????
R&D;you need to do some more R.

Well working behind the scenes in the industry I've seen a little more. No argument that the bypass is designed so you avoid pulling cool air and ash through the cat, but yes if you have a cat running yellow/white hot as we do in testing you can shock them with cold air to the point it shatters. Likely something the average Joe hasn't seen before. It's a very dangerous situation since the cat is full of cancer causing agents, but for the most part all that gets sucked up the flue when it happens.

 

[North of 60]

What if Blaze King went out of business. Would I be able to replace the catalytic combustor?

Hiker Blazeking is a 25yr+ company. Google stove combusters. lots out there.
If you were really worried buy one now and you would be good for more than 15 yrs.

 

[RidgeHiker]

Any comments on the Lopi Revere part of the question???