As far as the internet is aware, this stove never existed

[Kalradia]

My wife and I recently bought a home. This will be our first winter here, and we had no idea about this prior to purchase, but our wood stove doesn't even have a trace on the internet, and we don't have a manual for it. According to another post on this forum (and the only other person I can tell that has one) it's from the 80's. We had everything inspected and cleaned and they told us everything passes and it's fully usable, so we wanted to give it a go this winter to try to offset the cost of heating. Electricity heating looks like it would cost us $300+/mo for Dec/Jan/Feb/Mar, so I turned to our wood stove to see if it could save us some money.

The problem is, it seems to be pretty inefficient, but maybe I'm the issue. I ran it yesterday for the day to try to learn how to operate it optimally and ended up burning through about 1.6 cubic feet of wood (19 split logs) in the span of about 8-10 hours. This seems super inefficient to me, as I had to add a couple more logs every hour. I even tried to add 5 at a time and it still only burnt for a single hour, just hotter. My strategy was to let it combust, then I would cut the air intake back to virtually nothing, sometimes even completely shut, and closing the flue to about 3/4 the way closed.

For reference, we live in Canada, it's relatively cold where we live (Montreal). We're able to find a face cord of wood here for ~$120 (fun fact, they just call it a cord here, and it's the only way people sell it). I'm really at a crossroads, do we just tough it out and use electric heat this winter and save up to replace it, or do we use it occasionally to offset the cost of the electric heating? I'm leaning towards the latter. I wanted to only use wood heat, but it's so inefficient compared to the newer wood inserts that I just can't bring myself to waste that much wood.

Is there anyone here that has advice for us in this situation? I need to buy wood now if we're going to go this route, and I'm considering 4 (face) cords, just to help us heat a little during the day/evening during the winter. Also, I've attached a couple photos of the fireplace.

Edit: I should probably specify that our house is 2 stories (basement and main floor), about 2,000 sq ft, and the heat from the fireplace does pretty well at getting up to the main floor.

 

[NickW]

1.6 cubic feet in 8-10 hours isn't a lot. It takes a lot of BTU's to raise and maintain temperature in that much square footage. I have a 3 cubic foot stove and can easily fill it 3 or more times a day trying to heat 2500 square feet. My typical annual consumption is about 4 full cord (1 1/2 - 2 low BTU & 2 - 2 1/2 hardwood).

 

[EbS-P]

Was the stove and chimney inspected by a professional?

 

[Kalradia]

Was the stove and chimney inspected by a professional?

Yes! The official inspectors for the province. https://abcramonage.ca/

They took a ton of pictures and had one of their technicians go over everything and write up a report.

1.6 cubic feet in 8-10 hours isn't a lot. It takes a lot of BTU's to raise and maintain temperature in that much square footage. I have a 3 cubic foot stove and can easily fill it 3 or more times a day trying to heat 2500 square feet. My typical annual consumption is about 4 full cord (1 1/2 - 2 low BTU & 2 - 2 1/2 hardwood).

Wow! I guess it seemed like a lot to me because I was low key hoping it was possible to heat with a lot less wood. I keep hearing about people able to stuff their stove and have it run for 16+ hours. By hour 3-4 without feeding mine, it's mostly just a few embers.

Maybe 1 1/3rd cord isn't enough for us for the winter.

 

[begreen]

Montreal has some cold winters. It could take 3-4 cords to heat 24/7 there. I'm a bit surprised they allowed this old stov to be used because I had read they have very strict guidance on wood burning there.

 

[Kalradia]

I actually generalized. We're just south of Montreal on the south shore, where there's less strict requirements.

 

[NickW]

The new stuff, depending on how it works can definitely get long burn times at low outputs. BK folks (catalytic) can get 24-36 hours on a single load at low outputs. Higher outputs reduce burn times. My secondary combustion stove can't do that, but it's way better than my old smoke dragon.

 

[bholler]

It looks similar to a country comfort or an Alaska cat stove from the late 90s. They weren't bad stoves at all. Does it have a cat in the front above the door?

 

[brenndatomu]

Maybe 1 1/3rd cord isn't enough for us for the winter.

We use 4-4.5 full cords to heat 2000 sq ft in northern Ohio...3-4 "face" cords might get you some evening and weekend burning...and good luck buying wood that is ready to burn this year. Everybody advertises "dry" or "seasoned" wood, but apparently dry means it hasn't been rained on in the last 24 hrs, and seasoned, well, nobody knows what that means in relation to firewood...when I season my food that means salt, pepper, maybe some garlic, dunno why that would benefit your firewood though.
If you buy wood that hasn't been cut split stacked for a couple summers at least, it isn't ready to burn, unless it's been kiln dried maybe...and you'll pay a premium for that.
Burning wood that isn't really dry is just an exercise in futility.

 

[EbS-P]

You will figure out the best way to heat your home it just may take some time and experimenting, and have found the best community on the internet.

Don’t jump in and buy 4-6 face cords right away (it’s probably not dry enough anyway).

My recommendations buy a moisture meter. Buy a small amount of dry wood and see if you like using the stove. Depending on what your electric rates are buying wood may or may not be cheaper than a heatpump.

 

[Kalradia]

Does it have a cat in the front above the door?

No cat, there's just a flue that never really shuts all the way.

3-4 "face" cords might get you some evening and weekend burning...and good luck buying wood that is ready to burn this year.

I think that's what we're going to be doing, just some burning during the day (since I work in the basement and need some heat) and evening. We both work from home, so anything we can do to offset our electrical consumption is money back in our pockets. I have located someone that will be able to provide great firewood next season, but he's out of dried wood this season.

There is someone else that has wood ready to burn this year - it's been sitting out for a year. I just forgot to ask how it was stored. I'm worried it was just split and thrown into an unstacked pile for the year. Sounds like termite/bug city.

You will figure out the best way to heat your home it just may take some time and experimenting, and have found the best community on the internet.

Don’t jump in and buy 4-6 face cords right away (it’s probably not dry enough anyway).

My recommendations buy a moisture meter. Buy a small amount of dry wood and see if you like using the stove. Depending on what your electric rates are buying wood may or may not be cheaper than a heatpump.

I'll have to look into the moisture meter. My father in law did bring us an old heat pump that we may install next season. But we may just bite the bullet and buy 2 Mitsubishi ones that can handle the really cold days/nights. We don't have an AC for the summer season, so it does kind of suck at times. Sounds like it could knock out two birds with one stone. It still is nice to burn a little bit, though. Nothing beats a warm fireplace. My (late) father would always heat our house with a wood fireplace, but I never learned from him. Never thought I'd have to.

We'll probably pick up 3-4 face cords this season if we can locate some good dry pest-free wood. If not, I guess we'll be spending a bit over a grand to heat this place this winter. I've got about half of a face cord left at this point, left over from the previous owner. Definitely not enough for the season, but enough to give us a taste of the good life. 😆

 

[kborndale]

You probably won't be able to get wood ready to burn for this year, but still buy it and stack it and it will be ready to burn for next year. Once your a year ahead on your wood it's not a problem to buy wood.

 

[Kalradia]

Where there's a will, there's a way! We got 4 face cords delivered yesterday. Fully stacked and ready to go. It's very dry and pretty darn solid and bug free from a local farmer that has some dead trees last year. 95% ash. He called some of it ironwood too.

 

[NickW]

Ash is good. It lights well, burns good and still gives some decent heat if a little over ideal moisture content. Get up to operating temperature quickly if moisture content is a concern and make sure you are burning hot enough to avoid creosote buildup. Ironwood is a premium wood that coals forever. It is noticably heavier than ash, has a fine pattern hairy looking bark, and is typically a small tree (12" is about the biggest I've ever seen and more typically 6-8"). It doesn't light easily. It is great for overnight loads mixed with the ash on a good coal bed. I'd personally try to separate the two...very different burning characteristics.

Good luck and be safe!

 

[Wood1Dennis]

Ironwood is premium stuff here!
I don't get a lot, like Nick said, it never gets very big. But I like to mix it in and burn it when I need a long burn.

 

[all night moe]

Can you share a pic of that hand cart? Where did you get that one?
looks like something I could highly benefit from. Mine isn't up to my tasks in the basement, hauling splits.

 

[Kalradia]

Can you share a pic of that hand cart? Where did you get that one?
looks like something I could highly benefit from. Mine isn't up to my tasks in the basement, hauling splits.

Sure! I don't use it for getting wood inside. We have hardwood floors in the basement and I don't want to damage them, so I use this other thing to carry in a couple bundles each day, to fill up the storage beside the stove. We used the hand cart with a large heavy duty storage tote to haul all the wood into the cellar beneath the garage. Super easy access all winter long. This cellar is heated to ~15c.

My father in law gave it to us, so I don't know the brand. He probably got it for free somewhere, honestly.

 

[blades]

my opinion , your stove is an insert, it may or may not have a blower on it or in the surround. This limits amount of heat radiated in to the home. Wood that is insufficiently dried ( in excess of 20% moisture content) expends most of contained btu's drying out the excess wood moisture content. For this season I wood recommend obtaining compressed wood blocks which could be used in conjunction with the wood splits or stand alone. Moisture meters are of 2 types pin and non pin, The non pin is simpler to use. Note that in ether case the split being checked must be at room temperature and just resplit to read the internal moisture content.