Deciding on a new Furnace

[brenndatomu]

How much radiant heat do you guys get from the Kumma? My stove room is in a spare bedroom in the basement. With my current setup, it’s totally unusable during the winter because the room gets so hot.

Some, not a ton like the old school furnaces did...my basement stays around 70* when the VF is running...and that's with a heat pump type water heater that "steals" some heat from the room.

 

[Ncguy427]

Finally getting the VF hooked up this week. I needed someone to drill a new thimble for this since my old one for my stove is way too low. It was not easy finding someone who could do this. All of them are willing to sweep, maybe replace some brick on the chimney, but that’s about it. We just don’t have people around here experienced in wood stoves or installs or anything like that. The one guy I talked to who’s going to do it won’t just put in a new clay thimble. He said he’s worried that his air chisel will crack the tile when making the hole for a new thimble. Everyone suggested I talk to a brick mason, I found one who was willing to do that for a reasonable price but He wasn’t experienced in working with chimneys so I passed,

So the only guy I found who was willing to do this would only do it by putting in a stainless liner, so there could be a solid connection from smoke collar to the top of the flue. I guess a liner is a good thing, safer and should help with draft. But I didn’t plan for a $3000 install of this furnace. Was almost going to have to hold off until summer to save up a bit, but decided to go ahead with it now. After it’s done I should get a good 6 weeks of burn time.

I scheduled this back in December so been waiting a while now, but I wasn’t too bummed out that he couldn’t do the install until February as I really didn’t want to have to cut 5-7 cords of wood down from 24-26 inches to 20-22. So I’m happy that I’m only going to have to do that for 6 weeks.

I’m super excited to get this thing going. The liner is being installed Thursday and will hook up the VF. Saturday will build the plenum and the duct work and tie it into my central furnaces plenum.

 

[brenndatomu]

So the only guy I found who was willing to do this would only do it by putting in a stainless liner, so there could be a solid connection from smoke collar to the top of the flue. I guess a liner is a good thing, safer and should help with draft. But I didn’t plan for a $3000 install of this furnace. Was almost going to have to hold off until summer to save up a bit, but decided to go ahead with it now. After it’s done I should get a good 6 weeks of burn time.

Well, the 26% tax credit should lessen the sting a little...assuming you can fully utilize it.

 

[Ncguy427]

Well, the 26% tax credit should lessen the sting a little...assuming you can fully utilize it.

Ya definitely. Thank goodness for that tax credit. If it wasn’t for that, my wife might have me sleeping down here in the basement with my new furnace lol.

What size ducts are you guys running off your plenum to your central units? We’re going to do 12x24. That’s about the max we can with this wall we have to go through. But it looks like the max output of the blower is about 1000cfms so that should be sufficient.

 

[brenndatomu]

What size ducts are you guys running off your plenum to your central units? We’re going to do 12x24. That’s about the max we can with this wall we have to go through. But it looks like the max output of the blower is about 1000cfms so that should be sufficient.

Mine is way oversized...it was what was here though...would be almost impossible to change it.
I ran the first winter with a temporary setup that utilized a 10x20"...worked fine...but I run on low all the time too, I think most do though.
You are fine with a 12x24" though, they only call for 180 sq in on the supply (IIRC)