favorite stove?

[Seasoned Oak]

For me its all about the fire view. ID say the fire show is No. 1 on my priority list although it keeps me from getting my work done. The last stove i bought was 100% just for the big beautiful front door.(and the great price $700) So its the Big Madison 2400SF by Englander. Second runner up, Harman TL-300 downdraft toploader. Not as large a fire view but a quality stove all the way, rated 17Hrs ,not bad for a non-cat stove, and i can cook food IN it, or use it like an open fireplace with a custom spark screen. Its a lot more dough though about $2500. Pictured is the Madison. I should mention they are both very effective heating machines.

 

[Sodbuster]

Last night in the Summit, I always find it hard to capture pictures of fire.

 

[Joyboy]

Progress hybrid. I too like the fire show. I’ve been very impressed how much heat this thing can throw out.

 

[Beldin]

View attachment 215592 Progress hybrid. I too like the fire show. I’ve been very impressed how much heat this thing can throw out.

I absolutely love your choice of stone. Very, very nice.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

Love it! Best thing they ever did for wood stove junkies was get rid of those old no view all steel doors with the air caps in front.

 

[SuperJ]

If I didn’t have a Blaze King Ashford, I’d get a Woodstock.

I think Vermont castings makes some of the best looking stoves.

 

[BrotherBart]

Lotta good wood stoves out there. But since we are doing burning pics...

 

[Ashful]

Nice, Bart. This was one of my Ashfords this morning, 12 hours after loading. Fire pics at less than 10 hours don’t count. [emoji12]

 

[BrotherBart]

Nice, Bart. This was one of my Ashfords this morning, 12 hours after loading. Fire pics at less than 10 hours don’t count. [emoji12]

View attachment 215618

Sorry that you got stuck with a stove that takes so long to get the heat out of a load of wood.

 

[RobbieB]

Not to mention it's so ugly you have to hide it in a closet -

 

[webby3650]

Not to mention it's so ugly you have to hide it in a closet -

You’re smoking crack if you think an Ashford is ugly!

 

[Joyboy]

You’re smoking crack if you think an Ashford is ugly!

Lol. It was a good one though!

 

[BrotherBart]

A BK fan boy walks into a forum...

 

[webby3650]

A BK fan boy walks into a forum...

That’s right, Mr. NC-30...

 

[webby3650]

Here’s a picture of one of the nicest burning stoves I’ve had. It was one of my favorites.

 

[Ashful]

Not to mention it's so ugly you have to hide it in a closet -

Nice!

I think Bart once claimed he could park a Mini Cooper in that fireplace.

 

[BrotherBart]

Nice!

I think Bart once claimed he could park a Mini Cooper in that fireplace.

Damned car only burned for six hours. No coals. Went and bought the 30-NC.

 

[HisTreeNut]

We bought from a local company (as supporting local is important to us) and have a Buck 94NC. Able to heat 2145 sq' ranch with it and keep the electric heat off.
It's a non-cat as we are in a damp area its more forgiving with wood that is not under 20% mc.
Average burns with mixed woods, 5-7 hours with another 2-3 hours of heat from the coals.
We like it...and we get a pretty good flame show.

Sent from my VS835 using Tapatalk

 

[Woody Stover]

Started back in '85 with an Englander 24 Radiant, a plate-steel step-top N-S burner. Good stove but didn't work too well on Red Oak that was only in the stack for 3 months.
Around the year 2000 came a '96 Dutchwest 2460, a cast iron cat stove. That one didn't (doesn't) like wet wood, either, since it's a cat stove. Both of these stoves kept us from freezing to death, barely. I knew I should have been stacking my wood sooner, but that seldom happened. One year I got some White Ash from a neighbor and thought "Hey, this stuff is burning great." Didn't fully comprehend that it was that it was due to the wood being drier. Once I got dry-wood religion here, about seven years ago, I got way ahead on stacked wood, and there I have stayed ever since.
The Dutchwest got me hooked on having an ash grate in the bottom of the box, with a pan underneath. None of the hassles associated with the Englander and shoveling, like pushing coals around in the box, trying to contain the dust, and carrying out a blazing-hot load of "ash" that was half coals. With the grate, just swirl a poker through the coals once every few reloads, and that's all you do until it's time to pull the pan and dump it. As Seasoned Oak hinted, to have a window was amazing, both for the beauty of the flame and the operation of the stove. The DW window is small, though.
I wasn't too familiar with Woodstock stoves until my SIL picked up a used Fireview for $350. It had clearly gotten hot but was not seriously damaged due, I think, to its heavy duty cast iron construction. I had to replace the combustor scoop, but the bypass was undamaged. Woodstock parts don't cost you an arm and a leg...barely a couple fingers. The Fv had some air leaking into the box, probably from seam cement being loosened when it got hot. Luckily, that's pretty easy to fix to an acceptable degree. My Keystone had some air leaking from one seam, right from the factory. In light of that, I think I'll avoid any seamed stoves, be they cemented or gasketed, and that my next stove will be welded plate-steel. There are a few plate-steel cat stoves out there, but as far as I've seen, only Woodstock has the top-flight engineering, quality materials, price, ease of service, and customer support that I'm looking for. And the ash grate...and top- or rear-venting...and hybrid tech-knowledge-y. IMHO, no other plate-steel stove has it all, to the extent that the Woodstocks do. One thing they don't have is blowers, only a modest amount of convection built in, so they may not work as well as a blower stove in a chopped-up floor plan where you need to move a lot of heated air.

I’m yet to find a stove that will out perform a Blaze king, not even close...Hands down the best stove I’ve had to date.

Yes, but you haven't yet gotten the Woodstock steel stove that you have been threatening to buy, so your testimony doesn't carry quite as much weight as it might.

Well rest assured, BK does not have the issues with failures like cat stoves from the past.

No, they've come up with their own unique set of failures that no one else even thought of.

If I didn’t have a Blaze King Ashford, I’d get a Woodstock.

Ah, don't sweat it, it probably won't be all THAT horrible...

 

[Woody Stover]

A BK fan boy walks into a forum...

And we're right here waiting to give 'em some chit when they do.

Here’s a picture of one of the nicest burning stoves I’ve had. It was one of my favorites.

Which model Buck was that, non-cat? The mighty Buck 91 will always be a fond memory for me. 620 lbs. of big-arse honkin' steel stove!
Webby, you oughta put all the stoves you've had in your sig...that would be impressive. If they allow that many characters in the sig!

 

[Ashful]

It's a non-cat as we are in a damp area its more forgiving with wood that is not under 20% mc.

This is a misconception, I believe. My experience is solely cat stoves, but I've heard these comparisons endorsed by those who've had both:

1. A cat stove runs ~20 minutes with the bypass damper open at the beginning of each load, before engaging the combustor. If your wood is a little over 20%, this is going to take most of the water out of it right there, before you even engage the combustor.

2. A combustor supports secondary burn at a much lower temperature (500F) than a non-cat (1100F). For this reason, it is actually easier to maintain secondary combustion with a little steam in the mix.

The reason cat stoves are incorrectly slighted for requiring dry wood is that they can burn at a much lower rate, if the operator chooses to do so. If you want to burn at these very low rates, way lower than a non-cat could ever achieve, THEN you need dry wood. The heat produced by burning wood at these low rates is not sufficient to maintain secondary combustion, if you wood is not dry. However, if you're comparing apples to apples, as in running the two types of stoves at the same burn rate, a cat stove should fair even better than a non-cat, with wet wood.

I ran my old cat stoves on wet wood, the first two years, and this was my experience. I did not have nearly the trouble everyone here said I should, but I did have troubles with back-puffing or stalling, when I'd try to run them at very low burn rates. I'd have never noticed these problems with a non-cat, they simply can't stretch a single 2.5 cu.ft. load of wood beyond 20 hours.

 

[webby3650]

And we're right here waiting to give 'em some chit when they do.
Which model Buck was that, non-cat? The mighty Buck 91 will always be a fond memory for me. 620 lbs. of big-arse honkin' steel stove!
Webby, you oughta put all the stoves you've had in your sig...that would be impressive. If they allow that many characters in the sig!

It is a Buck 21, non-cat

 

[Rearscreen]

I've owned a couple of Jotuls, a couple of Hearthstones and settled into the Progress. I'm on my 4th year with my Cat. PipNH you already live in NH, just a quick drive. No tax.