Hi all,
My wife and I are in a really cool solar envelope house. At the center of the house, parked in front of a big mass of brick, in a wide open first floor, is an old Garrison I stove. This stove is the primary source of heat (aside from solar assistance) for the whole house.
We'd like to replace it with something new, efficient, and - well - just plain better.
Here's where things get confusing.
Conventional wisdom seems to be that the way to heat a house with a big, open floorplan on the first floor (not quite so open on the second floor - and about 2400 square feet total) is to use a convection-based heater. That it's the best way to get heat out throughout the house without baking the people on the first floor in the process.
Ceiling height on the first floor is somewhere in the 9ish feet range.
So, with that in mind, we've been perusing stoves like: the Regency 3100 - Lotsa BTUs (to heat the sq. footage), and designed for convection.
But then, there's something that calls to me about the Jotul TL 50 Rangeley. It has a slightly smaller firebox (so fewer BTUs). But supposedly more efficient (they are rating it at 84%, as opposed to 75% for the Regency) - so seems like it would use more of its available BTUs - and so the difference is negligible. It blends radiant and convection heat.
Before I really started looking, I was convinced that we were going to need something like the Jotul Firelight. A BIG heater. Primarily Radiant. The Firelight is bigger than the Garrison, but still radiant. And something tells me that just maybe it's important to have a radiant heater after all, so that big mass of brick in the center of the room (right behind the stove) will absorb (and later on emit) a lot of the heat.
And my fear is that if we get a convection-based stove, it just won't cut it like this big ol' junky Garrison does. Even if it IS more efficient.
So - what do you think? Big convection stove, like the Regency? Not quite as big, but still pretty big (and ultra-efficient) "hybrid" stove, like the Rangeley? Big radiant heater, like the Firelight?
I welcome your thoughts. Thanks in advance! Happy to provide more info, too - if you need it.
My wife and I are in a really cool solar envelope house. At the center of the house, parked in front of a big mass of brick, in a wide open first floor, is an old Garrison I stove. This stove is the primary source of heat (aside from solar assistance) for the whole house.
We'd like to replace it with something new, efficient, and - well - just plain better.
Here's where things get confusing.
Conventional wisdom seems to be that the way to heat a house with a big, open floorplan on the first floor (not quite so open on the second floor - and about 2400 square feet total) is to use a convection-based heater. That it's the best way to get heat out throughout the house without baking the people on the first floor in the process.
Ceiling height on the first floor is somewhere in the 9ish feet range.
So, with that in mind, we've been perusing stoves like: the Regency 3100 - Lotsa BTUs (to heat the sq. footage), and designed for convection.
But then, there's something that calls to me about the Jotul TL 50 Rangeley. It has a slightly smaller firebox (so fewer BTUs). But supposedly more efficient (they are rating it at 84%, as opposed to 75% for the Regency) - so seems like it would use more of its available BTUs - and so the difference is negligible. It blends radiant and convection heat.
Before I really started looking, I was convinced that we were going to need something like the Jotul Firelight. A BIG heater. Primarily Radiant. The Firelight is bigger than the Garrison, but still radiant. And something tells me that just maybe it's important to have a radiant heater after all, so that big mass of brick in the center of the room (right behind the stove) will absorb (and later on emit) a lot of the heat.
And my fear is that if we get a convection-based stove, it just won't cut it like this big ol' junky Garrison does. Even if it IS more efficient.
So - what do you think? Big convection stove, like the Regency? Not quite as big, but still pretty big (and ultra-efficient) "hybrid" stove, like the Rangeley? Big radiant heater, like the Firelight?
I welcome your thoughts. Thanks in advance! Happy to provide more info, too - if you need it.