Replacing the old Blaze King

[GrampaDennis]

Interesting. If I understand meathead's response correctly, he's talking about getting too much draft. Mellow seems to be talking about having too little draft.

My chimney is in the center of the house and it's quite tall. I suspect that I would be more likely to have too much draft than too little. I guess the only way to know for sure is to try it out.

I've gotten a lot of nice responses from folks who point out that the long, low burn of a cat stove, especially the Blaze King, would be great. However, I still like the idea of not having a catalyst to replace. That, along with over $1,000 price difference, still has me leaning heavily toward a non-cat stove. It will definitely be the shielded "convection" type with a blower. I will not have a single-wall "radiant" type heater.

 

[daleeper]

If I were going to install another Blaze King, I would try it without the liner, as you have already proven it will work with that Royal Heir running low that it will work. I have my smaller version of that stove hooked up to an 8 inch flue with no problem, although it is a class a chimney instead of brick.

It will most likely work for the other non-cat stoves, but if you do have a draft problem, be ready to line that chimney.

 

[GrampaDennis]

Update:
The dear old Blaze King is gone. My son helped me move it out of the house while he was home for Thanksgiving. The move went pretty slick. We put it on a flat dolly and rolled it to the front door. We put the tractor outside and a pair of planks through the doorway. We muscled the stove onto the planks and out enough to transfer the weigh to the loader bucket. We put a chain around the stove to the bucket hooks. The next transfer was from the loader to my utility trailer.

After much agony, I had decided to take the old stove to a scrap metal buyer. Because it had warps and cracks in it, I did not want to sell or give it to anyone for use anymore. I had thought about another potential use for it on my property, but decided against it. It weighed 420 lbs. I had not removed the firebrick or the glass door. I got $33 for it.

I am still leaning heavily toward the Enviro Kodiak 2100.

My wife is one of those people who won't buy anything until she has shopped around for the best price. I do that some, too, but I'm not as fanatic about it as she is. She got a list of dealers from Enviro's web site and and called around. We learned that we had been quoted "list" price, and that there were at least 2 dealers within a 50 mile radius that would do about 10% off. I gave the guy that we had been dealing with an opportunity to match or come close. He called back and said his original quote was the best he could do. On Monday, we are going to see the nearest of the dealers who quoted 10% off. At 10% off, he will still be making a decent profit.

Tonight, the kids have gone home and the Thanksgiving warm spell is fading away. A fire in the Living Room sure would be nice! Hopefully, we won't have too long to wait.

When I get a new stove, I will start another thread and share the experience.

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving!

 

[David Tackett]

I ran my stove 6" to 8" and it did ok. Now my stove is 8" going into 8" and it runs like a beast. I think if the put the reducer or increaser what ever you want to call it right at the stove and run the 8" pipe to the thimble you will do better.

 

[Highbeam]

Do you now wish you had just left the old stove in place until the new one arrived? You'll have some sort of help at that time since the new one is heavy too.

 

[GrampaDennis]

Do you now wish you had just left the old stove in place until the new one arrived? You'll have some sort of help at that time since the new one is heavy too.

Not really. We are supposed to be able to get the new one in 2 to 3 weeks. We're running the oil a little on the cool side of comfortable, but that's by choice.
Yesterday, I cleaned my masonry "through the wall" section. While at it, I rechecked the chimney with a mirror and it's quite clean. I don't think I need to get up on the roof with my chimney brush just now.