The "pick Joful's new stove" thread!

[Ashful]

Whats the BTU gap between the Firelight 12 and the Ashford 30?

Both metal boxes with a fire inside. Both can chew thru a fixed load of similar BTU content very slow... or very fast, depending on air setting. Both are efficient catalytic stoves. So, manufacturer claims aside, how could they realistically have a BTU gap?

 

[Ashful]

Jotul. Couple of notes. Webby is right. I think the Ashford is not a very good radiwnt heater. Without the blower we would be freezing I think.

Begreen probably remembers this sketch from my first post on this forum, as he was the first to answer me on that day. The room labeled DEN is actually the original kitchen of this house, and that large fireplace is where I have one of my stoves.



This is the stove that's putting the larger dent in my heating bill, despite it being in a less than ideal location for air circulation. Yes, the Den is warm, and the Living Room gets cool without the central heat working. Yet, I'm still cutting my oil bill roughly in half with this arrangement (from $7000/yr. to $3500/yr.).

The primary heat loss is those thick stone walls, I suspect. They hold a constant 52F, this time of year, no matter how warm or cold it is in the house. Better in many ways than older framed construction, but obviously not on-par with today's latest.

So, in an arrangement like this, what is better. Convective? Radiant?

 

[Grisu]

Radiant means "line-of-sight". If you can sit right in front of it, it will be better/nicer. Otherwise, I would go convective and even more so if the back of the fireplace goes to the outside.

Btw. For your long splits, you could still buy two Ashfords but only install one until you have burned off most of the long stuff. (I assume you will be doing the install yourself.)

 

[Ashful]

Radiant means "line-of-sight". If you can sit right in front of it, it will be better/nicer. Otherwise, I would go convective and even more so if the back of the fireplace goes to the outside.

Btw. For your long splits, you could still buy two Ashfords but only install one until you have burned off most of the long stuff. (I assume you will be doing the install yourself.)

You know I hate agreeing with you Grisu, but I think you're right on both points. The stove does back up to an outside wall, and I'm pumping quite a lot of heat into that wall with the Jotuls. I had made up heat shields, which I was going to space 1" off that wall as a reflector to reduce heat loss into the outside wall behind each of my stoves, but have not installed them yet. I do enjoy feeling the radiant heat coming off my Jotuls, but any stove with glass can push some radiant heat, right? I think most of my radiant heat off the other five sides of this iron box are going right into my stonework, and so there's a good argument that convective is better.

On buying two Ashfords and only installing one, that's a good idea. However, for the sake of domestic tranquility, I think it best if I make this one operation. I would probably just have the stove shop do the full swap / install, and either take my old stoves away, or plant them in one of the garages for easy advertising and sale.

 

[Grisu]

but any stove with glass can push some radiant heat, right?

With good flames, yes. In "pure" cat-mode, not so much.

I had made up heat shields, which I was going to space 1" off that wall as a reflector to reduce heat loss into the outside wall behind each of my stoves, but have not installed them yet.

I would rather put some Roxul behind them, that will have a larger impact.

 

[Poindexter]

Both metal boxes with a fire inside. Both can chew thru a fixed load of similar BTU content very slow... or very fast, depending on air setting. Both are efficient catalytic stoves. So, manufacturer claims aside, how could they realistically have a BTU gap?

I dunno. begreen knows WAY WAY more about this than I hope I ever have to learn. I know you don't see the low temps I do, but your older house is not as well insulated as my newer one. My only reservation about the Ashford 30, for you is the sheer number of sqft you are talking about. Local to me I talked to other home owners in my neighborhood, my local stocking BK dealer, it was either a size 20 box which would be enough most of the time, or a 30 size box which will be enough all the time. Easier to build a smaller fire in a big stove, done deal.

As a supplemental burner, OK, sure, you can probably burn eight cords per year in each of two Ashford 30s and lop 16 cords worth of BTUs of your oil bill.

But when does your heating season really start? I lit mine on August 27th 2014 because the wife was cold. It will probably go cold for the summer around Mother's Day. If you are trying to cram eight cords through one of those starting in late September and finishing in late March - and you got magnificent eastern hardwoods with a long coaling stage- well, you are going to have a battle on your hands.

Can you maybe call some tree services to see if they are cutting any soft wood? Anything at all the you can process at 18" in the next two months or so (poplar even) and have it dry for autumn 2015?

Look good doing it, except for that trimming all the splits thing, absolutely.

 

[shoot-straight]

I want to add that the split length argument doesn't hold water. We are talkng about a 20 yr investment vs a year or two of cutting some splits. That's insane. Buy the right stove then fix your splits if needed.

BTW I fit 3 23" splits in my Ashford to today. Corner to corner. Again the split argument is not worth it. Buy the right stove. Which the Ashford may or may not be.

 

[Ashful]

Taking Grisu's comment to the extreme, I think the ideal stove for me is one whose only radiant heating is out the front. We always talk about how tough it is to heat a basement, with big concrete heat sinks on five sides, but that's exactly the situation my stoves seem to be in. This may be why I can chew thru cord after cord of wood, keeping the stove in the floor plan above running 24/7, without being able to keep up temps just one room away. I am probably radiating more than half of the heat my stove generates directly into the stone hearth floor and three walls. A stove with lower radiance out the sides and back would probably be an enormous improvement, and that means moving to a convective stove.

...your older house is not as well insulated as my newer one.

I remember reading an article from one of the building science types, several years ago, discussing the treatment of old stone houses. Since there is zero insulation (solid stone right thru from inside to out), and the walls tend to hold almost perfectly to the temperature of the soil in which they are planted, a different sort of theory was required in the planning of thermal losses and sizing of heating systems. These walls are not R-anything... they're constant temperature sources. That temperature is 52F in February.

As a supplemental burner, OK, sure, you can probably burn eight cords per year in each of two Ashford 30s and lop 16 cords worth of BTUs of your oil bill.

Check. You've got it, except I'm only planning to do 8 cords between them. I have a full-time job away from home, eh. The division is probably close to five cords in the stove running 12 hour cycles, and three cords in the stove running 24 hour cycles.

But when does your heating season really start? ...If you are trying to cram eight cords through one of those starting in late September and finishing in late March - and you got magnificent eastern hardwoods with a long coaling stage- well, you are going to have a battle on your hands.

I suspect the furnace starts running a little on evenings in September or early October, but I generally don't light the stove until Halloween. I get so busy in spring, that I usually let the stoves go cold around the end of March. So, I'm burning 8 cords in 5 months, with two thirds of it being on the stove in the floorplan above.

 

[webby3650]

I think a Cape Cod would look really nice in that setting with the two chairs facing it.. can't beat that huge glass either. I think that can take 20"+ logs...

For the others, maybe something not so pretty and just go for efficiency/ lower cost?

Except he is replacing a stove that's hard on parts. Doubt he wants another one sitting in there.

 

[webby3650]

If you were closer I'd let you give my Ashford a try.

 

[drz1050]

Except he is replacing a stove that's hard on parts. Doubt he wants another one sitting in there.

I know you used to run one... didn't know you replaced it until I just checked your sig line. What parts was it running through?

 

[Ashful]

If you were closer I'd let you give my Ashford a try.

I appreciate that, webby!

 

[Dairyman]

Except he is replacing a stove that's hard on parts. Doubt he wants another one sitting in there.

No one said anything about a VC.

 

[webby3650]

I know you used to run one... didn't know you replaced it until I just checked your sig line. What parts was it running through?

Warped baffle, warped fettle/andiron, cracked stove. Others blew through cats, mine did not have that issue. Although it wasn't even a year old.

 

[tarzan]

Joful, do you run fans to help move the air around? I'm assuming you don't have any type of blower.

 

[simple.serf]

I was wondering the same thing about the blowers. My stove would really struggle to heat our place without the blower, due to the layout.

 

[graycatman]

Doesn't look like you're considering them, but neither of the WS's mentioned, the PH or IS, is approved for an alcove install, and at least from what I see in your pictures, those might all be considered alcoves.

 

[jeff_t]

Doesn't look like you're considering them, but neither of the WS's mentioned, the PH or IS, is approved for an alcove install, and at least from what I see in your pictures, those might all be considered alcoves.

I don't know if you can consider a gigantic fireplace an alcove, if there is nothing combustible.

Taking Grisu's comment to the extreme, I think the ideal stove for me is one whose only radiant heating is out the front. We always talk about how tough it is to heat a basement, with big concrete heat sinks on five sides, but that's exactly the situation my stoves seem to be in. This may be why I can chew thru cord after cord of wood, keeping the stove in the floor plan above running 24/7, without being able to keep up temps just one room away. I am probably radiating more than half of the heat my stove generates directly into the stone hearth floor and three walls. A stove with lower radiance out the sides and back would probably be an enormous improvement, and that means moving to a convective stove.

I use my wood furnace in my basement when the BK needs a little help, or if I want to do something down there. I've never used a thermometer, but after I get the furnace fired up and the blowers running consistently (they cycle a lot until the firebox gets good and hot), but I bet the air temp goes up at least 20° in an hour. Similarly, it probably drops 20° in an hour, after the blowers shut off for good (they cycle a lot on the way down, too). I don't have a lot in the basement as far as stuff to soak up heat, just the floor, and block walls that are almost all in the dirt.

You will probably be happier heating the air, instead of trying to heat objects (walls) that are never going to warm up.

 

[Poindexter]

I have been chewing on the floorplan above overnight and thinking about the convection fans on my stove.

I think an A30 in that alcove with the fan kit not running is really going to have to work to put heat out into the room.

OTOH a regular box fan on the floor at the foot of the stairs sucking cold air from the living room floor and blowing it straight towards the stove alcove, with the optional fan kit on the A30 running MIGHT setup a clockwise convection loop around the stairwell that might do very well. Aesthetic cost is a box fan on the floor just inside the front door, and the not too bad sound of the fan kit on the A30 running.

There is a quick sketch of my floorplan in this post: https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/indoor-air-quality-hepa-filters.139980/#post-1881743

What I notice is when my wife is on the phone with the quiet child, my wife often turns the fan kit on the A30 off to hear just a little bit better. About 15-30 minutes later the air temp in the upstairs BRs and office is noticeably lower, even with the box fan on the floor in the hall pushing cold air along the floor towards the stove uninterrupted. In my little footprint I don't much care what speed the A30 fan kit is set too, as long as it is running.

These guys don't list any pine, I think the Pine Barrens of Southern New Jersey is Joful's closest source of softwood that might be processed to 18" and ready for Sep 2015. Even though they don't list pine, they clearly handle a LOT of wood, and they buy wood too, according to the website. I dunno if it is legal to ship firewood over the Delaware river, there are lots and lots of rules about stuff back east.... http://www.jerseyfirewood.com/

I go off call at 1700 local tonight and ought to have room in my stove to test fit some 18", 20" and 21" square cut 2x4s.

 

[Poindexter]

Thought of one other thing. Joful might bring in a couple or three cords of 16" "seasoned" splits and get those stacked loose and covered on top for the summer.

Instead of rushing around trying to find softwoods, he might get 16" splits off craigslist now down to maybe 22%MC by October. If his 20" splits are already at 16%MC that would put him at 18-20% average MC per load.

Not ideal, but it would get him out of cutting two inches off every piece. Loading the 16" splits in the floor of the A30 "should" give him room to be loading 20s NS up to the top of the door opening.

Maybe some biologs in there with the 16s to drop the average MC per load even more while he is waiting on fresh 18" splits to come through the pipeline...

Once he has a good supply of seasoned 18", then he can sell off the rest of the 20s.

 

[Ashful]

I've been thinking along these exact lines, Poindexter. I was hoping to get to a BK dealer to see what proportion of 16" and 20" splits I could fit in that box, and then order in some 16" to fit that ratio, if I decide to go Ashford.

At this point, Ashford is looking like the top contender. I think convective is the way to go in my particular install, and I do want those 24 hour burn times for the second stove, with an even 12 hours on the other.

 

[Poindexter]

If you get a loaner princess I am real curious to hear what you can get with convection instead of mere radiance...

https://www.plumbersstock.com/product/7181/blaze-king-z1714-fan-kit-for-king-and-princess/

 

[begreen]

Although I concur with the conclusion there will be a caveat with installing a BK freestanding stove in a fireplace. The thermostatic control is in the back. If there is too much heat build up in the fireplace cavity, the thermostatic operation can be erroneously affected. Talk with BK about this.

 

[shoot-straight]

I've been thinking along these exact lines, Poindexter. I was hoping to get to a BK dealer to see what proportion of 16" and 20" splits I could fit in that box, and then order in some 16" to fit that ratio, if I decide to go Ashford.

At this point, Ashford is looking like the top contender. I think convective is the way to go in my particular install, and I do want those 24 hour burn times for the second stove, with an even 12 hours on the other.

I still can't fathom not getting a stove simply beacause of some split wood you have that's too long.....

I will also say that buying an Ashford doesn't immediately garuntee magical 24 hr burns either.I have to run mine fairly high to keep warm when its cold. Normal burns in mine consists of 8-10 hours in active zone with fan running. Thats it. In mine, longer burns are impossible when fans are running. Yes I it makes that much of a difference in my setup. My pipedreams of loading once a day were crushed, but its still better than what I had or could have I think. If there was something betterbetter that fit my space and setup, I'd buy it. Although I'm dissapointed, I'm satisfied. My expectations were just too high.

 

[begreen]

Your results are not that inconsistent with BK posted specs. You should be able to get about 10 hrs of continuous heat from the stove when it is pushed. There may be variations based on the wood, load size and draft. Extolled long burn times are not relevant in very cold weather.

Every home and chimney setup is different. If the stove is barely able to keep up with cold outside temps it could be the heat loss is too great for one stove. The best solution in this case, if the sq ftg being heated is not overly large, is to tighten up the house and improve insulation. That will payback year round for the life of the house.