What Is In Your Stove Right Now?

[ctreitzell]

The main thing is that Europeans heat differently than folks here. Most use the stove as an area heater and not a 24/7 burner. And they run smaller in size as room heaters instead of whole house stoves, most are in the 4-8kW range. The other problem is that the trend over there is toward modern, stylish units rather than practical steel boxes that are meant to run 24/7. There are probably some American stoves sold there, but they could be hard to find. I see the Hergom Manchester is sold there which is a big stove.

FWIW, the French are perfectly capable of making very good stoves, cars, etc. Godin stoves have a good reputation. Franco-Belge is a very good forge and brand. FWIW, I leased a Peugeot 406 many years back and liked it so much that I wanted to take it home with me.

oh my, lets not get started with french cars 🤦‍♂️
again, only nordic cars for me!

Listen, heating wise, it all changed last year with skyrocketing energy prices;
there was an absolute rush on wood stoves here...
all stock was sold in a couple of days!

Most residences in my area heat with electricity. Many with heat pumps (electricity).
That all changed 12 months ago.

There are several kinds of layouts, some high energy efficient open plan and various floorplans. My house is a converted barn with three 2 foot thick stone walls separating sections...it is literally impossible to heat the whole house with a single appliance without ducting and electricity. We are doing our best to avoid that. Further, energy efficiency was not in the thought process of the people who renovated this building. I know people with the exact same issues in the UK.

In the UK, gas combi boilers are the norm with instant hot water and hot water fed radiators. Not in France, it's been electricity and oil heaters. Cost rose on both energy sources last year. The public has moved, en masse to pellet and wood heat.

I have wood on my property, a no-brainer.

So, we are amidst a massive heating change here in France.

I am getting tired of my stop-gap measure with this Panadero...I don't want to do this again in 2024/2025...I want to get all the info I can and install something that is built to burn 24/7. Then I can apply that to the rest of the house building I'm doing here. It won't happen in a day.

I've looked at several web sites for wood stoves, I don't see anyone with offerings over 8Kw so far.

 

[ctreitzell]

Interesting, no response from the company to your long comment. It's a really nice looking stove but if it doesn't hold up than it's junk. I'd get a tried and true solid stove from a well established company.

apparently they only speak spanish...I sent an email to their contact section, and did get a response in english

as I said in my intro and my last post, the move to wood burning in France last year was unprecedented. The stores had stock on wed/thurs and by sat the shelves were empty with no new stock coming until feb

this Panadero Delice fit into the spot the old Esse stove was in in my house, that's why we bought it

I agree, it's junk...it's what I have right now, I'll have to live with it a while longer, too...I'm currently showing on hearth.com what a PITA this Panadero stove is

 

[ctreitzell]

sorry to derail, maybe all those posts about Panadero should go in my Panadero thread

One thing I will repeat here, junk or not, this stove does heat a 420 sq ft salon well
too hot at times

it raises the temp of the 420 sq feet on the next level by maybe 5 degrees C
and the adjacent rooms go up 3°C which is a huge deal and a lot of space!

it just has to be reloaded too carefully ...which is a hassle

 

[ctreitzell]

anyway, back to topic
it is nasty wind and rain outside

while I was responding above, the fire nearly went out...I had left the air open all the way at dinner time🤦‍♂️

so I just brought back to life with twigs of apple, elm and hazel
then a mix of beech, ash, oak and rotten, mushroomy elm

alls well again

 

[thewoodlands]

When our first load of ash had a good thick bed of coals, I reloaded another 6 splits of ash. The stove top temps on the reload were 350 on the left and 425 on the right, I had it settled in at a stove top temp of 625.

At the moment the outside temp is 23.2, the basement was 77, the living area up here 71 to 73 and the sleeper is 69.

I still had lots of coals so I through on 3 splits of pine and another split of ash, guess I better push the air in some around 9.

 

[zmender]

It's a beautiful stove for sure man, love that huge viewing window. Very unfortunate it doesn't serve your purpose.

You mentioned that you were getting 4hr burn with 8-10in pieces... is that the length of the log or thickness? Are you able to load up with thicker splits? For me the "steady burn" splits are 4-6in in diameter, sometimes I toss even 8in diameter by 18in logs to the back to let it slowly simmer.

 

[zmender]

Cooling down to 31F outside and will be mid-20s overnight. 67F in living room. Just loaded the stove full of locust. It was an easy, no-frill 3-loads day about 7, 8 hours apart.

 

[thewoodlands]

The outside temp tonight is 22.9, the basement temp started out at 79, the sleeper is 69 and the living area temps are 71 to 73. I loaded up the wood stove (nice thick bed of coals) with 6 splits of ash and 1 split of pine.

 

[ctreitzell]

It's a beautiful stove for sure man, love that huge viewing window. Very unfortunate it doesn't serve your purpose.

You mentioned that you were getting 4hr burn with 8-10in pieces... is that the length of the log or thickness? Are you able to load up with thicker splits? For me the "steady burn" splits are 4-6in in diameter, sometimes I toss even 8in diameter by 18in logs to the back to let it slowly simmer.

diameter; overnight I always load 15-16" lengths
I am able to load thicker splits, but it's destroying the stove quickly...
As far as reloads, the user manual reads the fire should be reloaded "every hour with 2.5-3 kg of fuel". That was not disclosed before we bought it...again, maybe I should move my Panadero comments to my Panadero thread

I got up at 0345 and put in beech/2x oak/ash

my tubby cats were all over me for food, I caved

my black cat, Liz (seen earlier in this thread), was driving me nuts, messing with every other cat...messing with me...she attacked our new stray who is less than half her size (the reason for Liz' malcontent)...I tried to chase her down to try and throw her outside and the whole house woke up...the missus dealt with her and told me off..it was a horrible windy storm last night...btw, we don't put our cats out at night, we make them come in

Ugh, forget it! I let that load get to all charred and shut down the air intake completely and went to sleep
I'll have to pre heat the flue before trying to re-ignite it

yeah, it's nice to look at the fire...I've never had a window like this Delice /Dover before..nor a baffle which trains the flames at the door! can be very dangerous...it also heats well

really we needed to spend €7K+ on a good new install than listen to the stores selling stoves and structural engineer. my structural engineer insisted on the horizontal run in this location. Obviously the 4" flue is creating a wind tunnel and blasting thru wood, hard to cold start..inconvenient to restart choked embers...as it is, we spent around €1500 and the experience of using the cheap method is bearing out to be insufficient

 

[zmender]

27F outside with high going up to 40. A full load of locust just went in before we head out to church and other new year eve activities.

 

[Wildflush]

House 64 this AM and 33 outside temp. quick top down start at 7:14 with oak and maple. Only 3 medium splits and two smaller splits about 3” on top got the STT cruising at 550. 9:30 now house is 70 and comfortable. STT dropping to just below 450 now. Will reload another small load around 250-300 STT. Mixing in cherry next load.

 

[ctreitzell]

Restarted choked embers at 1330, so about 8 hrs of around 1Kw heat on the choked embers

pre-heat flue, open intake and a nice bed of embers achieved
we're out at friend's 5 min away, so I came back to reload...
stuff the stove suggested load, I just about filled it up with Ash and one stick of oak

heading back to friend's after I shut down the intake

 

[thewoodlands]

We had 21.7 for a low this morning, the basement started out at 73 (lots of coals) with the living area and sleeper temps at 67 & 68.

Before I headed outside for some work before 2023 ends, I loaded the liberty up with 7 splits of ash and 1 split of pine. I think the wife burned a load of 3 ash splits with 2 pine splits, we're still burning down coals.

 

[begreen]

It was 43º this morning so I started a fire. First one in a week. Doug fir buring today, as usual.

 

[bigealta]

Still going thru the partially punky, spalted oak (i think). Was originally kicking myself for bringing it home but it's been heating our house for a month. Saving a months worth of the good oak for the colder part of winter was worth dealing with this stuff which turned out to burn fairly well with decent secondary combustion going on.

 

[Kevin Weis]

Cooler weather finally starting to settle in. Mostly oak in tonite.

 

[Wildflush]

35 outside now dropping to 27. E/W reload stacked tight of oak, maple and cherry. slow rise to 650 STT. House 76 inside temp now.

 

[Pinesmoke]

It was 50 today so I let it fall to a small ember bed for relight. Raked it up and dropped a pine, 4" oak limb and an oak split to start bringing it back up. No recipe for the wood, just what was in the pot next to the stove.

 

[ctreitzell]

5C/ 41F outside but real feel is -1C/31F

just trundled thru a few wet-ish splits of ash...just put on some beech and oak

happy new year!

 

[thewoodlands]

The load of pine that was in the wood stove is down to coals, I should've pulled the coals in from the sides and back but I put 1 big split & 1 small split of pine on. I'll have it ready for the overnight load by 10:30, that will be all ash.

The basement is 81, the living area temps are 70 & 71 with the sleeper at 69.

 

[Caw]

Wrapping up 2023 with a rare load of almost all cherry. I keep opening the door and taking a big whiff as it takes off. Smells delicious.

 

[thewoodlands]

Tonight on 12.31.2023 we have an outside temp of 20.5, the basement started out at 77, the living area temps are 71 and the sleeper is 69 the last I checked.

I had burned down the coals pretty good but still had plenty when I made the overnight fire, 8 splits of ash are going in the wood stove.

 

[zmender]

Happy 2024 everyone! May your fire burn bright and hot.

Got home around midnight and happy that I still had a coal bed. I really should've used some kindling but ended up loading all locust splits. Had to leave the door open for half an hour to char the wood enough to completely close the door.

 

[NickW]

Christmas at our house today, no fire until now since last night. Upstairs hot with 4 crock pots and 20 bodies and a window cracked, downstairs is pretty chilly now. Coals didn't quite make it, so cold starting with 6 ash & 1 sugar maple.

 

[jblnut]

I tossed two 5gal pails of coal in last night along with the wood to see what happens. I have two ton of the stuff to burn this winter and it’s finally getting chilly enough to put it to work !