PEAK PUTTERS

We are thinking about swapping out our wood stove for a pellet stove for next winter. The yearly hunt for wood, splitting, stacking, mess, ash, has us thinking.

Just curious as what everyone prefers. This would be for indoor use, not a shop stove.

Pros/Cons of each?

Have a pellet stove and a fireplace. Haven't used the fireplace in the year we've been here. And pellets are cheap...

personally i love a wood stove....in the shop as for house pellet stove all the way the automatic auger plus the blower makes for an awesome setup that will heat a whole house and cook you out of the room your in theyre worthless with no power but that doesnt really matter around these parts

A good/modern heat pump and electric is the best way to go. A wood stove is a great backup when the power goes out. A wood stove is also a plus when your primal urges need fire. I looked into various heat sources prior to upgrading my wood stoves. At less than $240 a cord for good wood, burning trees when outdoor temps are below freezing is the cheapest (but dirtiest) option. Natural gas is very competitive with wood and might get cheaper in the next few years. When outdoor temps are above freezing, a good heat pump at less than $.085 per kilowatt hour is as cheap as wood or natural gas. Keep in mind that any appliance located in your TV watching room that must run a blower will cause you to bump up the volume on the TV.... not a big deal for porn but not good for Duck Dynasty.

I go get my own fire wood, for me to get it is cheap. What it would cost to buy one cord is what it cost for me to heat my house for a year to get fire wood. I do also have a heat pump and a 90% gas furnace. For me, there is nothing out there like a wood stove and the heat it puts out.

Go figure... a fireman likes fire

Grew up with a nice blazeking wood burner and house was toasty warm but it was labor intensive, parents replaced it with a pellet stove. Less maintenance but didn't put out the heat like the blazeking just due to the smaller fire but it was pretty simple to operate. A few years ago they junked the pellet stove for propane and its awesome compared to either previous heat sources. Zero maintenance, rather cheap for fuel too.

My parents swaped the woodstove for pellets and they love it. My mom especially due to the simplicity, my 80 +/- year young grandma lives with them now and she has no problem with it, my dad has a couple bags next to the stove and if it needs filled up before someone gets home she scoops more pellets in... simple. They have had it for 3 years now and no regrets.

Gas fireplaces are very inefficient. Pellets are ok, we had one in Dayton. To me it was just a little less work than the wood stove. A wood stove will heat a house, a pellet stove will heat a room. Yea yea I know a pellet stove will heat a house, but you have to work it, been there done that. My point is the heat is different. I have my system to use the heat pump until it gets down to 35*, then my thermostat switches to the gas furnace, at that point is when I fire up the wood stove. It takes me 3 trips/days to the mountains to get enough wood for the year.

I follow the same plan as Cim. Fore the most part, it is cheaper and easier for me to run the heat pump until it gets below 35F. If you plan to just heat a TV room to make it real cozy, I would go with a gas because it so simple, quite and clean. You could run a ventless system to get more efficiency and about 1 quart of water vaper per hour at 40K BTU to humidify your house.

I'll throw in my 2 cents:

For the home, I would lean toward a pellet stove or natural gas (if available). Wood stoves require a lot of maintenance and cleaning and Propane is too expensive.

For a shop, a wood stove would be good to burn extra wood, garbage, or oil soaked rags/towels.

Efficiency-wise, you really cant beat electric here in WA (very low electricity prices). Natural gas furnaces are very close, but still not quite as efficient.

Just a note, when talking about gas furnaces, there are two different types: Natural gas and Propane. They are not the same. Natural gas comes straight from the ground, and Propane is a byproduct of gasoline refining. Propane prices are directly subject to the swings in fuel prices, while Natural Gas is NOT. Both types of furnaces are about the same efficiency, with a dramatic difference in fuel price.

My customers living in their trailers constantly report that supplementing their heat with electrical heat dramatically reduces their monthly bills, because Propane is so expensive now.

I have a portable electric fireplace in my house and love it. I can move it anywhere and plug into any outlet. I ordered it from Washington Hardware in Kennewick, as they had a great selection and beat everyone's prices.

Propane is not a by product of gas, it is a by product of natural gas and petroleum. Also Propane is more efficient, its just not as readily available.
Also pellet stove require almost as much cleaning as a wood stove.
The big thing to think about is, are you willing to put in a bunch of work to heat your house, or would you rather pay for it.

So Dave, you haven't weighed back in yet.

I've had all three types of heat in two different houses and, though it's been slightly touched upon, it's not been made clear regarding the size of the house. The first house we lived in with wood heat had a electric furnace and a heat pump. As Ryan indicated it was also a Blaze King and it would put you out of the place in a heart beat. But this house was designed around the fireplace to be totally heated with wood...and it worked like a champ. When we were burning we had the fan going on the furnace all the time to keep the heat distributed evenly thorough out the house....probably not the most cost efficient thing to do. We did this for 20 years and yes it got tiring and was dirty, but like Cim said, you can't beat the heat a wood stove puts out.

Now take a conventional house that the builder just chose to put in because it looked nice is another story. It was designed to just heat one room, not the house. We currently have a gas fireplace in the living room and that's all it heats.

Another consideration is the proximity of your thermostat to the fireplace. IT WILL effect the conventional heating for the rest of the house. We have that problem in the current house and had it in the old one too.

So, more fodder for your fire I guess. Good luck with the decision.

Thanks for all the input. This helps a lot. Definitely lots to think about. I guess I should of included more info about the house in my original post.

The house is 2900 square feet, but a lot of it is wasted space due to the cathedral ceiling in the living room that goes all the way upstairs. We have a heat pump as our only other heat source. When it gets below 27 degrees outside, the house feels cold without a fire going. We have it serviced twice a year and it is working fine. One year, during an Arctic cold snap, I was not using the stove and our power bill was over $360 for that month. Our woodstove is a Quadrafire, most likely installed when the house was built in 1999. It does put out the heat. It is in the living room and the heat funnels right up the ceiling, and keeps the upstairs very toasty. But, the thermostat is in the family room off the kitchen, low ceiling and not in the line of fire of the stove. We have one of those electric fireplace/heaters in there, it is where we spend most of our time.

Interesting to hear that a pellet stove does not put out as much heat as a wood stove. I did not realize that. Maybe there is no real substitute for a cracklin' wood fire!

So you must have furnace. The efficiency of a heatpump drops drastically when it gets below about 30*. You must have a fan in the system somewhere that moves air for heating/cooling. We too had a peak in our house....23' from the first floor to the peak and using the fan for circulating the wood heat worked pretty good.

Like the stove, by the way....I'd keep it. All the work will help to keep you fit.

We have a service contract with Campbell & Co. Just had a couple items replaced in it. The guy said it has an emergency heat mode/element in it. He said it would draw more power than normal mode, and recommended always using the stove when very cold out.

Think the Mrs would frown upon a natural gas furnace hanging from one corner of the ceiling? I've got a decent sized shop heater I'd make someone a smoking deal on.

TJDave wrote:We have a service contract with Campbell & Co. Just had a couple items replaced in it. The guy said it has an emergency heat mode/element in it. He said it would draw more power than normal mode, and recommended always using the stove when very cold out.

The "emergency heat" mode is basically the old-fashioned heat by electric element. You will want to use this feature when the outside temps are below 35 degrees, as the heat pump becomes inefficient, as stated earlier. Heating with this method is not as efficient as "heat pump" mode.

"Emergency heat" mode will be about as efficient as any other electric heater/space heater/electric fireplace, but would distribute heat more evenly with the central heat circulation fan.

If you are really looking to reduce heating costs, have a home inspector check your house with an infrared camera so see if there are places you can insulate better for heat retention.

BTW, I am looking for a wood stove and the required smoke stack to install in my shop. If you choose to ditch the fireplace, let me know!

Okay, so with all of my years doing heating and cooling here is how it works.
Some of this will depending on where the return intake is.
First of all, once it gets below 30-35* switch your heating system to EM heat, other wise your still trying to run your heat pump with the electric furnace, you bill will go up using you electric heat but not as much as using electric elements and trying to run a heat pump at the same time. something else you can do is look to see if there is a damper to adjust the air flow to the upstairs at the furnace, if there is almost close off the air to the up stairs if there isn't close off most of the vents upstairs most of the way. With an open house as it sounds you have, the air will go up there anyway (during the summer for AC do the opposite). If you have a variable speed fan in the furnace, forget what I am about to say. It should only take moving one wire to make you fan run on slow speed, after doing that, run the fan on the furnace all the time while heating with the wood stove. You can run the fan as it is and it would also be fine. If it is a variable sp fan the fan will run at half speed of AC when in the on position. Box fans can be used to make the same thing happen. A ceiling fan would be a huge help also. It is all about controlling airflow and sometimes airflow can be heat rise. If you have a return upstairs, close it off(this will just increase the velocity) this will pull the air down. there are all kinds of ways to control the air/heat movement in a house, this is just a few basic stuff. Does you fireplace have a fan on it? There is also a fan thingy that goes in the flue that recupes (sp) 80% of the heat loss that goes up the chimney. I could go on and on.

Good information Paul and Cim. It is common to hear of folks don't understand the "in&outs" of a heat pump and electric furance -- it's not something that many of us grew up with. Like Paul mentioned, electricity is very reasonable in eastern WA. I keep up on the weather forecasts. If it's going to be warmer than 40F, I let the fire burn out and turn on the heat pump. Getting inexpensive but good firewood in Tri-Cities can be difficult. I understand why many folks switch to other sources of heat.

Love my natural gas furnace. 50 bucks a month to heat a 1700sq ft house.

Wow!

Lot's of great info here. Thank-you everybody.

Came home early this morning from work and the house was nice and warm.
Thermostat said it was on "emerg heat".

Everything is under the house in the crawlspace except for the big fan thing on the side of the house. So checking wires and things will have to be a project.

As far as return vents....One upstairs, two downstairs. No shut offs. Maybe I'll try to block off the upper vent with a piece of cardboard or something.

Blocking off a return duct is a bad idea with any furnace (especially if it were a gas furnace). This tends to cause an overtemp condition inside the furnace (which trips the temp limiter switch) because the airflow restriction also limits heat transfer. You want max airflow for best heat distribution.

Wrench wrote:Blocking off a return duct is a bad idea with any furnace (especially if it were a gas furnace). This tends to cause an overtemp condition inside the furnace (which trips the temp limiter switch) because the airflow restriction also limits heat transfer. You want max airflow for best heat distribution.

Yes and no. The fan WILL pull the air that it needs, the smaller the opening the faster the air will move. Almost every RA is way over sized for sound( don't make me pull out the ductulator out to prove it). There will be enough air moving over the limit switches, he has 2 RAs, so blocking off 1 will help control the air movement. You really shouldn't need to run the electric heat with the fireplace going anyway, but if you do or need to, 1 RA will pull enough air. Air speed equals sound in a heating system. If you have no idea about the fan and how it is wired, don't touch it. Just run the fan as is, block off the upstairs RA. Play with it a little and find what works best for your house.

Update:

I picked up another full truck load of tamarack last week!

...and now it's warm outside.