Replies

1. 
   TX66 | Oct 02, 2003 01:44am | #1

   I heated my previous home with a wood burning stove(10 years ago).  I researched wood pellet stoves but could not get the costs to support a pellet stove purchase.  Maybe they are better now, but this is what I remember:

   Pros: The pellets are very convenient to handle and are not as messy as wood. You load up the bin once a day and the stove feeds itself. 

   Cons:Pellets are expensive.  You can only burn pellets in a pellet stove.  If you do not have electricity then the stove will not work (auger runs on electricity).  Most use a fan to circulate air and will not function/could overheat without the fan.

   The dependency on electricity was a big deal for me, we regularly lost power due to ice storms in NC, and I wanted to have heat without electricity.  Plus I got to buy a chainsaw with the savings of the pellet stove vs. the regular wood stove and ended up cutting all of my own wood. 

2. 
   greggo | Oct 02, 2003 04:23am | #2

   Hearthnet .com has great info about pellet and wood stoves.they also have a fuel calculater oil vs gas vs wood etc.  Greg

1. 
   stikman | Oct 02, 2003 04:45am | #3

   I got a Lopi patriot in a 1100 sq ft house, it is a steel wood stove and not a cast iron, but still looks good. It puts out a soft heat, So you can get close to it without a radiant super hot temp.

1. 
   fadagiovanni | Oct 02, 2003 06:00am | #4

   o.k.......ya' asked somethin I know a little somethin' bout. Pellet stoves are high maintenance. If you do have a power outage you are outta luck, unless of course you have a generator. across the board N.G. is the cheapest, with some stoves boasting 85% efficiency, it's not at all like runnin' forced air heat. your using what we call "zone heating", that is heating the immediate living spaces ....I'm a mason by trade and love a real wood fire but nothing compares to the simplicity of a gas hearth appliance...I highly reccomend the Lopi "Berkshire", I not only own one but have installed approx. 100 or so for many a satified customer...

1. 
   JohnFinn | Oct 02, 2003 06:31pm | #5

   Thanks for your input. I'm thinking of scrapping the pellet stove plan. I like the ambiance of a wood fire as well, and don't think I can justify laying out 1500-2000 for supplemental heatof a pellet stove, I'll tweak the thermostat alittle more. I have a mid-eff. carrier unit, which I think is about 80,000 b.t.u.'s. It has no problem heating the house quick, but I liked the idea of having a nice warm place to sit in the living room, and I definately don't have room for flue pipes and chases, so the direct vent application applied to me. I will check out those units you have installed, maybe thats the way to go.

3. 
   billyg83440 | Oct 03, 2003 12:26am | #6

   Sounds like you've already figured this out. In case others are interested here's my experience.

   My last house had a pellet stove. 1200 sq. ft. house. I live in a cold climate. Our house also had electric forced air.

   When we first moved in we assumed the pellets would be cheaper. After buying lots of pellets at $3+ per bag, we realized that during cold weather we were using about a bag a day. After some figuring we realized that it was cheaper to run the furnace at night (time of day power was 3.5 cents/hr.) and the pellet stove during the day when power was $0.10/KWH.

   The pellets are easy to store, but unlike firewood they must be stored out of the weather (a shed or in my case in a closet or crawlspace. It was much cheaper to buy the pellets by the ton (50 x 40lb bags) so this became an issue.

   I doubt a pellet stove would be nearly as cheap to run as NG.

   We also found it to be high maintenance. If we didn't let the bin empty totally every bag or two so we could vacumn out the sawdust the feed auger would jam up. Occassionally it still would. Sometimes the auger needed unjammed and the fire restarted several times/day. You have to empty the ash bin, clean the chimney, & clean the window. A natural gas fireplace should be cheaper, less maintenance, not require electricity, ect..

   If I had both options I wouldn't seriously consider a pellet stove.

   On the bright side, unlike a fireplace the window was the only burn hazard for our small kids. Pellets didn't drag in splinters and dirt like firewood does. The heat output was controllable. You could easily stop and get more fuel on the way home from work. I also prefer heat from something burning to electric as it feels better, so that was nice. And, the stove looked really nice.

   (felt I ought to put in some positives too).