Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
Those barrel stoves put out a lot of heat, but you might play hell finding an insurance company that will cover one. But then, insurance might become a historical oddity in the not too distant future.
I've heated with wood for several years, and no matter what brand stove you buy, there's one drawback to them all: if it's in your living space, it will make a mess. A mess from ashes and wood clutter around the stove is inevitable. And a layer of ash and dust covers much of the house at the end of a heating season. Smoke stained walls, too. If you can live with that, fine.
I'm switching to a wood furnace in the house I'm moving onto another property to remodel. The furnace will go into the basement where the mess will be confined to a small furnace room. An existing chimney will handle the smoke, and I'll put in several floor vents to carry heat up to the house level.
I lived in a house for a couple years that had a wood/coal furnace in the basement and it worked great.
There's a company in Minnesota called Alpha American that carries wood furnaces: The Big Jack 90,000 btu output was $1298; Super Jack 125,000 btu was $1888, 2003 price list. See at yukon-eagle.com
For backup, I'll probably put in a propane wall heater.
Joined: Apr 03, 2004 Posts: 7024 Location: My Grandkids' Farm
Posted: Thu Nov 11, 2004 3:00 pm Post subject:
extra stone is a good idea - just make sure it's not river rock since it could have trapped water and you know what happens when water turns to steam; boom! _________________ Make a plan and work it:
Joined: Aug 13, 2004 Posts: 115 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Fri Nov 12, 2004 12:35 pm Post subject:
Olaf wrote:
The Quadrafire was one I was looking at as well. My fiance and I were not particularly impressed with the salesman at the retailer. Felt like I was shopping for a used car.
From what I have been able to determine, the following brands are considered quality wood stoves (not ranked):
1) Lopi (Travis Industries)
2) Avalon (Travis Industries)
3) Quadrafire
4) Jotul (did not like the door mechanism on the model I saw)
Olaf
Efel makes very good ones - don't know if they are available in the USA. I got one here in the UK - it is mounted in a brick inglenook in the old part of the cottage (walls are 3 foot thick rubble masonry). I burn it for about 8 hours which heats up the thermal mass of the room so it radiates the heat back into the room for about the next 18 hours.
Posting to get this up to page one. Someone started a thread asking about wood stoves, and I just KNEW there'd been a thread about it in the past--and here it is!
Does anyone have experience with using a woodstove for cooking?
We are trying to wean ourselves from natural gas and want to convert from a gas stove to a woodburning cookstove in our kitchen. Does anyone have experiene with this?
I'm thinking of putting in a corn stove rather than a wood stove. Around here corn is a lot easier to come by and store than wood. The problem may be that 5 years from now nobody will be growing corn. See http://www.gov.on.ca/OMAFRA/english/engineer/facts/93-023.htm
Does anyone have experience with using a woodstove for cooking?
Only putting the pot of soup/stew/curry on top of our airtight woodstove. It works well enough, but what I'd really like to have is one of these:
Oval Cookstoves
Cook your food, heat your house, heat water...
Given that I won't be able to afford one for a while, what I would like to know is if anybody has any experience using a dutch oven to cook on, or in, an airtight wood stove? I currently bake bread in our electric oven, but if the power goes out I'd like to be able to bake a loaf in our wood stove.
My family has always had Jøtul wood stoves, and we love them. Extremely efficient, especially with the catalytic converter. We have one small one in our 3-bedroom cabin, and it's amazing how much heat that thing puts out. My parents also have one in their home. There are many different styles with different door mechanisms. They live forever.
Does anyone have experience with using a woodstove for cooking?
We are trying to wean ourselves from natural gas and want to convert from a gas stove to a woodburning cookstove in our kitchen. Does anyone have experiene with this?
Twenty years of experience.
I've cooked on a number of antique stoves. I highly recommend finding a refurbished cast iron range, as they were invented and used in a period when they were really needed.
We now have an 1885 set range: a cookstove built right into the chimney wall. It frees up kitchen space. It serves three purposes: heating, cooking, and making hot water (with a range boiler).
Cooking on a woodstove requires no special training other than learning the quirks of your particular stove. The lids over the firebox is the "hot" area, and the lids off to the side are the "warm" area. They are so adaptable and versatile.
You'll have to learn to keep wood of various sized handy to adjust temperature.
You might have to get a stand-up thermometer to put in your oven.
My own preference for winter cooking/heating/hot water is coal. Non-renewable, I know, but we use it in a super-efficient manner.
Here's a sample of a restored stove:
http://www.uninets.net/~bryants/index.html _________________ "By the time individuals discover that remaining resources will not be adequate for the next generation, the next generation has already been born. " David Price
I cook and heat with a Heartland Sweetheart stove with the water-jacket to connect to the plumbing. I haven't actually connected that plumbing since I'm not in the actual house yet. (I've lived in this other building for four years now and it looks like at least four more years.)
When I bought a woodstove, I was trying to get a roof over my head quickly and I didn't have a phone. I looked at very few old stoves. Looking for new ones was just easier. I had already kicked tires and slammed doors (so to speak) at Lehman's General Store in Kidron, Ohio. They know stoves. The Heartland stoves operate very well. The hinges and latches are smooth and solid. I like the Hearland Sweetheart, but I wonder if an old cast-iron stove would last longer. The firebrick on the front and one side of mine need to be replaced. I will be more careful with the big chunks of wood in the future.
Learning to cook on it was easy. The range of temperatures available is wonderful. The stove and a few windows are the only sources of heat for me here in Maine.
I cook and heat with a Heartland Sweetheart stove with the water-jacket to connect to the plumbing...
Nice. I'm jealous!
OldSprocket wrote:
I looked at very few old stoves. Looking for new ones was just easier.
It was the same for me, but friends told me that in addition to running a lot cleaner (less pollution and chimney cleaning), your firewood goes a lot further. I don't particularly mind chopping wood, but there are plenty of other things to spend time on around here.
OldSprocket wrote:
The firebrick on the front and one side of mine need to be replaced. I will be more careful with the big chunks of wood in the future.
Most of these new stoves seem to need to have their firebrick replaced every couple of years; I had to replace about half of mine after about six years of use. Happily, they are not expensive, at least at the moment. I wonder if it wouldn't be smart to lay in a supply for the future?
killJOY wrote:
My own preference for winter cooking/heating/hot water is coal. Non-renewable, I know, but we use it in a super-efficient manner.
Oh, I've wondered about burning coal. Non-renewable and not very clean, but it's pretty cheap and there's lots of it around. I thought that it might make a good emergency fuel supply if things really start to go bad. I have quite a bit of wood around, but harvesting it takes fuel and time. Maybe I have somebody with a backhoe dig me a big hole, and then order up a couple of 12-yard dump trucks full of coal and have them dump it in the hole and cover it up. My own private coal seam!
But what about burning it? I remember reading somewhere that you need a different stovepipe/chimney than is used for wood. killJOY, did you do anything different in that regard? And where do you get your coal? How much does it cost where you live?
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