Pellet stoves...

I have been hearing a lot about pellet stoves lately...but I've never heard anything about them before.

What can you tell me about them?

Re: Pellet stoves...

we bought one recently & just started using it. It uses pellets that look like rabbit food made from wood scraps, cardboard & other scrap materials. It can be used to heat a home exclusively or to supplement heat.
It differs from a traditional wood burning stove because it has a hopper that holds 40 lbs or more of pellets that can burn for a few days straight if desired with no effort. a wood fire needs to be stoked much more frequently and wood fires require a more expensive chimney system & create much more ash which means more work. pellet stoves are available as free standing units or as inserts for existing fireplaces.

on the down side its very difficult to buy pellets right now because the demand for them has risen so quickly.

hth!

Re: Pellet stoves...

Would you believe that my FIL used a coal stove through last winter? We are movng in in 10 days and he finally got rid of it --- and we're looking to replace it with something else that will help to heat the downstairs of the house, so he only has to turn on the upstairs thermostat.

I am assuming that since the pellet stove burns the wood pellets that it does get hot, right? We are concerned about that because of DD.

He has us looking into Electric fireplaces, that double as electric heaters, and I'm still debating their cost efficiency next to oil. I have been seeing a lot about pellet stoves, but don't know if it is exactly what we are looking for either, although it sounds great.

Re: Pellet stoves...

We were going to get one this year, but when we went shopping there was a wait for the stove and pellets are scarce. Then the price of oil dropped so we decided to wait it out.....

Re: Pellet stoves...

coal stoves actually work really well & coal is abundant & cheap but its so unfriendly to the environment.
The pellet stove does get hot, but I've seen baby gate type things that they sell to keep pets & kids away.
Some of the electric fireplaces are great for ambiance but don't throw much heat. The ones that really heat up a room are really high BTUs & mean they are major energy suckers but maybe they are other options. We didn't research electric too much.
Gas might be another option, if you don't have natural gas you can use propane on some gas stove/heaters.

If you are trying to save money the best thing to do is make sure you're not loosing energy through drafty windows & doors, new weather stripping & thermal drapes work great for this, make sure you can't feel cold air near outlets & switches on exterior walls....stuff like that will save you the most $$$$

Message edited 10/22/2008 7:36:07 PM.

Re: Pellet stoves...

Kelly --- all of the windows were just replaced as well a the siding over the summer. They were origional levittown windows from the 40s so the new windows should help. The upstairs windows were from when they reno'd in the 70s.

According to my FIL the biggest problem with heating the downstairs is that there is still radient-under-the-floor heat. There are patches that you can feel while you are walking that don't get any heat at all so generally it is very chilly downstairs.

The coal stove did do a great job of heating .... but sometimes TOO great a job. Sometimes it got so hot it was unbearable, but letting it die down wasn't so great either bc it was a pain to re-start again. FIL was the only one who was able to get it to re-start. I've tried many times and can light a wood-stove no problem since I grew up with one in the house but could never start the coal.

Not to mention that it left soot all over the place and even with the playard-gate around it, I was still nervous with DD being around it.

The electric stoves we are looking at now are around 4500-5000 btus. I just don't know how good that'll do, since I have no experence with this.

Re: Pellet stoves...

if you are going to use electric you might want to consider adding electric baseboards to each room. You'll be able to control them easily that way & although LIPA rips us off, at least you'll have even heat.

I highly recommend the pellet stove.
We got the 'summers heat' by Englander stoves at Lowes.

Re: Pellet stoves...

My brother just bought one but he lives OOT. When I saw it up & running 2 weeks ago, I came home & told DH we should really consider getting one. I think we might look into it for next year & place it in the basement this way we don't have to worry about our future kids or nephews touching the glass....It does warm the house up a lot though!

Re: Pellet stoves...

I can attest to the fact that it is the best investment you will ever make.
Our oil bills dropped by 85% last year.
We got 2 tons of pellets this year- they weren't scarce or hard to find.
Our oil company told us we used less than 200 gallons last year- they weren't happy with us- but screw em!
The house was never warmer than it was last year- we always kept the heat on 68 or lower- with the stove it was at 75 on days when i was home (i'm always freezing) and we were burning NO oil - only for hot water.
It burns clean- no stinky wood smell- it's absolutely amazing!

Re: Pellet stoves...

Ok....I'm intrigued...where do you buy these pellet stoves? How much do they cost? Where do you get the pellets?????

Re: Pellet stoves...

The Lowes website has some