Wood stove old v new difference

[machsnell]

So I have an older style stove that is what I wanted.
- Glass front to see FIRE
- fan to blow out hot air
- big firebox to not have to cut everything down to 16 or 18 inches.

It is big and makes heat but I read new stoves are much more efficient. My stove had a ceramic honeycomb that was broken when I got it now I know that was for emissions i presume.

So my question is are newer stoves that much more efficient than older stoves?

Now I am thinking that btu's in might not be the key to output necessarily.

I have a tremont

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

 

[nadogail]

IMHO, yes they are.

Full Disclosure, I have not heated anything with a wood stove for more than 60 years.

 

[ericm]

Many of the current EPA stoves use passive air injection/reburning of gasses to reduce emissions. There still are catalyst stoves too. Both get more heat out of your wood than the old non EPA stoves- burning the pollution makes additional heat. However they often don't deal well with wood that's not been seasoned properly. It needs to be under 15% moisture. As long as you can get a year ahead on your wood splitting you'll be ok. Right now I'm burning some Madrone I split two years ago. It's very dry (2%) and burns very well in my EPA stove.

 

[Buckgnarly]

I have owned 2 Woodstock Soapstone Stoves, the Classic and the Progress Hybrid. The Classic was state of the art catalyst in 1995, the Progress is the latest catalyst and reburner. I loved the Classic, but the Progress is LIGHT YEARS ahead of the Classic. Gets to temp WAY faster and puts out WAY more heat.
So yes, the new ones are amazing, and the catalyst and reburner is not just for emissions, but make the stoves work even better.

 

[walrus]

The new stoves don't hold a fire over night as well. The good part about that is less pollution, the stoves don't allow you to damp them down as much. The bad part is starting a fire every morning. The new stoves make for a cleaner chimney also. That being said I like my old cigar burner box stoves. I have 3 of them. Made in Maine back during the energy crisis, late 70s.

 

[Bert_]

I've never heated with wood full time. I like reading about the stoves though.

A masonry stove would be at the top of my list. You burn short, hot fires and the stone/brick radiates heat for many hours.

With a regular metal box stove everybody wants a low smoldering fire. You get terrible efficiency that way, even with a good stove. I have one of these with a giant firebox. It's pretty terrible. I've thought about trying to reduce the size of the firebox so I could have a smaller, hotter fire. If it was anything more than a backup I would tear it out and do something better.

A really good stove would have a well insulated firebox. A hot fire is so much more complete and efficient. A heat exchanger could then take the heat from the exhaust rather than directly from the firebox.

 

[kelpaso1]

The newer EPA stoves are way more efficient and clean burning stoves of old. Mine has a catalyst secondary burner on the roof of the stove to reburn the smoke before it goes up the chimney. Looks like a BBQ burner on the roof and shoots out blue flame. Once it is burning good and the damper almost shut down the fire burns slow and hot and clean. No visible smoke coming out the chimney. I get the chimney cleaned once a year but could get away with every two years because not much creosote comes out after a year of burning. My stove is big enough to heat my 1700 SQft single level house almost too much (if I want). I can load it up before bed, get it going good, then turn down the damper, and in the morning still have a good bed of coals left to start some smaller wood in the morning then add bigger wood after that is going good. I use less than 2 cords of wood (rock maple and yellow birch) all winter to keep me nice and cozy warm.

Stove is 2.2 cuFt firebox and puts out 72,000 BTU's.

 

[RandyIA]

FWIW- I heated exclusively with a Longwood multi-fuel furnace for about 17 years. It was a pain, but it made the house comfortable. It was a pain because the door was so small (12" square) and the firebox was about 6' long (hence the name). It also had an oil burner in it that was seriously inefficient. Diesel fuel got expensive and at about 1 gallon per hour consumption on a cold night I quickly stopped using it.

I know this doesn't answer the primary question.

This stove had a heat re-claimer on the flue. That heated the basement and that heat moved upwards too. It was an old, all manual firebox. It was on a t-stat only to run the blower after it got hot enough to throw heat. A fire at low flame would last about 12 hours with the firebox packed full of slab remnants from a local sawmill. We only kept the house at 58° during the winter here in upper Iowa though with that stove and it was comfortable. Now we have electric heat and the t-stat is kept at 61 to 64 (depending on how cold it outside) and it always feels cold inside. Wood heat is just so much better feeling. And I love the smell in the house.

 

[u2slow]

I will happily trade off some efficiency if it means a cheaper, simpler, longer-lasting stove that requires less ongoing maintenance parts.

My firewood is free and I don't mind sweeping my chimney every so often.

EDIT: I use a $30 stand-alone fan instead of the $200 stove accessory.

 

[Buckgnarly]

The new stoves don't hold a fire over night as well. The good part about that is less pollution, the stoves don't allow you to damp them down as much. The bad part is starting a fire every morning. The new stoves make for a cleaner chimney also. That being said I like my old cigar burner box stoves. I have 3 of them. Made in Maine back during the energy crisis, late 70s.

They don't burn as long as my old stove, but it does burn more completely. My old Classic would leave coals I had to throw out, it did not however have an ash pan....even Woodstock told me that was a mistake!

 

[.mike.]

Newer ones burn cleaner and more complete. I have a 5yr old Pacific Energy wood stove, and my chimney pipe is much cleaner than its ever been. Also, the newer stoves can be much closer to the wall than older models. Our previous stove required a 36" standoff, whereas the new one could be as close as 4". Operation is stupid simple, and it looks much more modern.

Old vs New

 

[lakeroadster]

So my question is are newer stoves that much more efficient than older stoves?

Yes.

I've been using wood stoves since back in the early 1970's. Started out with a Ben Franklin cast iron stove, the type with the bi-fold doors.

We bought a new Pacific Energy Summit Classic wood stove back in 2015.

Here's a link to their site: https://www.pacificenergy.net/product/summit-classic-le/

Pretty amazing stove, we love it. We burn pine here and I'm amazed at how well the stove performs. Other than replacing the door gasket last year it's been flawless.

 

[walrus]

They don't burn as long as my old stove, but it does burn more completely. My old Classic would leave coals I had to throw out, it did not however have an ash pan....even Woodstock told me that was a mistake!

I use the coals to start the next fire, why would you throw them out?

 

[CJM8515]

jotul. seriously we used one at my old cabin for years, that little thing heated the place faster and more efficient than one 2x the size that was old at the time.

 

[Buckgnarly]

I use the coals to start the next fire, why would you throw them out?

Build up too deep during cold snaps, like -20F nights, you could not get more/enough wood into the firebox. I think that problem was more of a function of no ash pan though.

 

[machsnell]

All good info gents. I appreciate the detail and real world examples.

My stove will throw heat but i can fit 7 or 8 pieces of 22 plus inch sticks of firewood in there also.

The fan is loud amd i was going to replace them but I think about the amount of wood I burn (all free to me as well) and it would be nice to be more efficient and pollute less at the same time.

I know my pellet stove (Harman p61) in the garage throw hotter air amd would probably burn us put of the house in living room.

I will start looking at makes and model.

If anyone else has additional models to those listed fire (pun intended) away.

Thanks

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

 

[3robert 1]

Definitely the newer stoves are much more efficient and controllable too. Changed out our older style stove, roughly 30 to 40 years old to a new stove this year. Complete replacement including chimney. It's smaller in footprint and has a higher btu rating. Once its running properly it throws more heat and easily goes the night with usually some coals in the morning. Cold weather will be the test but so far I'm totally sold on it.

 

[walrus]

jotul. seriously we used one at my old cabin for years, that little thing heated the place faster and more efficient than one 2x the size that was old at the time.

Made in Maine, great stoves.

 

[930dreamer]

I used 1976 Fisher wood stove in my old shop for years.

 

[Bretny]

If your serious about burning wood the stove should have 3 things. An ash tray, a thermostatic damper and an outside air kit.

Thermostatic damper really helps keep the heat even and run longer. The outside air kit made a large difference on my house. I burned about 25% less wood and have a more evenly heated home. I have a vermont castings defiant from about 2000. I expect it to last at minimum another 20yrs.

 

[mooseracing]

Biggest thing with the new stoves, make sure the wood is well seasoned and dry. Otherwise they can't reburn as well (whether secondary or cat combustion) and then do not get the stated heat output.

Otherwise I love the lesser amount of wood used.

 

[Jackfre]

try hearth.com

 

[littleboss]

I have an 80 year old woodstove in my farm shop and a 15 year old Vogelzang (non catalytic) in my wood shop. Then at our vacation home I had a Hearthstone WFP-75 zero clearance fireplace installed with outside air for combustion. It's rated at 68% efficiency. The new fireplace leaves about half the amount of ash that the other two do. On the flip side it's hard to get started. You have to leave the door on it cracked for a half hour or more until it gets to going good, then at that time you can switch over to outside air only. The flame is more subdued than the two old stoves as well

 

[ericm]

I have a Flame Monaco zero clearance EPA stove. (BTW "Flame" is a dumb name for a stove brand). On cold startup it needs a door cracked for ~10 min to get going. That's with measured at under 15% moisture wood. If the wood is not dry enough it's much harder to get going.

 

[Denwood]

So I have an older style stove that is what I wanted.
- Glass front to see FIRE
- fan to blow out hot air
- big firebox to not have to cut everything down to 16 or 18 inches.

It is big and makes heat but I read new stoves are much more efficient. My stove had a ceramic honeycomb that was broken when I got it now I know that was for emissions i presume.

So my question is are newer stoves that much more efficient than older stoves?

Now I am thinking that btu's in might not be the key to output necessarily.

I have a tremont

So the good news is that you already have a "newer" stove. Google "replacement woodstove combustor" and replace that catalytic combustor. Why? Wood combustion gases normally do a secondary burn at temps around 1000F, but catalytic combustors reduce that to 500F. In contrast, with 500F inlet gas temps, a catalytic cumbustor body will radiate pretty much twice that, so 1000F. That's a lot of heat. Your combustor in that stove is key to efficiency.

To add, load up your wood box, and damper the stove down. The cumbustor may be sitting there glowing red hot for 12 hours (longer in some stoves) even with no visible flame in the fire box. Also Google the terms "catalytic woodstove bypass". It should be open when loading wood, and until the firebox is up to temp after a cold start. The bypass allows flue gases to bypass the combustor so you're only (correctly) using it once the stove is hot. You also open it during wood loading to keep smoke from back puffing into your space.

We have a 2000ish Napolean fireplace with outside air intake, heating fans, secondary combustion etc and it will heat us out of the house with 60K BTU output. Like most of these units, it will burn overnight leaving a usable coal bed in the morning if dampered down at night.

Here is the EPA database for wood stove efficiency: https://cfpub.epa.gov/oarweb/woodstove/index.cfm?fuseaction=app.searchResults

Kuma Stoves (a US company) has a few hybrids in the 81% efficiency range which I think is the best out there right now. 0.7 grams of particulate/hour emissions of particulate is insanely low.

Given the labour and/or cost of decent cord wood, you'd be nuts not to buy the most efficient stove you can afford as with each percentage increase of efficiency you're effectively dropping fuel consumption for greater heat output.

 

[TractorJeff]

After 50 years of heating with Wood, all I will say is this!
QUOTE
"Given the labor and/or cost of decent cord wood, you'd be nuts not to buy the most efficient stove you can afford as with each percentage increase of efficiency you're effectively dropping fuel consumption for greater heat output."

 

[FTG-05]

I will happily trade off some efficiency if it means a cheaper, simpler, longer-lasting stove that requires less ongoing maintenance parts.

My firewood is free and I don't mind sweeping my chimney every so often.

EDIT: I use a $30 stand-alone fan instead of the $200 stove accessory.

You can get a good high efficiency wood stove from Englander for $650 or so during their March April sale. Their 30-NC is simple and efficient. Mine hasn't required any maintenance in the 7 years I've had it.

Efficiency = far less wood and far less labor:

- Cutting trees
- Bucking the wood
- Splitting the wood
- Stacking the wood
- Less wood needed = less space needed.
- Less ashes to deal with.

I heat full time with our 30-NC, there's no way I'd want a smoke dragon and burn **** tons of more wood.

 

[Denwood]

Check the burn chart on page 6 of this Blaze King pdf: https://www.blazeking.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Broch_King_Princess.pdf

You can see that with a catalytic stove, flue temps were consistently 200F (quite low) over a 26 hour burn, and as fuel temps (the fire itself) dropped below 600F, the catalyst was still in the 900F range. Keep in mind that this was 24 hours after loading the stove! After 26 hours on a single burn, the catalyst was at 800F, while the fire was at about 450F. That's a lot of extra BTUs on a long burn radiated by the catalyst body.

If you're shopping, you should be looking for "hybrid" stove (secondary burn + catalyst) if you want the best efficiency, particularly for those longer burns. If you're just blasting a fire to heat a poorly insulated cabin, the efficiency gains are less, but you should still be looking at an EPA stove with secondary burn.

 

[Jazz1]

Upgraded to Pacific Energy wood stove 15 years ago from old wood stove. Much more efficient, burning 30% less wood.

 

[Busted_Knuckles]

I have owned 2 Woodstock Soapstone Stoves, the Classic and the Progress Hybrid.

I heated a 2500 sqft 2 story 1900 farm house with the Progress hybrid, after several " second hand " stoves.

Might run on a 1/3rd or less wood than a poorly designed stoves, not to mention its tight as in your place wont stink like fire. Also run all night on one load of hard wood, still lit in the morning. Love the ash management. The cat needed to be cleaned about every 10 days. Would buy that stove again in a minute.

 

[Showkey]

After 50 years of heating with Wood, all I will say is this!
QUOTE
"Given the labor and/or cost of decent cord wood, you'd be nuts not to buy the most efficient stove you can afford as with each percentage increase of efficiency you're effectively dropping fuel consumption for greater heat output."

Agree especially if Nat Gas is available.

Propane that change change .........it was not that long ago we were at $4-5 per gallon. This and every other information forum was on fire with pellet and wood alternatives. Not only a price concern but a tight supply is possible.

Nat gas is very plentiful and inexpensive now.......that is also subject to change.

 

[Unhdsm]

You have good taste. I was a tester for the Woodstock Stoves Ideal Steel pre-production then designed my own.

I have owned 2 Woodstock Soapstone Stoves, the Classic and the Progress Hybrid. The Classic was state of the art catalyst in 1995, the Progress is the latest catalyst and reburner. I loved the Classic, but the Progress is LIGHT YEARS ahead of the Classic. Gets to temp WAY faster and puts out WAY more heat.
So yes, the new ones are amazing, and the catalyst and reburner is not just for emissions, but make the stoves work even better.

Sent from my SM-G781V using The Garage Journal mobile app

 

[Prospecter]

Grew up with wood heat, and still heating with wood at age 64.

Cast stoves:
Antique cast parlor stove
Morso box stove
Waterford box stove
Jotul box stove
Jotul 8 parlor stove
Morso parlor stove (the big one with double doors)
VC Vigilant
VC Defiant
Kitchen cook stove
Antique soapstone stove (with cast parts)
generic box stove

Boiler Plate stoves
Russo (70's step stove)
Regency 3100 (x3)

I prefer bigger stoves, because they take bigger sticks. (Less cutting and splitting.)
I prefer boiler plate over cast. The cast parts break, and are expensive to replace.
I prefer simpler over high tech. The Vermont Castings promoted a long smoke path that filled with ash. The Russo produced too much creosote unless burned hot.

The box stoves worked pretty well, other than the problems with castings, but were too small.

The Regency's are MUCH more efficient, and reduced my wood consumption (and labor) by about 20%. I have avoided catalytic stoves because I inevitable burn some shop scraps, etc. and have family that cannot resist tossing in other scraps that would be problematic.

 

[930dreamer]

https://news.google.com/newspapers?...AIBAJ&sjid=K4ADAAAAIBAJ&pg=4421,4166252&hl=en