Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Wood Burning Stoves

I'm not trying to brag, but this is an areas where I have an great deal of expertise and experiance both using, and installing wood heating appliances. I've also used/install for family and friends lots of stoves and different makes and capacities.

Heres some stoves makes I recommend

Buck
Avalon
Enviro
Quad R Fire
Vermont Castings
Scan-but I dislike the non standard fire brick used by Scan.
Morso
Lopi

The most problematic and defective stoves I've replaced and or owned:

Blaze King
Jotul Black bear model
Lopi Leyden model


The Blaze Kings I've installed burned out prematurely and the old design had an catalyic system and that is pretty much obsollete. Jotuls are know to have cracking issues in the upper stove manifolds and the ones with cast iron liners are an complete waste of money, (my sis had 2 new ones as did some of her friends/complete junk). My Lopi Leyden cast iron stove has chitty Chinese castings and is a bit air starved and doesn't take standard fire bricks but one off moulded type that are not likely to be around long.

My suggestion is to get an liner kit for your chimney and get an stove or insert that is of good boiler plate steel, and you'll want one with an secondary burn and not an cataylist stove. Also make certain the stove has standard replaceable type fire brick and not propriety or custom bricks that are hard to find. And last of all get an stove that is an bit over capacity instead of too small. I burn wood as my primary heat and you'll thank yourself for getting an stove with enough capacity.

A few other thoughts.

I REALLY have seen boiler plate stoves by Lopi, Quad r Fire, Enviro, Avalon, and Buck work really well from the ones I've installed. If I were pinned down spending my own money I would get an Lopi, Quad, or Enviro. I currently have an Lopi boiler plate step top and my dad has an Enviro, both are quality stoves.

The quality of your wood and they species will also play an huge part in performance and how much creosote will accumlate. Get an thermometer and dont burn too cool and you'll be fine.

Also be very mindful of your local codes and manufactuer clearances. If you don't go with an existing chimney and liner kit the Class "A" insulated chimney is easier and what I prefer rather than block and liner chimney. Also a free standing stove will radiate more heat than an insert.

Sorry that was soooo long, but I've done so many installs and replacements that I just had to shoot off my 2 cents.

Good luck, and study up. Stick to standards, don't go to small or cheap and keep the wood seasoned.

We've got a Mors� at our place. Mostly cuz the wifey wanted it, but I'm Danish so I approved. A bit pricy, but it's got a beautiful soapstone exterior that acts like a heatsink. Smallish fuel box, but burns very slow. It cranks out a lot of heat for it's size.

Im very familiar with your Morso stove, and they are a little pricey. That is an excellent stove if you like that styling and your correct in that it puts out lots of heat despite the small capacity.

Im replacing my sisters Jotul Black Bear with an cast iron Morso. Im sick of seeing Jotul design flaws and QC issues. At least the Morso has conventional brick lining instead of that crazy internal cast jacket.

BTW I really like the look and function of your modern Morso and the Scan stoves.

Lopi or Nippa. The Scandinavians make some fine wood stoves...

+1 On the Jotul. Buy one and cry once.

Lefty C

Jotul as well +1. I don't burn wood now but all my friends do in the UP of Mich and they stick with their own kind. They all use stoves built/designed by Finns, Swedes or Vikings. And their houses are always nice and toasty as well as the sauna.

here's me and i LOVE IT! minus the show trim

http://www.harmanstoves.com/Products/TL300-Wood-Stove.aspx



oldpinecricker, any experience with this stove? I can't really say anything bad about it? I get two 7 cord tri-axle loads of oak dropped off and get @ 3 years out of it. @4.5 cord/yr 1300sq/ft ranch home with it in the basement and 250gal of back up oil lasts 2yrs. 100-125gal/yr when it gets zero/single digits.

That's a beautiful stove! What does one cost?

My (very wealthy) friend had one of those giant soapstone stoves built into his house... I'm completely blanking on what they are called.... the ones that are so efficient that a big armload of wood in the morning heats the house all day. I think it was about $25k.

Agreed that the Mors� stove is gorgeous! I have a pellet stove in my open-plan new house, to cut down my natural gas use. It's OK but of course one is beholden to the pellet manufacturers, and the pellet prices keep going up! If I end up replacing it, it will be with a good woodstove. I have a bit of birch on my property so I should be able to feed it.

Jeff O, The super-efficient (and expensive) inbuilt stoves are sometimes called a Tuliviki or a kachelofen, or more commonly a masonry stove.

Some links:
heatkit.com/html/gallery.htm
grannysstore.com/Do-It-Yourself/masonry_stoves.htm

I don't have one, but wish I did!

Stuart

BTW, if anyone else out there has a pellet stove, you will know that one of the things that has to be replaced occasionally is the ignitor, which are very expensive for what they are: a more-or-less industry standard "cartridge heater." I just got TWO for my Enviro pellet stove, for 1/2 the price of the "factory" one; I found the cartridge manufacturer's part number (not the stove mfr's one) from the actual cartridge and ordered it through a distributor.

Harman is an excellent stove that is quality made and efficient. I've installed two Harman stoves for friends and they love them despite they cost a bit more than some other makes.

My Lopi Leyden made by Travis Industries is an bad copy of an Harman top loading design. The Harman is better made than the Leyden stove I've owned.

Lopi makes an excellent plate steel stove but I think their imported Chinese cast stoves and copies of Harman are best avoided.

we put a rsf fire place in a buddys house... it heats the room it is in ...but with this http://www.icc-rsf.com/en/rsf/heat-distribution-options it throws the heat "below" the fire box...so if u - say put it in the living room the gravity option lets the heat blow below ..into the basement/downstairs neat as h*ll. let me add that it gets it "air to burn" from outside ...not pulling the air from inside the house making for "- presure"/

IIRC, ~$4k

and to use a Stickism, "if momma ain't happy, nobody's happy"

Northwoods Fireplace in Anchorage and Eagle River carries the Jotul line.

http://www.northcountrystovesinc.com/JOTUL_PRODUCTS.html


Tulikivi stoves are carried and installed by Alaska Masonry Heat and I believe Treeforms Amish furniture carries them as well.

http://alaskamasonryheat.com/

I've installed regency inserts in two houses. I've tried to sit for a while beside my dad's quadrafire. My brothers each had country stoves. And, I have a pacific energy insert in the house down south.

The only one I don't like is the pacific energy.

Inserts work great, and better with the blower. Regency had sales when I bought them where the blower was free.

If you have an existing fireplace with a large diameter chimney, you can run rigid or flexible 6" SS liner up the chimney and that will work great. If the chimney is a straight shot and ~10" ID like in my house up here, just slide the rigid down from the roof. I wrapped the liner tightly in two places with some pretty solid mineral wool insulation in order to block off the annulus. You'll probably have to do some detailing on your roof to keep the weather out. That's not particularly hard.

You couldn't pay me to put a catalytic stove in a house. What a PITA.

+1 on the liner kit for the chimney...

prior to installing an outside wood boiler system, a friend put an SS liner inside our house chimney...when we re-roofed, we tore the damn thing out and found out what poor condition the original chimney was in where we couldn't get a good look at it....junk.

Calvin, it appears the mileage do vary.


I did some internet research as to what was available locally, Lopi dealer (since shut their doors) Blaze King (Woodway ) and the Quadra fire type stove.

even though the BK is old technology with the cat converter, and the Quadra seems to be state of the art technology, I went BK as my internet research showed lots of happy users, lots of bad reviews on the Lopi

and talking to local folks they were really happy with their BK's

plus the BK dealer has been here a long time and looks apt to last even longer whereas the other two dealers were new to our area. Plus all the folks that had been burning wood for years here all raved about their BK's. One man's junk is anothers treasure I reckon.

we heat 2800 sq. ft on two levels, we have a fireplace on each level.

I chose a free standing BK princess for upstairs and a BK princess insert for the downstairs fireplace as we never burnt a fire down there.

it took a bit of getting used to the BK technology and we get a good deal of creosote buildup even though we're careful to use seasoned wood.

but we get 12 hour burns easy, once you figure out how to use the stove, you stuff it to the gills and then close everything down.

far different gig than our woodstove at the cabin.

the cat converter will eventually give up the ghost, but it seems to work pretty well for us.


we used to use 2K gallons of fuel oil per year, now down to half that, course we're also heating a garage and the MIL apt. above the garage.

we set the thermostats at 62 but count on wood heat to keep us comfortable (relative term, the boys and I like the house at 68, the wife and MIL at 72+) course the boys and I cut and haul the wood.

cutting wood gets old after awhile, but so does paying for fuel oil, so you have to pick your poison.

The chimney and fireplace at my cabin had deteriorated quite a bit. The metal liner and heatilator conduits in the fireplace were rusted and the masonry chimney liner and blockwork was crumbling in places.

I repaired the blockwork, installed a stainless steel flue liner, blocked the heatlilator vents with stonework and installed a Lopi woodburning insert. I can get an 8 to 9 hour burn with hardwood if I manage the insert correctly.

I highly recommend getting a blower. It puts out much more heat into the house.

That's very nice looking!

We put in this Quadrafire just before winter after a number of positive recommendations from the 'Fire and are very pleased. It went into a masonry fireplace so runs with a stainless steel pipe through the chimney. We did not want one that extended beyond the face of the fireplace and this one met that requirement. The surround has since been replaced with one that is a bit more decorative as they sent the wrong one originally. Our house has four heating zones and the insert heats the primary living area really well as we hoped.

I just picked up a Woodstock Soapstone stove. They get a lot of great reviews, glass window front, cat burner. Just what I was looking for and the right size. Found it on Craigs list for half the cost of a new one plus it came with the chimney stack/flashing etc.....That stainless stuff adds up quick.

A friend has a Lopi insert and loves it. Sole heat source for him so he burns a lot and its been going strong for quite a few years. They are made in Mukilteo, WA.