I am thinking of getting one. I like the renewable resource aspect. But I have only known one person who had one, and it did not seem to produce much heat. My house is small (900 square feet). I don’t want a regular wood stove. All I have now is baseboard electric and the house is NEVER warm in winter.
Advice?
I have a pellet stove in my tack room which is about 20 x 20 ft. We built it with very good insulation and for the first two years we used the pellet stove. Unfortunately, it got TOO HOT! In the middle of winter, even on the lowest setting, the tack room got close to 90.
Now, I don’t use it anymore and have one or two of those Oil-Filled Radiant Tower Electric Space Heaters. Very safe to use and usually one was enough to heat it and I would only bring out the second one when the polar vortexes were upon us!
For your size of house, I would think the pellet stove would work great. My previous BO had one in her house and it worked well for the downstairs portion.
We have two in our house. They are AWESOME! Both are big enough to heat 2500 square feet, plenty powerful to keep things warm in the winter. We also have forced air and baseboard heat, though, so we mostly use the pellet stoves first thing in the morning to heat the main living area and kitchen, and then downstairs at night while we’re watching TV.
Thank you for these replies!
I got one and it heats my little (1000sq ft) farmhouse just fine. Just make sure you get a good quality pellet. Some leave you all ash and dont burn as efficiently…
I have a pellet stove in my 1800 square foot sieve of a 1750’s farmhouse. It certainly helps keep it warm. When my furnace went out last winter, it kept the house in the high 40’s, so it isn’t suitable (for my house) for the only heat source. I go through 4 -5 tons of pellets a winter. Buy the best pellet you can, there is a big difference between brands. My stove is a Harmon, which I love. My sister has a Quadrafire, which she loves. Different feeding mechanism, different issues, but same heat overall. Easy to fill and doesn’t run out. Well worth the investment I think.
I love my pellet stove! We have a 1200 sq. foot house, and it heats it quite well. We use maybe 3/4 bag of pellets through the day. It has really cut down on our heating costs.
Make sure the pellet is nice and tight. Loose pellets don’t burn well. Cherry pits are listed as another pellet stove source, but they really don’t burn well either. Spend the extra fifty cents for a good bag of pellets, it is worth it.
I have been running a Harmon XXV for 8 years in an 1800 sq. ft. farmhouse. I would say do not buy a cheaper unit. This one burns pretty much any kind of pellets with good results, one thing to be aware of is they are not silent like a wood stove, but they produce a steady heat unlike a wood stove.
Your situation will dictate your choices.
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I looked at pellet stoves, corn stoves and wood stoves. I decided on a wood stove for heat to be independent of a pellet supplier or anybody else. I can buy firewood from many sources or I can cut my own.
We’ve had 2 Harman pellet stoves, one in the house we used to own and the other in our current house. They work great and put out a lot of heat. Cleanup is easiest with a shop vac.
One small issue is the ones we’ve had won’t run if we loose power, since they have an electronic component. So we use the wood stove, which works very nicely.
We also have a pellet boiler for our mill building. It does a great job of heating. One thing with this an all renewable energy…do your research first. Make sure you know what needs to be done, since all the installers we’ve worked with have either not been fully forthcoming or have just been plain incompetent.
We have a Harmon for our 1,200 SF house. It keeps it nice and warm. It does run on electricity however so if we lose power we have no heat. (But that would be true even without the stove…)
Side effects of pellet stoves are dirt in the air and dirt in the house. Air is very dry, also seems people catch colds easier. My friend really liked her pellet stove, but quit using it because her house got so dirty and she always seemed to be catching or ending a cold breathing that air. She has a converted old Schoolhouse made into a home. Small, though she has a second story loft with two small bedrooms.
We have a wood burning stove, which we also quit using because of the dirt. Kids were always coughing, house was dirty. Along with the time needed to haul out ashes, haul in firewood and keeping the fire going while not home. We got a new furnace, which was really nice. All the coughing, dirt issues went away when we quit using the wood stove. All of us are much healthier these days!
Still have the wood stove, in case the electric goes out like in 2013 for 10 days. We now have a nice generator, but if it didn’t work, ran out of fuel, the wood stove keeps things around 50F thru the whole house. We can manage with that for an emergency time.
We also have a Harman and LOVE it! We have found that the key (Aside from getting a good brand stove- you get what you pay for!) is high quality pellets. We had great pellets our first winter, but were not able to get the same ones last year (They were not available) and there was a noticeable difference- they didn’t produce as much heat but they left more ash (not as efficient burning). We got better quality again this year and are thrilled with them. While yes, it does dry the air out, we have not noticed the house being any dirtier while using than when not using the rest of the year, as the poster above noticed. I would say the only other negative is that the fan is a bit loud when running, but the benefits far outweigh the cons. We paid good money for the stove (one of the best models) but in less than 3 years, it has already paid for itself in terms of savings that we would have spent on oil (we can tell, because the oil comes on all the time in the winter when the stove isn’t running, but rarely comes on when it is!).
If you can find one that will work with no electricity, then one might make a good choice. We had a pellet stove, but put in a wood stove instead. Wood is free (well, the labor isn’t) on our farmette/area because trees are plentiful and our property has enough to use. Buying logs has been cheaper than buying pellets. A ton of pellets is usually around $220–and you have to pick them up, and stack them in a dry spot. If you run through 4 tons a year, you are pushing $1000 for heating. I haven’t spent that much in wood in 4 years.
I’ve heated with a pellet stove for the last 8 years. For me it was either pellet or propane, and pellets were cheaper. This year, with fuel prices down, I don’t know that it would make much of a difference, and propane is certainly easier. That said, I didn’t find my pellet stove particularly dirty to operate. A 40-lb bag of pellets generated less than a cup of ash. You are dependent on electricity - my stove has three motors. My house is 160 years old and drafty, so the pellet stove has it’s work cut out for it. It’s hard in the South (I’m in Tennessee) to find pellets, but Tractor Supply carries them. If you buy over 100 bags (2 tons) they cut you a small break on the price.
StG
[QUOTE=HPFarmette;8356424]
I am thinking of getting one. I like the renewable resource aspect. But I have only known one person who had one, and it did not seem to produce much heat. My house is small (900 square feet). I don’t want a regular wood stove. All I have now is baseboard electric and the house is NEVER warm in winter.
Advice?[/QUOTE]
Is this a stove or furnace? Is this in a house or barn?
Wood and wood pellet furnaces can do a very nice job of heating a home, if they use the ducting system in the house.
I cannot even fathom the cost and poor performance of heating with electric baseboard in W NY state. I shudder and shiver simultaneously.
I have corn/pellet/wheat etc stoves - Enviro and Bixby. Right now burning corn as it’s really cheap. re: humidity, actually the air is less dry w/ the stove vs the furnace. If you do get a stove, be sure to use outside air so you’re not drawing cold air into the house through leaks in the walls and windows.
May I ask a dumb, or at least ignorant, pellet stove question? The house I’m renting has one. There is a thermostat associated with it. Presuming I have pellets in it, would it light/go on if I turned up the thermostat? Or is there a separate lighting ritual, and then after that I can depend on the thermostat?
If it has a wall thermostat most likely it would have an igniter. I would google for a manual before lighting it up.
[QUOTE=Calvincrowe;8357358]
If you can find one that will work with no electricity, then one might make a good choice. We had a pellet stove, but put in a wood stove instead. Wood is free (well, the labor isn’t) on our farmette/area because trees are plentiful and our property has enough to use. Buying logs has been cheaper than buying pellets. A ton of pellets is usually around $220–and you have to pick them up, and stack them in a dry spot. If you run through 4 tons a year, you are pushing $1000 for heating. I haven’t spent that much in wood in 4 years.[/QUOTE]
I have a wiseway gravity fed pellet stove which does a great job heating my small house (800sq ft). No electronics involved so useable in power outage. Complaints…that there is no surface for heating/drying/etc.
And it’s funny looking…
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