Anyone have a pellet stove?

**FrugalMomof3** · 11-20-2008, 07:34 PM

My husband and I are interested in getting a pellet stove and since we're newbies on this subject wanted to get your opinions.

Now we are looking at getting an Englander from Home Depot either the 1500 sq. ft or the 2000 sq. ft but again we wanted to get your opinion.

Does anyone have this type? How well does it heat? Do the pellets feed well into the hopper? Are they messy?

If you want to recommend another brand that's fairly reasonable in price, please do.

We want to get one to help cut down costs of heating our house with oil heat, I mean even with the cost of oil going down we are still trying to find ways to cut down, I know the pellets cost money but I am pretty sure not as much as having to purchase oil every single month at $500 a pop.

TIA!

**anna021** · 11-20-2008, 07:59 PM

we've had one for 5-6 years, when we got it pellets were 2.00 a bag, we're now 6.00 a bag, please do lots of research before you buy a stove. Our's is used to keep our home warm this time of year, but as soon as it gets below 32 degrees and colder, for us it doesn't keep the house warm enough or should I say, as warm as cheaply as fuel oil. Our home is all on one floor, I'm not sure it would work that well on multi levels, also there's a lot of lifting, 40 pound bags don't sound so heavy one at a time, but when your bringing 50 of them (1 ton) in to store, they get real heavy, or maybe I'm just 5-6 years older, LOL Make sure you get a stove that's quiet, ours is made in Austria and very quiet, but we have friend's who have a stove you can't hear the TV when it's on. So let me just say check them out well before buying, check out the price of pellets in your area, make sure there's someone in the area who services them, oh, and also make sure you have a place for the pellet that is very dry, as pellets are ruined if they get wet or even damp. One more thing, I would say make sure you get one with a large window in front, nice to watch the fire.

**frugal is fun** · 11-21-2008, 11:09 AM

I don't have a pellet stove but we considered one years ago. We ended up buying a woodstove instead.

Our main reasons were you can get wood for free. Yes it takes work but you can get wood for free. We've had our stove for 8 years and have NEVER bought wood.

I believe pellet stoves need electricity to feed the pellets (or at least they did years ago) so if you loose power you loose your heat source. And like someone mentioned you need the space to store the pellets and I know in my area, there was actaully a shortage of pellets this year.

Just do your research and you should be fine.

**wanderinggrandma** · 11-21-2008, 03:14 PM

We have a Lopi pellet stove--for about 10 years now. Before that we had a wood stove. We loose power every winter--and we can run the pellet stove off of the generator or a battery back up system.

The pellet stove is our back-up heat. We have a heat pump with a furnace. I really prefer the bags of pellets over lugging in wood. I maybe getting lazy. We buy pellets by the ton and have them delivered on a pallet and then transfer them to a pallet in the garage. We had a surplus and havent bought any for a couple of years so I have no idea how much they are now--you do save when you buy a ton in our area.

Oh a final thought--I only have to fill the hopper every other day--not every few hours like the wood stove.

Good luck! Oh and for us frugal folks--I place a clothes rack in front of the stove to dry laundry and get moisture back into the air. Dries the laundry really quickly!!

**rachelj** · 11-21-2008, 03:28 PM

We looked into a corn and wood pellet stoves.

The biggest reason that we decided against it was storage. Where do you store all of that corn/wood pellet without bugs/mice getting into it. We live in a residential area (subdivision) and we decided it wasn't worth the mess and extra work of coming up with a storage place.

**Karla** · 11-21-2008, 06:07 PM

I have to say I love my pellet stove, its made to heat 2500 sf, my home is one level and 1640sf. We haven't used our furnace in over 10yrs, except it is set so if the stove runs out of pellets the furnace will kick on. The stove will heat you out of my house.
Pellets have gone up but we are paying about 225.00 a ton we use less that 2 ton a year so for 450.00 we heat all winter, yes it uses power to run but our power hasn't gone out much over the years and you can run a generator for it if necessary.
I wil say to check out your area for the cost of stoves, and pellets and see if its practical for your area...it sure is for us.
My stove is a Quadrafire and its paid for itself more than once already...it cost us 11 yrs ago 2500. but it was more than worth it.

**my4littlebuffaloes** · 11-21-2008, 06:16 PM

Very timely thread, my dh and I want a pellet stove desparately, but don't have the cash to pay for the stove and the pellets, or either one. We want to use it heat our whole house and forgo using the furnace. We have looked into many brands and the one we keep coming back to is the Quadrafire. It seems like a good one. Now, even if we did have the cash, there is a shortage of the stoves here.

**FrugalMomof3** · 11-21-2008, 06:42 PM

There is an article in the magazine This Old House about a couple who uses their pellet stove instead of oil heat. They are saving about $2200 a year! I know DH really wants one and if we could get one and slowly wean off using oil heat, it would work great.

**kabin63** · 11-21-2008, 11:57 PM

We have an American Harvest Stove. It heats 1,800 sq. ft. It was given to us by an older couple that wanted to install natural gas. They said the stove saved the a ton of money when they were on propane. This is the first year we have it and so far it has cut our natural gas bill in half, but, I still haven't figured out how uch we will use over the course of the year. So far, I can say that I love being able to sit in the living room and not freeze. The pellets are running us about $4.99 a bag here. I know that if you find a good price and go to Lowes they will price match plus 10% off the bill. 50 bags is a ton, or one skid. We are storing the pellets in 50 gal. drums that are lined with huge trashliners. We are keepingthem outside the house, but they are well sealed off. One thing to keep in mind is that you need humidity with a stove. It gets so dry (haven't found a huidifier yet) that my hair sticks to my face. Hate that, but love the heat. Overall I agree that you should just research the heck out of them and then decide. Good luck in your venture!

**FrugalMomof3** · 11-23-2008, 06:32 PM

Ok ladies.... well I got a New England Pellet Stove that can heat at 1500 sq. ft or more home. Works perfect as we tested it out.

No one had pellets not Lowes or Home Depot but we went to Walmart and the 40 lb. bags were $6 a bag! OMG! We have to find a cheaper place but until then wherever we can get it the cheapest is better.

I am excited to get this setup in our new home.... we should be closing before Thanksgiving and DH is off Thursday and Friday and then Sunday so he should be able to hook it up in no time.

Is it required to have the pellet stove sit on a fire proof type base? My DH and I figured it would be cheaper to just put tiles down in that area, the bases are running at Lowes for like $40, a few tiles would cost us less than $10.

**kabin63** · 11-23-2008, 11:00 PM

Tracy,
We put ceramic tile on the floor, but we also layed some cement board before hand. Again, something for extra protection. My husband was worried that the tiles could crack. The stove itself doesn't get hot to the touch, accept for the door, however, if a door seal goes bad it spray hot sparks out onto the floor. I found this out last Thursday night. My best advice is to make sure there is plenty of space around it in case of hot ash. BTW, replacing that door seal isn't a bad deal or a huge cost. Thank goodness for that.
Kathy