thinking of a hand fed stove

rberq wrote: ↑

Thu. Jan. 31, 2019 6:40 pm

Tell her it builds character.

- i usually say "suck it up Buttercup!"

Well,
someone going to run the show.
If the Squad Leader does not run the Squad, then the Squad runs the Squad Leader.
When someone starts whining, you can empathize with them, BUT, if you sympathize with or for them, they will soon be running the show.

i have a hand fired Harman MK I + it works great + the fan that can be turned off just purrrrs. fan pushes a lot of heat thats between its double wall construction + i also have a small fan behind the stove i use when its "cooking" BUT unless your retired or someone is usually at home its heat output varies a lot if its throttled down when your out for the day. i installed it before retiring + can say unless your tolerant to cooler temps forget it!! when its really cold you need to keep it "cookin" of course a bigger stove would do better but depending on your layout one area can be a sauna + another chilly. i like it cool to sleep with lotsa covers so thats fine. a coal stove with a water heating option like on bigger harmans + a tankless water heater would work. IMO a house with a full open basement would do well with a warm basement that warms the floor above, all depends on your preferences but a change of heart can be costly $$$$$

rberq wrote: ↑

Thu. Jan. 31, 2019 9:26 am

I don't know how noisy your Keystoker is, but many hand-fed stoves also use fans which can become annoying hour after hour. Hand-fed stoves can be had without fans -- see previous replies -- so the question is, how much is a circulator fan needed for air distribution in your setup? Also, in my limited experience, a hand-fed with a hopper is far easier to tend than one without a hopper.

Remember, Stoker Stoves have two fans. ....And most should not be shut off.

oliver power wrote: ↑

Sat. Mar. 02, 2019 7:41 pm

Remember, Stoker Stoves have two fans. ....And most should not be shut off.

I have a gnome 40 from Alaska, it has a direct vent fan, combustion fan, blower fan, and a feed motor, with all those fans running it is a bit noisy, have really been looking for a nice hand fed stove for the house and I will put this back into the garage for a bit of heat out there !

I have a Hitzer 354 with the blower fan. It's true that the fan is noisy (it's just a cheap squirrel cage blower motor). But I only run the blower on the really cold days. On high the fan is insane, and even on low it's loud. Mine has the plug-in rheostat and even on the lowest setting it still blows almost too much air, I wish there was like a "super low" setting that was more gentle.

The 354 is a beast, I easily heat a 2000 square foot house w/ it, but it is my only heat source right now (probably getting a stoker boiler and installing HW baseboards by next winter).

If using a hand fed stove just for supplemental heat, you could probably get by with the 254 model or a similar smaller stove.

It's also worth mentioning that the 354 easily burns wood in the shoulder season or whenever. Wood burning does soot the door glass pretty bad, but a day or two after burning coal all the soot is cooked off and it's clean as a whistle again. I leave about an inch or two of coal ashes on the grates when burning wood to stop airflow up under the wood and getting a "runaway" fire. I would not burn wood on the bare grates as even good oak stovewood can burn up in an hour or so with all that airflow under the fire.

BTW even though the instructions say not to burn wood in a Hitzer, the dealer told me that's something they have to legally say because of EPA regulations being different for wood stoves. Trust me it can burn wood just fine and it doesn't hurt anything, but obviously the heat output is 2X or 3X better with coal than wood. I've been burning nut this year in my Hitzer and average about 2 to 2 1/2 five gallon buckets a day of coal thru the stove.

I ran a Keystoker 105 for 2 years in the house. It sits between the kitchen and the livingroom. I got to the point where I was tired of the noise of the fans. Also we lost power the last year we had the stove for 5 days when they were calling for over night lowes below 0*. I HAD to get the generator going to keep the house from freezing up. I switched it to a Hitzer 50-93 and it does an absolute amazing job. I'm heating 1800 sq ft. older ranch house. It does have a blower on it that I only use if it gets below 5* or the wind picks up bad.

I would 100% recommend the Hitzer 50-93. It is simple and a heating monster when you need it or can be idle way down to the point where you don't even know it's running.

A month ago I was off from work and we had -12* with high winds, Since I was home i decided to push the stove a little bit to see what it could do. I was able to hold the house at 78* in that temp outside. It was amazing. I also didn't push the stove over 500* I know it still had room to go but I didn't need it!