A Challenge to Anthracite Stove Makers

Look at Vermont castings, Godin, old baseburners (to die for), Agas and now some wood burners - all gorgeous stoves. Even the Harman DVC wih a gold door is not bad and the new Magnum looks OK. Here again is a post from a guy who bought a Vermont Casting based on looks. In my book none of the above stoves are worth a damn as modern anthracite burners (with apologies to Mr. Herrick). My Pocos are in the basement so I don't care what they look like. So come on let's have a design forum not functional design ideas just looks. Let it be something that could go onto the front page of Architectural Digest. With oil at $120bbl the snobby McMansion set will be looking at new ideas.

coalnewbie wrote:Look at Vermont castings, Godin, old baseburners (to die for), Agas and now some wood burners - all gorgeous stoves. Even the Harman DVC wih a gold door is not bad and the new Magnum looks OK. Here again is a post from a guy who bought a Vermont Casting based on looks. In my book none of the above stoves are worth a damn as modern anthracite burners (with apologies to Mr. Herrick). My Pocos are in the basement so I don't care what they look like. So come on let's have a design forum not functional design ideas just looks. Let it be something that could go onto the front page of Architectural Digest. With oil at $120bbl the snobby McMansion set will be looking at new ideas.

The thing is my Base Burner will match the heat output of your stove while using 50 to 75% less coal and do it without any dependency on electricity or auxiliary appliances. So what are you trying to say here.

Yeah, I'll take function over form as well. My 1600 isn't pretty. But it cranks out the heat and holds a lot of coal.

Most people looking into coal are doing it to save money, adding a lot of ornamental stuff is going to add hundreds or even thousands to the cost. When they produce a new unit they want to sell tens of thousands of them and this would be a very small market making it unprofitable.

coalnewbie wrote:the snobby McMansion set

Doesn't give two toots about the cost

Sting wrote: Doesn't give two toots about the cost

...and rarely is going to bother with coal for heat. Out of the 600 customers I had maybe 2 that would fit into the cost doesn't matter category. One had a boiler and the other got 15 ton to stock pile for hand fired stove I never heard from again.

Richard S. wrote:

Sting wrote: Doesn't give two toots about the cost

...and rarely is going to bother with coal for heat. Out of the 600 customers I had maybe 2 that would fit into the cost doesn't matter category. One had a boiler and the other got 15 ton to stock pile for hand fired stove I never heard from again.

One of my kid's friends family lives in a standard - always feels cold - with cathedral ceilings in entryway and family room - McMansion. The mom felt how warm the house was when she picked up her kid one day and started asking questions. She was real impressed with the warmth and the yearly $ (said they have been choking on their oil bills), but the Dad is on the road for weeks at a time and she didn't want the coal chores added to her daily duties since they have 5 kids. Oh well, the choices they get to live with!

wsherrick wrote:The thing is my Base Burner will match the heat output of your stove while using 50 to 75% less coal and do it without any dependency on electricity or auxiliary appliances. So what are you trying to say here.

While I am admirer of the best of the old stoves I don't think you are being objective in assessing new stoves. Your stove is a batch loading stove with an extended heat exchange area. It lacks both a magazine and thermostat to automatically control the air. A modern stove like the Hitzer also has the equivalent of extended heat exchange area by using a blower to increase the effectiveness of its heat exchange. It also has both magazine or hopper and thermostat. I very much doubt whether any batch loading stove whether new or old can match it for efficiency when run at a moderate firing rate. There are also efficient modern stoves that do not require electricity. Both the Surdiac and Franco Belge have extended heat exchange plus both hopper and thermostat. They have been tested to achieve efficiencies in the upper 80s and even to exceed 90 percent by official government testing laboratories in both France and Germany.

I am not saying that any of these stoves are perfect or that there is no room for improvement which I think is true in both old and new stoves.

I am looking forward to the report by Nortcan when he gets his new stove running to compare with his Vigilant. I think he will be objective in his report.

Concerning styling I agree that for the most part the old stoves have better style but even here it went rapidly downhill after the 1920s or so.

franco b wrote:

wsherrick wrote:The thing is my Base Burner will match the heat output of your stove while using 50 to 75% less coal and do it without any dependency on electricity or auxiliary appliances. So what are you trying to say here.

While I am admirer of the best of the old stoves I don't think you are being objective in assessing new stoves. Your stove is a batch loading stove with an extended heat exchange area. It lacks both a magazine and thermostat to automatically control the air. A modern stove like the Hitzer also has the equivalent of extended heat exchange area by using a blower to increase the effectiveness of its heat exchange. It also has both magazine or hopper and thermostat. I very much doubt whether any batch loading stove whether new or old can match it for efficiency when run at a moderate firing rate. There are also efficient modern stoves that do not require electricity. Both the Surdiac and Franco Belge have extended heat exchange plus both hopper and thermostat. They have been tested to achieve efficiencies in the upper 80s and even to exceed 90 percent by official government testing laboratories in both France and Germany.

I am not saying that any of these stoves are perfect or that there is no room for improvement which I think is true in both old and new stoves.

I am looking forward to the report by Nortcan when he gets his new stove running to compare with his Vigilant. I think he will be objective in his report.

Concerning styling I agree that for the most part the old stoves have better style but even here it went rapidly downhill after the 1920s or so.

Believe what you will and as far as my objectivity goes, the numbers speak for themselves. I don't make statements lightly due to my bias. There are others here who have found my arguments sound and based on close observation. My observations match theres, they just don't want to argue publicly about it. Maybe you are the one who might be a little biased. If you want to prove me wrong, get a base heater and see for yourself. I dare you.

And I agree with you about the cabinet style circulators made after the mid 20's. There are very few of those that I think are attractive at all and also I believe the overall high quality of parlor stoves began their long decent during this time as well.

wsherrick wrote: If you want to prove me wrong, get a base heater and see for yourself. I dare you.

I am constantly on the lookout for a small good one. But the opposite also holds true for you unless you have already tried a stove or stoves with the features I think important.

So far this winter I have run four different stoves and sold three in an effort to try different configurations and learn their weak and strong points.

Like you I believe the vertical configuration with round fire pot to be best.

I had a Vermont Castings stove with a thermostat and an Ashley with a thermostat and this winter I did a side by side cost and performance comparison between my stove and a co worker who bought a Harman Stoker. His house is similiar and his installation is similiar and he also lives in the same climate as I do. The stoker has to burn 60 to 70 pounds of coal to produce the same heat mine does with 30-40 pounds. Plus it is a loud enough contraption with all the fans and stuff on it that makes it go.
Another comparison was done with a Chubby by someone else who has a No 6 Base Heater. The Glenwood heated more area much more evenly while running at 375-400 degrees while consuming 25 to 30 pounds of coal where as the Chubby had to burn 80 pounds of coal and run at 550 to 600 degrees to get close to it over the same length of time. So there you go. By next winter the Glenwood will have its magazine restored to it and then I will run another series of tests. I know these tests are ancedotal but I have compared notes with other Glenwood owners and their results are very much the same.

I won't even mention except in passing the comparison to my neighbors that burn wood. Burning coal in a trash barrel would be more preferable to me than being a slave to a wood stove.

wsherrick wrote:I had a Vermont Castings stove with a thermostat and an Ashley with a thermostat and this winter I did a side by side cost and performance comparison between my stove and a co worker who bought a Harman Stoker. His house is similiar and his installation is similiar and he also lives in the same climate as I do. The stoker has to burn 60 to 70 pounds of coal to produce the same heat mine does with 30-40 pounds. Plus it is a loud enough contraption with all the fans and stuff on it that makes it go.
Another comparison was done with a Chubby by someone else who has a No 6 Base Heater. The Glenwood heated more area much more evenly while running at 375-400 degrees while consuming 25 to 30 pounds of coal where as the Chubby had to burn 80 pounds of coal and run at 550 to 600 degrees to get close to it over the same length of time. So there you go. By next winter the Glenwood will have its magazine restored to it and then I will run another series of tests. I know these tests are ancedotal but I have compared notes with other Glenwood owners and their results are very much the same.

I won't even mention except in passing the comparison to my neighbors that burn wood. Burning coal in a trash barrel would be more preferable to me than being a slave to a wood stove.

So are you saying on my DS box stove I use 40lbs a day unless were at zero or below with blowing wind then it will go to 80lbs that I could use 20-40 lbs a day, cause if I can save that I will keep my eyes open for a glennwood. It takes X amount of BTU to heat an area, if it's not going up the chimney it's going in the house.

Eric

I don't know how your house is set up. In the coldest sub zero weather I never burn more than 40 or 50 pounds of coal a day in the Glenwood. Others may have different results. I am reporting the results I have obtained with it and compared it to all the other stoves I have ever had or been around in a half century of heating this way. I don't know how much surface area your DS has, but; the Glenwood has over 27 square feet of radiating surface area to work with.