Pellet Stove Heat Sink?

This might be a dumb question, so bear with me.

My family is considering putting a pellet stove in our basement, but due to how it's constructed the standard chimney would be rather expensive and it would have to go through a deck. That's not exactly ideal.
So i was thinking about alternative ideas, and heat sinks crossed my mind. Would it be possible to put a large heat sink such as a big block of copper or whatever somewhere in the chimney assembly so the chimney can be shorter than it usually has to be?
Or is that just stupid?

I would NEVER call anyone stupid because I know first hand how tough it can be to meet requirements sometimes at a given location.

I am having trouble understanding how a heat sink would help though. I have a pellet stove so I know how the chimney is constructed, and how the power draft works, so chimney height does not influence draft in this case. Usually chimney height on a pellet stove is high (in your case above the deck) because of snow fouling the chimney. If it terminated at ground level, that can be an issue.

If I am picturing your set-up right, you are exiting the basement with a chimney at the rim joist level, then will need to make it go straight up through a hole in the decking material.

A workaround is possible perhaps, if you protect the deck from heat with a heat shield, and extend the chimney horizontally to the edge of the deck, then turn it upward at a hand rail post or something. If that horizontal run is long, and the cost expensive, you might look on swap ads for used pellet stove chimneys. People replace pellet stoves quite often with heat pumps and such, so a ton of perfectly usbale, but previously used, but cheap chimney pipe is out there to be had.

But i am not sure what your sitiuation is exactly.

Well, my basement is a Berm from the 70's, (built into the side of the hill, with one side open), and it's made of some very thick concrete. About fifteen or twenty feet up is an overhanging deck, and it would be a big pain in the neck to go through it. so i thought maybe a heat sink would allow us to stop at just below deck level.

I don't have a lot of experience with wood stoves, but what I do know is that you need to get the exhaust and venting right the first time, and properly deal with all the heat that is created.  It's not something to mess around with at all.  The dangers of fire and/or CO2 are significant.

There are a lot of times where building codes seem arbitrary.  But when it comes to wood burning stuff, it's critical that you take the advise of those who do this professionally.  For insurance purposes alone, you want to have this thing signed-off by the building inspector, or make sure the installer is licensed and bonded.  

Go slow on this one and get it right.  There's a lot of things that people on Permies.com can give great advise on, but for this one, I'd also want to get an "eyes-on" assessment by a professional.

Best of luck.

m

So if your deck is out front, why not put the chimney pipe through the rim joist on one of the other three walls? there would never be drilling through concrete to do that.

pellet stoves are remarkably easy to install, so i am not sure you have thought of all the configurations that are possible. As I said, it has a power draft by design so it is very easy to install.