wood stove ideas

first thing i wanna say is i did probably 5+ hours of reading before i posted this.

i have a couple idea i wanna run by you guys but first i know a rocket stove and a mass bench stove would be way better then moding a wood stove but with my limited space and and my gf there not an option .

so a lil info about my house  its 850sqfeet one lvl the sealing is about 12 feet tall over the stove and the pipe will be about 14 feet tall minus the stove.

i plane on getting a none cataleptic stove with the secondary burn air intake pipes so i will burn small hot fires. (i dont know what one yet but i can get this one easy for a not bad pricehttp://www.lennoxhearthproducts.com/products/stoves/striker-s160/ )

1the first idea i have if since i know i need to add mass to my stove and i also know by doing this i can overheat the stove. is can i add a hollow metal base under the fire place filled with massons sand and rebars welded to the bottom of the stove sticking into the sand? do you see any problems with overheating?

2  can i do the same thing for the back and chimney of the stove without overheating it? will the sand (or i can use cement or some other mass) soak up the heat or will it insulate it and make the stove overheat.


3 what if i buy a stove way bigger then i need and add more mass inside the stove?

thnx for your time

Greetings, If you buy an over size stove, as you mentioned, you can stack bricks inside on three sides adding to the mass. The stove will not over heat and you can close the damper as the fire burns down and it will give out heat for longer than it would have had you not added to the mass. Not sure if that helps. With a house of that size it should be easy to keep it warm. Adding a heat thief to your stove pipe will remove even more when the stove is burning, I've heard talk against them but I have used on for  years with good results.

hey thnx for the reply. i have done more research and found this http://geopathfinder.com/9597.html im gona copy his idea but make it about 1/3 the size because the floors where installed in 1948 and there not to cod lol. im also thinking about using an old water tank and pump and robing heat from the stove with a coil and then let it out once the stove is out.

grenade wrote:

i plane on getting a none cataleptic stove with the secondary burn air intake pipes so i will burn small hot fires. (i dont know what one yet but i can get this one easy for a not bad pricehttp://www.lennoxhearthproducts.com/products/stoves/striker-s160/ )

OK

1the first idea i have if since i know i need to add mass to my stove and i also know by doing this i can overheat the stove. is can i add a hollow metal base under the fire place filled with massons sand and rebars welded to the bottom of the stove sticking into the sand? do you see any problems with overheating?

Two things... there should not be much usable heat coming out the bottom as the firebox should be enclosed in insulating firebrick so that the fire can burn well and fully. Second, sand is not the best thing for heat storage as it tends to insulate itself...

2   can i do the same thing for the back and chimney of the stove without overheating it? will the sand (or i can use cement or some other mass) soak up the heat or will it insulate it and make the stove overheat.

Yes, I would use a thin layer of clay brick... fire brick is not needed except in the flue path... outside of the clay brick (used... free is best) I would put concrete blocks outside of that if they are cheap enough.. or more clay brick if they are cheaper... right up to the roof or ceiling is fine.

3 what if i buy a stove way bigger then i need and add more mass inside the stove?

Could be a problem. If you do this make sure you put some insulating brick inside to form the firebox. It doesn't have to be very thick, but enough to make the fire really hot so it burns completely.

grenade wrote:
hey thnx for the reply. i have done more research and found this http://geopathfinder.com/9597.html im gona copy his idea but make it about 1/3 the size because the floors where installed in 1948 and there not to cod lol. im also thinking about using an old water tank and pump and robing heat from the stove with a coil and then let it out once the stove is out.

That was one of the sites I was going to point you at

The other is somewhat harder to navigate... but here is a picture of the stove part. Walter actually has quite a lot of mass along the flue... notice he has used all cinder block (concrete) in his design. This is probably ok... just remember concrete looses its strength at around 600 or 700C (say 1000 to 1200F). If the fire box has insulating fire brick as part of it there should be no problem. If you ask Walter he is pretty good about pointing you to more articles on the same subject on his site. but do try a search first

The picture is from this website:
http://flashweb.com/blog/2009/03/16th-cord-of-wood.html

I notice there is ash molded along the bottom of the door to seal the flat slide where that type of stove leaks. I have one [ not using it at this time] that has a small broken piece out of the slide, it gobbled the wood and didn't give much heat for it.

valley ranch wrote:
I notice there is ash molded along the bottom of the door to seal the flat slide where that type of stove leaks. I have one [ not using it at this time] that has a small broken piece out of the slide, it gobbled the wood and didn't give much heat for it.

So as built it is not much good... but, in this use it seems to work well. Hmm... Ok, let me suggest that this use of this kind of stove works well because of that. The first thing is that it doesn't give much heat for the wood... this means that burning wood most of the heat goes up the flue... not good.... normally that is a bad thing, but in this case it is actually good. This set up extracts almost all of the heat from the flue in a similar manner to the RMH. The flue path extends up from the stove (which is in the centre of the dwelling BTW) then goes back to the back wall before exiting. The whole path is enclosed with mass (in fact the whole dwelling has a lot of mass). The fact that it doesn't throw much heat at the firebox means the kitchen is not over heated. The front of the house has very good solar collection (good enough that on sunny days in the middle of winter the stove is not used) and the horizontal section goes through the loft where half the family sleeps, warming that too. This stove was chosen partly because it is small and the house is less than 300sqft with not much room to install a stove. The flue mass is part of the wall and therefore stacks functions. This stove is also a functional cooking appliance.

One has to look at the whole picture. That is a big part of the problem with most cast iron stoves ... they are generic... they are designed for an application that does not exist because they are trying to fit lots of different applications and CSA/UL/EPA testing costs a lot of money. Even a RMH or a masonry heater has to be designed to fit the space it is used in to give the best effectiveness for the fuel consumed. What works in Idaho and what works in Portland and what works in Siberia are all different solutions.

This setup from what I can see is the very best match to that family's needs. The experience others have had with the same stove though not very good, are also just as valid. We can learn from both.

grenade wrote:
about 1/3 the size because the floors where installed in 1948 and there not to cod lol. im also thinking about using an old water tank and pump and robing heat from the stove with a coil and then let it out once the stove is out.

Just some thoughts. Making the mass smaller would be ok so long as you are not talking foot print. The size you wish to think about is mass per square foot, not total mass. If you have room the mass can be spread out. Or if the house is yours (not rented) the foundation can be improved (the masonry heater guys do this all the time). A hole in floor the size of the stove hearth and build a U shaped cinder block support from the ground. If there is a basement, the U shape gives back the space for storage, if there is only a crawl space then it can be square instead. In a rental.... you have what you have. Water has weight too... the average hot water tank weighs 500 to 600 lbs BTW and all of this with an 18inch circle foot print. Brick may spread this load out a bit more.

I'm sure you have it  dialed in well. You're using it heat a thermal mass. I'ed like to know how that's working out for you. I've read a bit about doing that.

I spent all day installing a chimney, night caught us wifey and I up on the roof with a light putting on the storm collar. We put a plastic bag over the pipe end , still have to make the chimney cap.

We are putting in a small wood stove with a glass front.

Have a very good day.

Sounds like it's woking well for you. I like the idea of putting thermal mass to work. Have a great day