Looking for Plan B - Need suggestions for backup heat

we have an outdoor wood furnace..no chimney needed..no wood mess inside..we installed the pex and heat exchangers ourselves..the one for the furnace fits in the space below the furnace between it and our ductwork and the fan from the furnace blows the heat through the ductwork through the heat exchanger..works like a charm..ours even runs our sons house and garage.

we bought a insulated pex tubing and ran it from the furnace to the heat exchanger..you can also hook them up to heat your water, garages, greenhouses..etc.

if you can do basic pex work plumbing you can do it yourself..we did also install a boilover thermostat and got a generator to run the pump in case of power outages..but you have that already.

IMO get an "Infrared" vent less heater, not the "blue flame".

the infrared have a ceramic insert that glow red when running and it heat so much better than the blue flame,

I put the vent less in the barn in the milk room and in the meat cutting room, (at first I had one of each) I had a blue flame and could never keep the room comfortable warm I a infrared, in the other room and it was nice, I went and bought a second infrared unit and replaced the blue flame unit, now the room is warm, (it heats up the floor as well, as I have used the milking room for a nursery for baby goats and calves and now the cement floor does not suck the life out of them),

but if your going to use one get a battery powered CO detector and have it working as well,

Natural gas in most climates releases about 1 gallon of water for every 100,000 btu's burned. Propane releases a little less [CH4 vs C3H8] but not much as the extra carbon atom will not always burn completly but burns more Hydrogen when it does. The vents draw this out, unvented heaters leave it in the air. Read the instructions carefully and install as noted. Most are not acceptable for northern climates. When I looked at one for a garage the requirement was to install a permanent opening 10"x10" to the outdoors. That makes it even tougher to heat in a Montana winter.

This is not on topic. If you have a pellet or corn stove, consider buying a spare printed circuit board. I've run into folks that had theirs go bad and find out for various reasons such as the manufacturer going out of business, they couldn't get one. At that point they had no way of automatically feeding the fuel. A spare board now is way cheaper than having to buy another new heater later.

Women! In James' first post he said he wanted a small woodstove, now you're saying you want a large (enough for 2000sf) woodstove. You are not allowed to override James' decision!

Really, as long as you aleady have the small woodstove, I'd give it a go. If it doesn't heat the upstairs to 62-64º, then get a bigger stove. But remember, in order to get 62-64ºF upstairs or in the back bedrooms, the living room may have to be at 90+ degrees. It all depends on how the house is laid out, insulated and where the stove is located....but your know that.

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That was my thinking too.

Just make sure you also have the stovepipe and connectors you would need to connect the wood stove to the existing piping for your pellet stove.

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Popeye

It sounds like you're pretty well covered right now. Why not wait until your pellet stove needs replacing and then just put the wood stove in where the pellet stove is now, with appropriate chimney? Save some money and time that way. If you pre-purchase the chimney liner you wouldn't be caught short, either. Just easier, seems to me.

Jennifer

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make sure that the chimney for the pellet stove is ok for wood and that you have all the pipe ready and waiting to go on your wood stove! prep like theres no tomorrow, then pray that you never need it! good idea on the circuit board! one of the problems encoutered in our ice storm was power surges that blew out furnace parts and putors! we run a honda with sine wave for the putors, let us access the internet during the storm! (as long as someone did not steal the gen running the phone net!) today we are on wireless, hope they have a back up on their tower!

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Beware of the Ventless Propane Heaters....

You'll fall in love. I've got a couple of gas burners, I just turned the one in the bathroom down, even on low it was hot.

When I come in half frozen, it's a tossup whether I'll back myself up to the woodstove (piped for natural gas) or the heater.

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I'm not a fan of the ventless gas heaters due to CO risk, the moisture problems and the indoor air pollution from combustion byproducts.

If your situation, I'd make sure you had a good stock of pellets and call it good. You already have a pretty good back up plan. If your generator runs off the propane, make sure you have a large enough tank to keep it running for a week or more. If it's gasoline or diesel make sure you have sufficient fuel available & it's in good condition.

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Question about the ventless heaters: We had a couple in our house that we removed when we remodeled and put in the wood stove. They were a blue flame model, probably not a terribly expensive model. We did use them a few time before the remodel, but we were too worried to let it run without someone in the house (like when we lost power for a week and had to go back to work). Are they safe to leave running even if one isn't home?

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Sarah,

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If you got free wood all around you, I would sell the pellet stove and start burning wood.

If you need a backup for an inside wood stove, you are dead anyway…

Our inside wood stove is plan A, B and C!

If they are thermostatically controlled, then yes. I typically leave mine on to keep the pipes from freezing for a week or more when I'm in Las Vegas. There is no reason to think that doing that would be unsafe. I'm more concerned about running out of propane and breaking the water heater, pipes, or pump than I am about fire hazard.

However, of you have a smaller model (10,000 btu/hour or smaller) that has no thermostat I would be hesitant to set a fixed flame height and leave it alone for an length of time. You could get away with it just for the time you're at work, but not for a few days.

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Purely from a survival standpoint, yes, you are absolutely correct. But there are certain conveniences that you get from a more sophisticated heater. The temperature of a home is kept more comfortable when a thermostat is keeping temperatures in a tighter range. You can also have an extended fuel source, such as a 250 gallon propane tank, to allow you to leave your home for an extended period of time without worrying about pipes freezing.

You can certainly live with just a wood stove, but I don't begrudge anyone for wanting an appliance that's more convenient and comfortable for the primary heat source. Clearly, a pellet stove offers a level of convenience and comfort that the wood stove can't.

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I had a need for some supplemental heating in my home a couple years ago. I looked at ventless propane heaters and was scared off by the moisture they give back to the room and moreso by the fact that they all highly recommended that you leave X amount of ventilation to the outside by cutting a vent or leaving a window open.

That kinda seemed to defeat the purpose to me.

I ended up installing a small, direct vented propane heater. It does the job very well and I don't have to worry about waking up dead some morning.

I think you had bad advice about the open window. That could be necessary with unusually tight construction, but normally the CO alarm can be your guide. We don't leave a window open and the CO alarm has never sounded.

In very cold climates the extra moisture can be a feature, since it offests the bone-dry air during subzero and single-digit cold spells.

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My advice came straight from the owners manuals of all the units I looked at. Every one of them had specific requirements for fresh air being brought in.

It's a fact that combustion produces harmful byproducts. The only way to eliminate that possibilty of problems is to either remove the byproducts from the room or to make sure the room is big enough to absorb the byproducts while keeping the levels of harmful byproducts to a "suitable" level.

To each his own but I chose to take control of the situation and not have to rely on a CO2 monitor to wake me and my family up.

I'd use a ventless in certain situations but not in my home and definitely not where I sleep. In fact, the local propane dealers will not fill your tank if they know you have a ventless heater in a sleeping area.

Being able to leave home for long periods of time is definitely an important consideration, which is why we don't rely solely on wood heat. It is also worth noting that "free wood" is only free if you don't place any value on your time or effort.

I didn't like pellet stoves until we bought this house. Although it isn't an option for the EOTWAWKI situation, it is great for normal life. We don't have to cut or split the wood, worry about seasoning it, or deal with creosote in the chimney. There is little ash to deal with, and it is easier to regulate the heat, especially overnight. Having the generator means it is fine for short term (a few weeks) SHTF situations.

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While you've already gotten plenty of good advice I'm gonna toss in my 2 cents worth:

Fall of 2008 I installed a Drolet Wood Stove (60,000 btu rated) and a chimney in my 1400 sq. ft. 1 1/2 story house. It heats it great. First floor stays 75 deg with minimal effort and the second floor varies depending on who has what door closed. A stove this size should work fine in your house since A) you're in a little warmer climate and B) you can always block off the upper floors in a true worst case scenario. Total cost was about $1400 for everything. If you only need a chimney liner it should be even less for you.

Since you already have pellets I'd just plan on using your pellet stove until you are out. Then switch to wood. You can sell the pellet stove to offset some of the cost. Don't even worry about getting the LP ventless. Why spend the money on it now when you should switch to wood soon. I do see the advantages of pellets but I wanted a heat source that I could scrounge fuel for (instead of pay) if things got real bad. I don't mind paying for wood but I "don't have to". Nice feature to have in today's economy.

CB