Wood Stove Heat Reclaimers?

[WKPoor]

I'm thinking about trying a reclaimer on my stove. Has anyone here had or have experience with one and how well did you like the performance? My stove is probably seriously ineffecient and I know I'm sending most of my heat up the stack. I only have talked to one person who was ever around one and he talked favorably of it.

[johnbron]

If you are talking about the collector box with a fan in the chimney pipe we used to have one on our wood stove in the early 60s. That thing would drive you out of the room it worked so well. Really made a big difference for fast heating the room.

[400lbsonacubseatspring]

I had one on a wood stove once...they are amazing. There was one on my oil boiler when we bought the house, and it cooled the exhaust down so much, that you could put your hand in the chimney above it, no problem.

They do tend to gather a lot of soot in them, however, and if you turn them on too early, before your chimney heats up, they can contribute to creosote buildup.

[Marion(57 Loboy)]

I had one of those on a freestanding woodburner in a home I owned when I was first married. I forget the brand name, but it was in-line with the flue a few feet above the top of the firebox. The wood burning stove would keep the room cozy to sit in and enjoy the mood without the blower. WITH the blower, it would heat the whole house to the point you'd need to crack a window!! Mine had a handle on it that when you pulled it out and pushed it back, it scraped the heat exchanger tubes on the inside.

[400lbsonacubseatspring]

I forget the brand name, but it was in-line with the flue a few feet above the top of the firebox. The wood burning stove would keep the room cozy to sit in and enjoy the mood without the blower. WITH the blower, it would heat the whole house to the point you'd need to crack a window!! Mine had a handle on it that when you pulled it out and pushed it back, it scraped the heat exchanger tubes on the inside.

There was a brand called "heatolator" that had the soot scraper. That was a marvelous idea, BTW.

[George Willer]

The old time way of doing much the same thing... put the stove on the other side of the room and run a long pipe! Compare the increase in total area of pipe/exchanger.

[John *.?-!.* cub owner]

i would think that on the older sotves in a not very well insulated builidng they would be good, but in a well insulated house and with an air tight stove that only msolders most of the time anyway they would cause a severe increase in creosote buildup in the chimney.

[beaconlight]

I have a Heatolator on my wood stove in the country. When I go there wed evening the house was at 22 degrees. The stove is in the basement and has 8 inch stove pipe. The pipe runs through a steel plate through the floor where the fireplace will eventually go. about 4 feet above the floor the heatolator is in the flue. A foot above that there is an elbow into triple wall stainless steel and through the roof. There are loops of 3/4 pipe and elbows in the fire box that combine into 1 inch pipe with an close on rise aquastat to run a circulator. There is an expansion tank and ap high pressure blow down too. The system is filled with 50/50 automotive antifreeze. The hot water is pumped through 30 feet of convector on the inside wall of the kitchen and 6 rads in series parallel in the hall to the first floor bed room. This temporary heat for the house is still under construction. The fan in the heatolator cuts in somewhers around 200 degrees. I have a thermometer on the flue pipe above the heatolator and at one point while I was pushing it hard to get the house up to heat it got a little above 400 degrees. I of course run hot fires getting the house warm and try to burn as small a hot fire I can to keep it up to heat. There was Zero, None, Nada creosote in the stove pipe I replaced 2 weeks ago as well as none in the triple wall. I try to use the 22 gauge welded seam stove pipe. It is a lot more expensive than the bend and snap together type. Its strong point is that it has a lot thicker wall. It took 3 hours to get the house up to over 70 degrees. I let it over ride while I worked installing 1 inch thick foam boards as the vapor barrier in the cathederal ceiling in the living room, dining room combination. This cut the drafts down considerably and the temp got up to almost 80 degrees. before I opened some windows and cut the draft on the stove. The house is 30X30 with a balcony and 2 bedrooms and a 1/2 bath on the second floor.
Any way after all that background the heatolator pumped out a constant stream of heat. I pull the rod but seldom encounter resistance so I felt it must be clean of build up. I verified that to be so when The flue was replaced. The most common build up is caused by overloaded stoves choked down to get a long burn. I do that too at night uipon occasion but then run a small hot fire the next morning to vaporize the creo.
Some old timers taught me to do it this way.
We put a cap on my friend Mikes place one time. There was at least a 5/8 inch coating on the inside of his external stone chimney. It had a tile flue liner. I had him use small hot fires and when we checked it the next year most of it was gone with no sign it had burned. Large Out side chimneys have a hard time warming up enough to stay clean.

Bill

[Jack fowler]

beaconlight,

This is what Dad and I set up in his Country home in the Missouri, Ozarks. The heating system was hot water radiate, so we by-passed the electric boiler and installed loops of 1” iron pipe and elbows in a Heatolator fire box. I remember we had problems getting the water flow circulation and expansion tank capacity correct, but after that, the system work perfectly. I also remember the floors of the house being so warm on those cold weekends winter nights. The electric fired boiler would not keep up with the size of the house, so we had to do something.

After Mom passed on, Dad started traveling and I didn’t have time to cut the wood for weekend vists, so we converted to a gas fired boiler. That system worked very well and the house was comfortable. Since then the house was sold and the new owners, have install a geothermal system with propane gas backup. They get ground source water from a deep lake in which the house over looked.

I noticed by reading topics posted, many of you heat by wood. Wood heat in my opinion is one of the most comforting and maybe the most economic way to heat your home if the wood is easily available. I know I heated with wood for many years. I also enjoyed getting up early on cold mornings going out cutting it, but as time went on, my time, started to be limited, so the wood cutting had to be discontinued.

I know many of you have forgotten more in the last five minute about heating with wood than I’ll ever know, but heating with wood is probably one of the most dangerous heating systems of all if not respected properly. One thing most people neglect is flue liner creosote build up. Many things contribute to creosote build up, but the biggest cause is when you “choke” the damper down trying to keep that heat from going up the chimney. The flue liner gets cold and the creosote sticks to it like glue and then when you fire up the stove/fireplace the creosote ignites. If any of you ever had any experience with a flue fire, you know they’re almost impossible to put out and you’ll never forget the experience if not the tragic outcome.

I myself have always built masonry fire boxes with fire brick and chimney’s with clay flue liners. As you know as for as efficiency of heating that type of system is not very efficient. To remedy the inefficiency, I installed an air tight wood stove insert in the fire place opening and a free standing wood stove in the basement. To help eliminate the creosote build up, I also installed a stainless steel liner through the chimney with an air space between the clay flue liners and the stainless steel liner.

I have found out the stainless flue liner will get hot even with the damper “choked” down and help keep the creosote from building up. Where as the masonry flue liner would stay cold and have creosote build up.

The reason for the masonry back up even with the stainless insert, the stainless insert will fatigue and fail in time after burning Hickory and Oak.

I highest annual heating bill I had in the years I heated with wood was @ $125.00. Now it’s @ $725.00.

Pictures of my wood stoves (not in use anymore).





Jack Fowler

[Bruce Sanford]

I Had a wood stove for about 25 years.I always used seasoned wood,cut split and dried for at least six months. Three different houses and
three different and stoves. Always cleaned the chimney every month.The worst one I had was an outside chimney.Cold chimney made it worse.I switched to an oil stove two years ago.Big mistake!I certainley miss the heat of a wood stove. Bruce

[cowboy]

I am thinking of making a headder on the my stove and running six 1"3/4 car exhust pipes the four foot from the stove to the chiminy insted of the 7" stove pipe. I figure this would give me more surface area to radiat heat. I thhought of using water pipe but I was afraid of having galvanizing burning off in the house with a hot fire. What do you think

[Bill]

Been burning wood for at least twenty years. The stove is a EARTH STOVE. Cleaned chimney this morning. From basement floor to top of chimney is 32 feet. Check condition weekly, have access hole I put mirror in. Chimney goes up thru center of house( blocks with flue liner), always starts to build up where chimney goes thru cold attic. Have access to top on chimney thru attic. Wood is seasoned for at least one year.

BILL

[jakeesspoo]

Ironically I just installed a heat exchanger like the ones your talking about on my buddies shop furnace. It was a "magic heat" and had a blower on it and was probally from the sixtys. We used to have a bunch in our shop (we have a heating and air business) but i think that was the last one. They seem to love it so far. I run into them once in a while especially on old boiler systems.

[Patbretagne]

I am thinking of making a headder on the my stove and running six 1"3/4 car exhust pipes the four foot from the stove to the chiminy insted of the 7" stove pipe. I figure this would give me more surface area to radiat heat. I thhought of using water pipe but I was afraid of having galvanizing burning off in the house with a hot fire. What do you think

Hi Cowboy, I'm not a mathematician, so can't say if the exhausts would give more surface area than the single flue pipe, I would have thought so. If the pipes are close to the stove there shouldn't be too much carbon build-up inside.
Waterpipe, personally I would prefer that as it has thicker walls. Waterpipe exists in NON glavanised, black plain steel, use that.
Have a good newyear
Pat

[Jim Becker]

The surface area would be about 1.5x the single 7 inch pipe. However, the area for the smoke to go up would be reduced to about 3/8 of the original, about the same as putting in a section 4.25 pipe. That might be a problem.