I have a friend that works in an industrial area down in St. Paul, MN. He's been up to my place a few times and always comments on my wood piles. A few weeks ago, we were on the phone and he said that he had something for me. Well, I was down in the cities the other day and stopped by his place. I scored a couple of 110" pallets and some lumber! Thanks John!! I'll add this to the 27 feet of pallet out in the back yard. Now I need to find some old roof tin at the dump and I'll be all set. I'm working on building up a 3 year supply. Most of it is ready to burn and well under 20%. A few piles were cut this year and will be ready later. I hope to replace my very inefficient open fireplace by next years heating season. I'm thinking of an RSF Opel or Delta fireplace. I'd like a wood stove, but She rules the living room and therefore it will be a fireplace... The back yard rack... The side yard.... The garage....
Great score! I think it really pays to "advertise" you're a woodburner... You never know who has hookups for you! Super jealous of your stacks!
That's awesome! I'll have to look into those 2 fireplaces you mentioned. Same situation here. The wife loves the open fire, and we have a fireplace.
I'd be tempted by the RSF Opal. ICC is a great company. I've been impressed by their customer service re questions about my ICC pipe.
Do you currently have a masonry open fire place or a zero clearance built in unit? If it is a masonry unit would SWMBO* consider an insert? There are some inserts out there that are attractive, great heaters, and would be a lot less work than a total rip-out and rebuild... KaptJaq *SWMBO: She who must be obeyed.
Our current fireplace is a zero clearance style. It's built into the corner of the main floor living room. SWMBO and I have looked at several of the wood stove/fireplace stores in our area and she loves the RSF Delta. It didn't help that one of the stores we were at had one up and running. They use it as their heat source in the winter. They have a Delta at one end of their building and an Opel at the other. We were there on a very cold WI day and the Delta was keeping the place toasty warm. I'd be OK with a wood stove, but she likes the look of a finished built in fireplace so......
Just so happens that the fireplace place in our little town carries the rsf brand. Now, I'd be very shocked if they had the Delta fully functioning and on hand. SWMBO really liked the looks of it from the website. But yeah, as it's not an insert, there would be somework installing that in an existing fp, huh?
It wouldn't be an inexpensive project, that's for sure. Maybe not real hard, but time and $ consuming... But, if it would help cut back on the amount of propane I use in a winter by 50% or more, it wouldn't take all that many years to pay for it's self. I don't plan to move any time soon. I like it here.
Would she consider a wood stove if it was a model with a very large viewing glassed door? You still get to see the fire and get the benefits of wood stove. Or....just say me man of house we have wood stove you quiet.
Yeah, we've been here in the town of cedarburg since 08. We love the house and the yard. With what we've been using for ng in the winter, I'd take a 50% reduction of the gas bill. Yeah, it may take a bit of work and $, but there's a lot of dark oak trim in the house and that would be one way to reduce the dark oak in the house. The house was built in the mid 60's, oak kitchen cabinets, oak window trim everywhere, oak FP mantle and oak cabinets on each side, oak pantry doors.... I like oak. But it's too oak intensive.
I'd like an open fireplace again too. Heck the chestnut tree in the backyard to knock the chestnuts down out of to roast over an open fire would be cool too, but with my luck they are either banned here or would be shortly after I bought one - and of course you need a permit here for everything so it would be on a list .....
LOL I'd be looking at moving into the garage if I said that... hehehehe She likes the more finished look of a fireplace as opposed to the black box standing in the corner of the room look of a wood stove.... Happy wife = Happy life!
I always wanted fireplaces. Designed this house for five Rumford fireplaces, some huge. Ended up with a Woodstock soapstone stove, and am so glad I didn't put the fireplaces in. However, long after my chimney and stove install, I came across those RSF fireplaces, and they look pretty impressive. I wouldn't discourage anyone from them, although I would encourage at least taking a look at the Woodstock site, at the Progress Hybrid. It's a pretty stove with a huge viewing window and beautiful fires.
Perhaps your wife is not up to date on wood heating stoves?! Personally, I don't like the black box look either so can relate to her. However, there are many beautiful stoves on the market that are not black boxes. In addition to good looking stoves, they also have the potential to drastically reduce your heating bills. Shoot, just by getting rid of our old Ashley and getting a new Woodstock Fireview, we found we can heat the place a lot warmer using only half the amount of wood we had been using. And no, the Fireview is not a black box and you can choose what color you want for the castings too. The soapstone will generally give a slight blue cast. We love it. Progress and Fireview. Fireview. In the row below is a Progress and the second one is our Fireview. You will notice we went straight through the wall with the flue so that the stovepipe is not visible like most are. The next two pictures were of stoves in shipping at the Woodstock factory.
Thanks for the info, I'm sure we'll be checking out more stoves/fireplaces before settling on one. In the mean time, I'll keep hoarding firewood and working on a 3 year supply. I'm surrounded by Oak and Maple.
