Strongly Considering the Ideal Steel - Input Appreciated!

Hi all,

I am looking to upgrade and upsize my stove and am strongly considering a Woodstock Ideal Steel. I'm hoping to make a decision very soon while they have their sale going on, and I see a lot of people here have Ideal Steels and everyone seems to love them! This is kind of a long post, but I want to give enough details of my situation/home and seek the advice of the many experts here. I have a few concerns with the Ideal Steel, so I'm outlining these below Thanks in advance!

I currently have a Jotul F100, which is waaaaay undersized for my home, and I'm not feelin' it (both figuratively and literally as this thing just doesn't heat my space the way I'd like). I'd be rear venting the stove into a T and up my existing lined chimney (30 foot 6" insulated liner through a masonry chimney). My first issue is that I have a very close wooden mantel, which I would rather not remove as it's about 125 years old and beautiful (though I would consider removing it as a last resort). I spoke to people at Woodstock, sent them a picture with measurements (attached here) and they said that if I had the rear heat shield, I could pull a little in front of the 12 inch part of the mantel and run an 18 to 20 inch double walled horizontal run to the T and I would meet clearances and still be fine for draft (they said I may even want a damper with such a tall chimney). I believe I could do this at the second lowest height with the IS, which would still allow me to have the ash pan.

I spoke with two people at Woodstock, and sent them both the layout of my home and pics. They both said the stove would be the correct size for my home, however the first person said she was very concerned with the Ideal Steel overheating my stove room, which isn't too large. The second person I spoke with, who happened to be a manager, said she wasn't concerned at all about the stove overheating the stove room, that it's very flexible in how much heat you can put out or cut back on, and said in fact she thought my layout would be very good for the Ideal Steel.

My home is a bit over 2000 square feet, three story victorian from 1890s with original windows (a bunch of them and they are large at 34.5"x67") with not so great storm windows added in the 80s or 90s, I had blown in insulation in all the walls, and it's fairly drafty. We mainly used the first two floors, but the third floor is a nice finished non-heated attic - I'm not too concerned with heating the third floor, but I would use it more in the winter if it were warmer up there. I have a forced hot air furnace on floors one and two, and 9 foot ceilings throughout the first two stories. My first floor doesn't have an open floor plan, but there are open doorways throughout (with no doors on them), the stove is in the center of the first floor, there is an oversized open double door opening from the stove room to the living room next to it, and the stove room and adjacent living room both have open doorways that lead to an open staircase up to the second floor. The staircase to the third floor is also open (meaning no wall against the stairs so air can flow up/down the stairs). One other possibly relevant detail is whatever the temp of my stove room, the upstairs is generally about 6 degrees cooler - so if it's 71 in stove room, it's 65 upstairs. Not sure if this would carry over to other set ups.

I did a cardboard mock up of the Ideal Steel, and it does feel a bit large physically for the room, partly because I'd need to pull it in front of the mantel. My wife thinks that it's too big (both physically imposing and fears it's going to get us too hot), but I feel that a big cardboard box that was the mock up looks ugly whereas a big Ideal Steel would be beautiful! She's also always cold in our house currently, so I don't think she'll complain about the warmth, unless it is really so hot we can't sit in that room. The stove room is about about 15' x 14' with 9 foot ceilings, but does open to the living room with an open double door, and the kitchen with a single open door, and the hallway to the stairs with another open door.

The stove seems great from everything I've read, and I love the possibility of serious warmth and long burns, and like the idea of a cat and hybrid to help with all this. I've attached pics of my mantel with dimensions, my home layout (which is fairly accurate), the rooms, and the mock up I did. I know this is a lot of info here, but again, I hope it helps. Any input and thoughts either way are welcome and appreciated!

Thanks!

 

I know you don't want to wreck the mantle but I'd rip it all out and get the stove as close as possible to the wall. Maybe you can use the mantle for something else?

It is a big stove but it's very versatile. I only have 1 single door to the stove room. I use a fan to move the air. You have a lot more exit footage for the heat to get out. I wouldn't worry about that

Start stockpiling wood. The IS likes it nice and dry.

They also look much better in person.

 

Thanks Babaganoosh! (By the way, I love me some good baba ganoush with pita bread!). I forgot to mention, I have a ceiling fan in both the stove room and room it opens up to with the open double door. I also recently scored a nice stash of three cords of three year split and stacked oak, maple and a bit of cherry (measures about 14% on a moisture meter) and I have another cord or so of semi dry wood (hopefully good by next season), a third of a cord I just split and another cord or two of rounds I need to get to splitting this spring/summer, so I'm doing pretty well for now on wood.

Why do you say tear the mantel out? Do you think the horizontal run will hurt the draft/stove performance, or just for the sake of not having the stove so far into the room? Woodstock thought the 18 to 20 inch horizontal run would be no problem for draft/how the stove runs as I have such a tall chimney. I haven't totally ruled out tearing out the mantel, but it really is a last resort. I love adding modern features to my home, but also love keeping these amazing original touches. It also means a whole job of removing it, then patching... All of which I'd need to get done by May 31 delivery date of the stove (if I am to take advantage of Woodstock's current sale and free delivery).

 

Myself personally, I would have to disagree with Babaganoosh ^^
I love old architecture, especially the woodwork, so there is no way I would get rid of that mantle.

We are really happy with our IS stove, but through your mock up it seems it would look a little out of place that far forward from the mantle/fireplace.

The IS is a wonderful stove, but for what you have, and what you want.. I'm just not sure it's the right stove for your situation.

However, if it could be installed separately, once again it would look out of place, but it might work aesthetically, I'm just not sure though.

Ultimately the decision will be yours. The IS is a beautiful, and extremely functional stove, but it just might not fit with your existing decor.

As to heat output, yeah that would definitely be up to you on how much heat you want.
I have a much smaller house and if I load it up, it get's it in the 80°F range easily even when the air intake is low, but then things moderate, and it's around 76-78°F for hours.

Whatever you decide, I do wish you the best with whatever stove you purchase.
And also, welcome to FHC, it's a great site with a lot of great people.

Backwoods Savage ,Canadian border VT , and BDF all have IS stoves I believe, I'm sure they can offer additional (likely better) advice.

Best wishes,
Chaz

 

Thx Eric.

 

Nice to meet you to Eric VW! Thanks for the welcome and the complement on the wood floors. If you look carefully, the stove room has two different kinds of wood - white oak on the edges, and eastern pine in the middle. It was like this when we moved in, and I think the eastern pine was the original (it's what we have throughout on the second and third floors) and the oak was an update, perhaps due to the eastern pine being very soft and perhaps getting a bit beaten up and then replaced, but for some reason the kept the middle part - it's a little different, but I like it!

 

Thanks for the welcome Chaz! The IS is very different from the architecture of my home, but personally I think that the contrast of the modern look of the IS and the old original features of my home could be cool. It's something I don't think I'd mind. As for that it would be a bit into the room by being in front of the mantel and that it's pretty big in generally, it will be hard to know how it all looks until I were to get it in place (which is part of why I'm here looking for opinions). The Progress Hybrid is perhaps more in line with the style of my home, but I think the clearances would be even more of a challenge with that stove, plus the price is so much higher, and while people love that stove, I don't think people feel it performs any better than the IS, and perhaps the IS even has some advantages.

 

I agree with this. Tear out the mantle, go with a vertical-vent Ideal Steel and tap into the chimney higher up on the wall as to get some initial draft. A friend of mine had a setup similar to yours and tried to make it work with a different make of stove. It would up being a fugly mess. He tore out the mantle, built a proper hearth pad (something else you will have to consider with wood floors) and now he has a clean, attractive setup. The Ideal Steel looks big at first, however, it shrinks very quickly when it's bitter cold out and the stove is throwing usable heat for 14 hours per load. One more thing, if you rip out the mantle, you can mount the SBI AC02055 on the back of the stove which will automatically turn a fan on and off. I have that setup and the fan really helps push heat across the top of the Ideal Steel and into the room.

 

Welcome to the club, BeantownBurner !

You'll be amazed at how much heat the IS kicks out!

 

Welcome BeantownBurner, yes I have IS, my stove room is 19 x 19 with 7.5 high ceiling and double stairway away from stove. Can my stove room get hot, YES, but I also can control the stove so it won't, basically in the wintertime my stove room is 80, my stove room is on a its own floor with a split-level type Stairway to the next level, but that's how we run it and how we like it. I have wood trim around the windows just outside of the clearances of the burning and never had a problem.
Someone say that 80 is too warm and I don't want you to get nervous about that. I have a multi-level house and basically if the store room is 80 the kitchen is 70 and the bedrooms are 62 to 65 which is how we enjoy our home. When you come in from outside everybody goes to the stove and warms up and then you go finish up everything else you have to do.

 

Calling our engineer minded IS guru, BDF. Similar sized home

 

Thanks Backwoods Savage! Great input. I look forward to reading your primer! I've only been burning for a few months, so I'm still new to all this!

When you talk about the wonders of soapstone, would I not get that benefit by having the soapstone liner and panels in the IS? My plan would be to do all the soapstone possible in the stove.

I should be able to 1/4 rise per foot, maybe a little more, but not much. My fireplace opening is 30" tall, so my plan would be to have the stove on the second to lowest setting, which puts the top of the exhaust pipe at 28.5", however, I can't go much past 29" as I need at least 6" to combustibles from the double walled black pipe, and if I can get any extra, I would prefer to.

As for wood, I was really in a bad place with wood until I recently made this great score of well seasoned wood from a wood burner who recently put his home on the market and just wanted to get rid of his stash. Once I get this all stacked (it's currently in a big pile in my driveway, as I just picked it up last weekend), I will start more splitting and stacking of the wood I have and also keep working on getting more thinking about working towards a three year supply. I'm assuming I will ideally need 3 to 4 cords per year, but not totally sure. One issue I have is storage. As of now, I can probably get about three cords stored close to my house in locations where it's not difficult to access, but much of my property is on a hill, so beyond that it is going to involve lugging down and up the hill. I'm thinking about trying to build a wood shed too.

Again, thanks and any more thoughts are welcome!

 

I’ve had the IS in two different homes now. In fact, two IS’s. I went from a smaller, 2cf secondary stove. In my opinion- the reason the house stays warmer with the IS is that it runs longer, not necessarily hotter. This helps avoid the temp swings from the tube stove getting super hot to activate the secondaries then drop off at the end of the cycle. When my IS was in a smaller room at my last house, I didn’t notice it being “hotter” as much as I noticed it staying more consistent. For instance, the dog would still be sleeping next to the stove in the morning. It took some time for me to get used to not running it really hot since I used to do that with the last stove. This year I really focused on running lower but also more consistent.
I’d offer that, aesthetics aside, you should be fine with a couple well placed fans.

 

You won't be able to put more than 4 cord a year thru it.. Several IS owners here wonder how I burn four.. They can't burn 3 cord.

 

Thanks golf66! I don't think this plan would work for me, as much as I'm sure it is a good idea. I'd have to cut a whole in my wall and through the chimney, put in a thimble and tie into the liner. It sounds like a mega job, but beyond that, my chimney is about 125 years old, it has two small flues (we barely got the six inch insulated liner down), the one with the stove and the one next to it with exhaust from my forced hot air furnace, - who knows what kind of can of worms this would open up with the brick work, and then having to repair everything. I like the idea of having the vertical run before the bend, but it seems like it could end up being a lot of trouble. This would also mean I would have to have two 90 degree turns, one to go from vertical into my chimney and another to then go from that horizontal to the vertical of the chimney liner. While rear venting may not be as great as top venting, I only have one 90 from the horizontal into the T. For this reasons (primarily the age of my chimney and unknown variables) if I were to remove the mantel, I think I would still rear vent into the chimney, it would just enable me to get the stove closer to the wall/firebox opening and further back in the room. While I think that would make the stove seem less imposing in the room, when I think about it this is really only going to get me about 8 inches further back, as I still need 6 inches to combustibles with the rear heat shield.

I'm really curious about the SBI AC02055. I know there's not factory fan for the IS, and while some people feel I wouldn't need anything, especially as I have ceiling fans, I've really wondered about adding a fan/blower set up to this stove. I haven't read about anyone doing this until now, and I'm really curious to know more. When I looked up the SBI AC02055, I only saw a heat activated control for a fan/blower. Am I not seeing the correct thing? Do you use a separate fan/blower that you attach to this? Any more input would help, and if you have any links, that would be great too.

Thanks!