I have never run any stove I have owned on a thermostat. More often than not it is cold enough to have the stove run constantly so no big deal. Shoulder season is a different story, Even on the lowest setting it gets to dang hot. I know you burn out igniters faster but it's no big deal, they are cheap. What's your thought?
I have used a stat since day one. I hated the over hot house from my wood burning days. So it was hooked up pronto. I do use hi/lo once the temps get below 30*F at night. But fall/spring warm nights the house would still get to warm by morning. So I switch to auto/off during the shoulder's. Hi/lo does save some igniter cycles so helps save it some. My stat is also a programmable unit I can set back. With the amount of solar we get even in the cold part of winter I can shut the stove down before I leave for work(stat set back to 66*) and doesn't come on until I have it programmed to raise temp to 72*F. I also set back to 68*F(70*F if its really cold) during the over night. I have it raise temps a couple hours before we get up in the AM. House is warm when we need it and not as much when we don't. It saves a bit of fuel IMHO. Love my stat! Its a useful tool I just gotta have working for me
That's exactly the way I would say it. With just slightly higher temps during the night (74°) and I set stove to not run during the hours of 8 am and 3 pm. There was only about 2 weeks out of the whole year that I let a stove run during the day. We get great solar gain with a Southern facing home. So unless the temps were below 0° during the day? Everyday, the stove is off.
I'm the opposite. I have the stat hooked up but rarely use it. If the temp is going to be around 30-35, I set the furnace on 2. If it's going to be 25 or lower I set it on 3. If it's going to be above 40, then I switch on the stat to keep the house from getting too warm. My furnace is high/low, not on/off like the newer models. I found that I used roughly the same amount of pellets running with or without the stat. On really cold days I load the wood burner and keep the furnace on 2 or 3. The house almost always stays 68-70 degrees doing it this way. Wife is at home all day long, so if the house gets cold I get a phone call at work or cold dinner when I get home.
I read this again and saw the solar gain comments. That's one thingy that I very rarely get here during heating season. I'm just throwing out a number, but I'd guess that between mid Novevmber and mid-late February that there might be 7-10 days with sunshine, or enough sunshine to make a difference from a heating perspective. Lake effect clouds are very persistent here. I tried to like running the stat, but it isn't for me. I don't like to run anything at 100% output for any length of time. Idling on 1 for an hour then running on 5 for 2 hours didn't make sense. In three hours I'd still burn 6 pounds, so I figured leave it on 2 and avoid temp swings. Cold dinner is normal for me. I never know what time I'll be home one day to the next. Reason number 86 why I like the furnace with the extended hopper.
Every situation is different. My stove has never seen full tilt bogey. Its always on the medium 3 setting(approx 50% output) as its high end. Low is like a maintenance burn or pilot. But I still get temp rise when the outside temp is above 36*F so I have to go to auto/off to avoid getting the inside too hot by the morning. Same with solar gain. A good sunny day will trip me up so I just set the stove to auto/off during the day to avoid an over hot house. Solar gain is like free pellets to me. Were lucky to have it in the cold season. Total opposite once its warm out. We need to avoid it to stay cooler. Had to install some big ol ugly drapes to block it out or we roast in the warm season!
I've got 3 foot eaves on the house, so I don't get much solar gain in the summer when the sun is high in the sky. Nice for the AC bills. When I had my old single pane windows the house would warm right up on the few sunny winter days we get. The new windows with low E argon quadruple sealed space age whatever do a great job blocking most any solar heat that might try to come in. The dog and cat don't know that though. They still lay in the sunlight when it's there. I am enjoying the temps we've had in the high 30s/low 40s last week. I've dropped down to a bag a day. Watched the news last night and two years ago yesterday it was 87 here. I remember that day. Only time I've ever run the AC in March.
Sunny spots are reserved for the cats. Dog doesn't stand a chance with 4 to 1 odds. She'd rather sit on the deck anyway. On squirrel watch which is her favorite pass time. Funny how cats that don't usually get along sit so close when there's a sun spot.
I use a Quadrafire Smart-Stat hung up around the corner from the stove room in the kitchen. I have a thru-wall fan mounted between the stove room and the bedroom which is attatched to bathroom and the kitchen (where the stat is) via a hall way. Even with 20'+ celiing (A-Frame house) my VF100 heats the entire house with this setup. I keep the stat set at around 68 during the day when I'm not home and 74-76f at night when it's cold. The A-frame does eat some of the heat and there is a loft above the kitchen. The thru-wall fan does a great job of gently circulating the heat throughout the house and keeping it pretty even. I run high/low mode for now but will probably switch to auto/off mode when it warms up a bit. Love the stat.
