Hey thanks! she is a nice mass, loves the heat. I actually thought this doggie wouldn’t like it all that much since she prefers being out all the time but she’s just aging so heat must really feel good.
Well I guess wood-burning is more art than science ... I’ve discovered that about 1000lbs of stone works quite nicely ! When the stove is roaring during the burn cycle some of the heat is absorbed into the stone to be released when the stove dies down ... have 2 SS rectangles that hold about 3 gals of water in each ... have a temp gage in one ... seems to run well when water is 170 in the tank ... when water temps get down to about 130 - load 2 more splits ... it’s ZERO here and I’m at 63 degrees- when the thermal mass and water gets to operating temp it uses Very Little wood to keep the joint at 61-64 degrees- key is to never let her go cold - burn 24-7 - your mileage may vary !
I’m sure I will some day. That’s about 60 lbs of steel on that so I never actually tried it. Folks thought I was joking but really if I was to be gone over a day without relighting and the temps dropped, these would really be able to... how can I say this? Test their mettle?
I've been in the planning stages for about a year to build a new home in 3-5 year in conjunction with retirement. Small, super energy efficient, windows, overhangs and layout with solar gain in mind. An incorporated greenhouse or grow room . A solar furnace and wood stove pizza oven combined with thermal mass . I've got some ideas on paper. Have a couple years to refine them and buy some property . I've wanted out of the snow belt for many years. If I don't do it soon it will never happen!!!
That's the coolest thing I've ever seen!! Talk about convection! Paint the walls dark and cozy the whole picture up----single guy?
I would love to build and do the same. Here is my buddy's double sided masonry heater complete with stone mantles, flush stone hearths and pizza oven. This is a three story masonry heater from the basement up. These pictures are from the main upper floor and there is a single sided fireplace in a central sitting area outside of the bedrooms on the level below this. Well built and very efficient house. A quick hot fire and these stones radiate heat for hours. This is the company that built his. Temp-Cast masonry heaters, masonry stoves and masonry heaters with bake ovens
Those are the BEST ! An associate of mine has one with a built- in oven and pizza-pie cooker ... you load about 20-50 pounds of wood in the morning and it burns upwards of 1800 degrees in there ... the way it is designed internally the heat follows a maze-like exit and the stone radiates warmth for 12-24 hrs depending on how much wood you put in ...
A few years ago I had a cheap Vogelzang Stove and surrounded the pot bellied stove with rock; partly to keep radiant heat from a nearby wall, but also heat mass in retention. Honestly, I think it really helped. The temperature spikes in the room seemed less, but it was also a lot of thermal mass. I would say it was about a cubic yard of dry laid up rock. A cubic yard of gravel is around 3,000 pounds, so it was a LOT of rock at close to 1.5 tons.
