How will a modern insert heat with no electricity?

I agree !

 

I really like my Quadrafire 4100i. It is the primary heat source for my house, and I'm pretty far up north that it gets and stays cold. I've put it through some good tests temperature wise although I've not yet gone without power yet.

If I had to, I'd take my inverter and run it off a car battery. Without the fan, it certainly is not as effective.

I actually had to wire in a different power cord as my rheostat or switch went south on the original. Now it's only on high speed, but I can deal with that until I have a chance to take a look at the original. I'm in no hurry, and I can test and fix it at work.

 

That's what I'm thinking. As a Buyer by trade, and working in the industry I do, I find that many times a little research will save a ton of $, and can even make it better than original.

 

^^ I don't think my Fisher XL will fit into the fireplace opening. But I bet the GrandPa will.

 

My first wood stove back in 1977 (freestanding) was a thin double wall affair and it said in the manual not to run the stove without the fan, I always figured I would just have a small fire in case of no power keeping the pipes from freezing, never had to try that out luckily.

 

Back in 2011 we had an October snowstorm; very unusual for us. The trees still had leaves and the weight of the snow was snapping limbs everywhere. We were without power from Friday morning until Monday afternoon. At that time we were running a Hotblast wood furnace. It was in the cellar. There would be very little heat without the blower so I had to figure something out in a hurry.

I pulled the 2 batteries (deep cycle) out of my Dodge Cummins diesel. I hooked one battery up to a 450w inverter and plugged the furnace in. I had no idea whether it would work because I didn't know what the blower drew. It turned out that it was a little over 100w so it worked perfectly. I got about 12 hours out of the battery. When it drew down far enough to shut off the inverter, I hooked up the other one and put the drained one on the generator for a few hours. While the genny was running I also plugged in the fridge and freezer to keep our food from spoiling. Did that all weekend. It worked great. We stayed warm and didn't lose any food.

 

I never use a blower. I have the area above the stove filled with roxul and no surround. Mike from England Stove Works says it's safe to run this way.

The room the stove is in is my kitchen, dining room fireplace area and living room the the bedrooms off of that and it heats all of that.

I do plan on replacing the blower as I plan on using the wood stove much more from here on out and it may need the blower for when it's super cold.

 

I would love to know if this is ever gonna happen.

As far as running without fans, my Napoleon 1401 doesn't throw a ton of heat without them. When the stock ones went out I replaced them with some 4" duct fans from lowes. Trimmed the duct to fit in the stock opening and have been working great. Cheaper and much quieter than the stock ones. Put them on a variable speed switch too where originally it was either on or off.

 

My 1401 does pretty well without the blowers on. It's in a decent sized masonry hearth opening and radiates well. Not like a stand alone would, but it still has enough exposed surface area to heat the room without having to be over-fired to do it. Any chance you may have some pics of your blower conversion? I can tell the bearings in mine have had better days and I really don't want to rebuild these or replace them with the same ones if I can find something a bit less noisy and more efficient.

 

I can take a couple pictures tonight when I get home if I get time. I used some suncourt inductor fans, think they were like 25 bucks apiece. Gotta get in there to vacuum, have been neglecting that for a while so I'll take some pics.

 

+1

 

I hated pulling those covers..., at least the ones on my particular 1401. The screw locations and cover openings to access em don't line up too favorably and I always had a telescoping magnet handy to retrieve a dropped screw or two trying to put the covers back on. A light bulb went on last fall and I simply notched the rear lip of the cover from the screw hole to the edge of the lip. Now I can put the screws part way in first and then just slide the rear of the cover into place underneath em and tighten. Should come from the factory that way.

 

They are a huge PITA. I found it easiest to just leave it screwed together and take the sorround off and take the covers off that way.

PogoInTheWoods, I totally forgot about the pictures, sorry. Like I said, 4" inline duct fan trimmed up a bit to fit in there and secured with some wire to some screws. Pretty crude but works well and very surprising how much quieter they are over the stock ones. I was worried about the plastic fan blades at first but been fine for 3 seasons, must not get too hot in there. Don't mind the dust bunnies, gotta do my final season cleaning soon.

 

That is some superb redneckery, my man! I'll definitely keep those fans in mind when it's time to swap mine out. Thanks for the pics.

 

Haha, yeah redneckery for sure. I figure it's behind the covers it doesn't have to be pretty it just has to work, and that it does.

 

Trust me, the blower is a huge difference vs no blower.

Amazon and other sites have the same blower for 50-60 dollars.