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["Lisa K.V. Perry" <lisakvperry AT gmail.com>]

On Nov 17, 2007 8:59 AM, tom <tom AT honeychrome.com> wrote:

> We put in one of the new, fancy-pants euro wood stoves that meets epa
> standards without a cat.  It was more expensive than I would've liked
> to have spent, but I wanted to keep the significant other happy - it
> has a nice, big window and does a fine job as our sole heat source.
> Our place is small, and the european stoves tend to be smaller than
> the American made models and so it was more size/output appropriate.
> But it has one giant drawback (besides how much it cost)- the box can
> only accomodate 14" lengths, whereas the American standard is 16".
> No problem if you harvest and cut all of your own wood, but an issue
> if you're buying your cords, which are almost always cut to 16".


I wish we'd had this discussion two months ago.

We bought a Hearthstone soapstone wood stove, we agreed on the purchase
though it was not cheap. It's a hunk of sculpture. Seriously, even my
husband says it's beautiful. We never said that about the old unrepairable
Vermont Castings stove. The priority is function and heat, certainly not
beauty, but beauty is a side bene. Ours has a window/door on the front, the
rest is polished gray marbled soapstone held in place w/ cast iron.

It heats the home as well as the old VC did (before broken). We relearned
how to build fires because it is air tight (other than the adjustable air
intake valve). We bought a smaller model, the fire box accommodates up to
20" logs. We're happy with the stove. It loads through the front
window/door, though a slightly larger model had a small side door.

Had we known a cheapo model would have worked just fine and lasted for 20
years, we might have gone that route. We wanted something that would work
and thought a cheapo unknown stove would not be worth the trouble. Live and
learn. Repeat.

Lisa
sw VA