Wood Stove comparisons

Happy Customer in PA

Carole bought a stove this August so this is her first season using it. She just sent us this email on 12/12.

Can I just say I LOVE MY STOVE!!!! I have been using it lately because the weather finally cooperated. I just love it---I do not have to get up at night to put wood in it. I load it about 10 pm and am good until at least 9 am the next day. It does get quite warm in the house and I have to open windows and turn on the fan. The oldest dogs cannot breath when it gets over 72 degrees so I need to do the window and fan thing for him. He lays in from of the fan and sleeps all night. My son said it sure throws some heat. I have been burning both wood and wood pellets so far. I have corn but have not used it yet mainly because I the barrel is buried behind the Christmas decorations. Once I take them down and put them away--I will try the corn. I have never been so pleased with a wood burner in my life. I have had 3 and this is my forth and the last.

It is sooooo nice to sleep through the night and still have a warm house. My house is all on one floor and the stove is in the finished basement. I have 11 foot ceiling in the basement and 12 foot ones in the main part of the house. The rest of the house has 10 foot ceilings and every part is just as toasty as could be.

You and your family have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and thank you for everything.

Carole

Happy PA Customer

Doug bought his stove last spring and used it some then and has refired it this fall.

Here is a recent email we received from him.
"Haven't sent you guys a praise email in awhile so I thought you were do for one. After reading the manual 20 or so time over the summer I think I figured out some new stuff. I wasn't piling up coals against the baffle before reloading. And since I started doing that I'm getting exceptionally long burns out of my slabwood. Its been a steady 80 in the house since the weather turned for the worse. So once again THANK YOU! I love the fact that I don't have to cover my 5 year old in blankets when it 20 degrees out. Hope all is well with you and yours. Have a blessed holiday season."

Time to light the stove again

Well it is that time of year. It is starting to cool and the house is not getting above 60 degrees so it looks like it is time to light the Sedore stove. One of the days this week we will inaugurate this heating season officially.
In the meantime we wanted to alert you to a wonderful sale going on for the next month (until November 15th). All options on the Sedore stove, except the water coils, will be on sale for 50%. This is an amazing sale and has never been offered before. New prices for the next 30 days are as follows:
Window - $1100 - now $550
Stainless lid - was $600 now $300
Paint job - $150 now $75 except antique ruby which was $200 and now $100
Nickel trim - $400 to $600 now $200 to $300.

If you have even been giving the idea half a thought to purchase a stove now is the time. Winter is coming and it is getting cold, fuel prices are tremendously high, and there is a sale on any and all options you might want. Don't delay; time is limited.

Prices are going up.

Prices are going up on the Sedore stove, along with everything else around us. The prices changes are effective immediately, but there are a limited number of stoves available at current prices until April 30th. Contact us ASAP if you want to get something before the price change. Our website will soon reflect the new prices, but if you want to know the details now keep on reading.
Basic stove - $2975
Window - $1105
Stainless Steel Lid (Bobtop) - $624
Paint job - $160 (Except antique ruby which will be $213)
Domestic water coil (installed) - $468
Radiant Water coil (installed) - $715
Nickel Trim Package (new option) (Includes trim around air bar, ash door, and lid) - $448
Nickel Trim Package that includes trim around window - $605

Sedore Bread Recipe

This recipe and instructions come from Jim In Maryland who got his Sedore stove in January 2011.

Recipe makes a wet dough, but that’s apparently what allows it to store in the fridge so well.

Here’s the wife’s recipe for the dough & baking it on a baking stone in the oven;

In a large bowl mix;

6 C lukewarm water

3 tsp yeast

3 tsp salt

13 C flour

Mix & let rest 2hrs (longer hasn’t hurt), lightly covered (she uses a hand towel & leaves it on in the fridge too) then refrigerate.

To use, take piece off & roll in flour and/or cornmeal (I just cornmeal & seed) & let rise 40 min (20 min of that would be pre-heating her baking stone).

Bake @450 for 30min.

In my Sedore adaptation, I don’t bother letting it rise (I figure it has 2-2.5hrs @200-250 to rise & bake). Right out of the fridge, I just roll it in seeds & cornmeal then place a semi-flattened piece on the 1” thick foil “airbake” in the Dutch oven (on the Sedores back shelf) & cover. I usually rotate the dutch oven about 1hr in, since the stack side is the hottest. When it’s done, it will be firm to the touch & no longer like a squishy risen doughball. I was told to let it cool before slicing but I usually can’t resist so I don’t think it matters.

I found that if I load the stove up & get the stack toasty when the bread first goes on, it cooks faster. On my brother-in-laws conventional woodstove, the dutch oven gets much warmer (~350) & it only takes 1-1.25 hours for them. With the lid on, the bread “steams” & comes out really tender w/o a crusty crust. Back in the baking stone days, I would butter the top while fresh to soften the crust. I no longer have to do that with the dutch oven method.

Figuring out Sedore bread was one of my first challenges/ goals. I love getting the free heat out of it & not running the oven @450 three or more times per week. Probably part of the reason our electric bill dropped almost $300..

Jim

Thanks to Jim. We are going to try this here at VisionStone Stoves. Seems like a wonderful idea.

Haven't been on here much

We have not been faithful with our blog. Much of that is because we are posting more on the facebook page. But from time to time there is still something that needs a bit more room and so there will a posting now and then.

Letter from a happy customer.

Part of a letter from a satisfied customer in Maryland.

"We got the stove installed Saturday the 22nd. It’s been running great & we haven’t had to relight the stove since the first firing, even when we let it sit as just coals for up to 8hrs. We just rake it & throw more wood on. I’ve even played with some massive knotty logs & green wood (on top of the pile) & it eats it all up. Stack stays right at 200F with the draft set about 1/3 open. So far our only issue has been with how to deal with the heat it puts out. We found that for our size home we don’t have to keep it topped off at all times or load it right away when it runs out, thus the 6-8hr coal burns. When loading, it takes no time for the stack to reach 500F. In fact, with dry oak & hickory, it can reach 650+ in just a couple minutes so we really have to watch it. I’m guessing it’s good practice to get it up to 500 at every reload? Think I read that somewhere so that’s what I’ve been doing each reload. I was worried at first that our stack wouldn’t be tall enough at only 13.5ft but I don’t think it’s an issue since we don’t have any backpuffing like I’ve read about on the yahoo forum. Our home is a single story rancher & I positioned the stove so the stack exits as close to the peak as possible. At 13.5ft, it extends almost 5ft out the roof already so I really wasn’t looking forward to going any higher. Fortunately, it doesn’t seem like we’ll have to. Still don’t have the water pipe hooked up yet but will be trying out the thermo-siphon method next weekend. We also positioned the stove so the water heater is directly behind the stove on the other side of the wall, less than 3ft away. Hope the passive method works out so we don’t have to add a circulating pump. We’re glad we chose the Sedore, it’s a great stove! I’ll get you some pictures of our setup sometime this weekend."

Jim

Old Tyme Farm Days in Owego, NY

Bob is at the Old Tyme Farm Days this weekend. If you are anywhere close to Owego, NY and want to see the stove come by Sat. all day or Sun. afternoon and you can meet him and see the Sedore stove. The Farm Days are alot of fun too.

VisionStone Stoves at the Ukrainian Festival in Lehighton, PA

Cutting Wood

Since we burn mostly wood in our Sedore we need to prepare for the winter by cutting wood in the summer. We had a providential event here a few months ago. One of our large locust trees that was growing at an angle on our hill fell down without obvious intervention. I was outside and heard what sounded like gunshots on my hill. I was quite curious but saw no one and no evidence of any activity. I kept looking and the shots kept getting louder and more rapid. Suddenly as I was about to investigate the firing turned to the cracking of splitting timber. A 70 foot locust tree dropped down 20 feet above my log pile. The sounds I heard were the roots popping as they snapped intermittently beneath the ground.
I haven't been able to get to cutting up the tree until this weekend, as I do not have a good working chainsaw at the moment and needed some help. Locust is very dense/hard wood, which not all chainsaws can handle. It burns hot and long so is a desirable fuel for the colder months.
The tree is now cut into sections and will be split and loaded onto my woodpile in the next few weeks.

New Website

We are up and live with our new website. It is much more user-friendly and has access to all the pertinent information. Thanks to Jacob Lamont our web designer for doing a great job. If you are interested in contacting him about a project let us know and we will put you in touch.

New website is almost up. We are excited and looking forward to the new site. Hopefully you readers will find it more pleasing to the eye with the information better organized and more easily accessible.
Also we are now on facebook as vision stone stoves and on twitter as visionstone so if you are either of those sites feel free to stop by and check out the pages.

NY Customer- bought a Sedore stove In early January

Website facelift

We got a nasty comment on our blog today which saddens me. If you don't care for our site or for us please come out and tell us directly and not hiding it on the blog as an anonymous comment. But if this comment was in reference to our website I would like to make clear that we are working towards a website facelift in the next several months. We recognize that we are not showcasing this excellent stove to its full potential and we would like to improve on that. So stay tuned for more to come in reference to visionstonestoves.com

Tax Credit

Great news. Just heard from the Sedore Stove manufacturer that the Sedore 3000 now qualifies for the 30% tax credit under the American REcovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. This means that if you purchase a Sedore 3000 in 2009 or 2010 you can recover some of your costs for the stove and installation labor costs. There is a maximum of $1500 tax credit and it applies to 30% of the sum of all IRS qualified improvements made by a homeowner in 2009 or 2010. For further information please consult your tax advisor or visit www.energystar.gov. So if you have been considering purchasing one of these great stoves this is the year to go for it.

Soup on the Sedore

On Thursday this week we replaced our electric cooking stove in the kitchen. But we ran into some electrical issues and needed the electrician to make some adjustments with the plug. As a consequence when it was time to make dinner there was no stove plugged in to cook on. We could have ordered out but since I am cheap we didn't. Taco soup was on the menu and I pushed ahead with the plan. Time to test out the Sedore stove and its stainless steel cooktop. The temperature on top of the stove was 300 Fahrenheit. The vent was half open so I opened that all the way. The stove had locust in with a nice bed of coals. The recipe calls for chicken breast to be sauted in oil with onions and garlic first. I attempted first to cook the chicken in my dutch oven but it was moving very slowly. So then I got some cooking spray and sprayed the cooktop and put my chicken pieces out to cook. They did just fine and when they were done I put them back in the pot and added in the canned tomatoes, chicken broth, salsa, and other ingredients. I left that to cook for the next 15 minutes, then added the hominy and left it for another 10 minutes. The soup did not come to boiling before we ate it. But after everyone had a bowlful the soup was left on to cook and it eventually did come to a boil. We all liked the soup; it tasted as usual. Only problem was the onions weren't fully cooked which just meant they were a bit crunchy.
Dinner took a bit longer than usual but we know now that we can do it. So no worries if the electricity goes out this winter. We will be ready for it.

Cooking Wood

What is that heavenly aroma? Bob's cooking wood again. Maple wood smells like syrup on my cooktop. I put unseasoned wood or cold logs on my stove lid because the energy required to burn hot fuel is less than the energy required to burn cold fuel. I am conditioning the fuel. Therefore when it goes in the primary burn chamber it has more BTU's. Besides it is cheap potpourri.

Stove is burning

We lit our Sedore a week ago but then it was so warm that we let the fire go out again. Here in the mountains of PA we had a week of unseasonably cold weather for October. We even saw some snow, which did not stick. Now it has warmed back up to 60 degree days and in fact last Thursday saw something closer to 70. So we are enjoying these last warm days of fall and letting the stove rest a bit more.
The chimney is now cleaned out. We purchased an 8 inch chimney brush with rods and a rope and came from top and bottom to clean out the chimney. After 2 years of burning mostly wood through our chimney there was very little creosote in the stack. So we are pleased although not surprised. The Sedore is a great stove.

Happy October

Well it is getting cooler here in PA and we are almost ready to light the Sedore, but haven't quite given in yet. The leaves are turning and there are fall foliage festivals the next few Saturdays here in Jim Thorpe. Good time to visit if you have never been here before (or even if you have) and stop in and see the stove while you are in town.
We are now the only East Coast dealers so if you are east of the Mississippi and are interested in a Sedore please give us a call. We will do all we can to give you a thorough introduction to our wonderful stove, although we recognize for many of you that is too far to travel for a in person viewing.
We will try to start posting more regularly now that the heating season is beginning again. So check back about once a week for our heating related posts.