As part of our new house renovations a few years back, my wife and I got an Englander wood stove for our basement.
As anybody trying to be self sufficient knows, having a backup heat source is IMPERATIVE if you live in a cold climate! For a long time, I had wanted a wood stove, but it wasn’t really an option because I rented (if you are in the same situation, I recommend you pick yourself up a Deadwood rocket stove, or an indoor-safe, Mr. Heater, until a wood stove becomes an option).
The Englander Wood Stove 1200
Our Englander wood stove is actually the 1200 square foot model, so as far as wood stoves go, it is actually on the smaller side. It should still heat our 900ish square foot basement nicely, however. We got it for essentially $550.
This video is not a full fledged review of it, just a little “quick look”, so you guys can see it in action.
Getting a wood stove to burn well is all about creating a good “draft.” This refers to the cycling of air in and out of your stove. Each stove is a little different, so it takes a few burns to figure it out, but in general, the fire needs a lot of air in the beginning, and then can be slowly tapered off as it burns longer and gets hotter.
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You can see in the video that for this little stove, I keep the door cracked open for the first several minutes (10 or so), while the initial pieces of wood are burning. Then, once it is hot enough, I seal the door closed all the way and just use the baffle system to control the air.
Anyway, I’ll have more to come on the Englander soon, but for now I just wanted to do a quick show and tell of our humble wood stove.
You should also check out the option of building a masonry heater in your home during construction. While difficult to add as a retrofit, if you are building your home from the ground up, they can be a fantastic source of heat that warms the entire home.
