On Thu, 09 Nov 2006 17:13:08 -0000, (Chris
Lewis) wrote:

According to Lesley :

I have a Jotul Allagash natural gas-burning stove and I was thinking
about getting this type of fan for it. I know the Jotul has it's own
electrically-powered fan, but I thought if this one that doesn't need
electricity actually worked, it would be great to use that instead. We
recently had a 4-day power outage. . .although I had some heat because
of the gas stove, it would have been nice if I could have moved the air
around a bit. An added bonus is that it costs more than $100 less than
the Jotul blower unit, PLUS I don't have to pay anyone to install this!

As others have said, the heat-powered one isn't going to be terribly
useful, especially when you really need it to push hard (during a power
outage).

Our wood stove has a built in electric fan, of the 1/12 HP variety.
Given the layout of the house, it can heat the whole place _if_
the fan is operational.

When the power dies, we run the fan off a 400W inverter and a battery
from a recently deceased vehicle. That size inverter is available for
under $50 these days.

The combo is capable of running the fan full blast for several days,
and can be used to provide power for other things. Like a CF
lightbulb and the radio. TV and dish receiver too if we're
feeling really bored ;-)


Of course, if you really want to use wood-heat to heat the
whole house without power, you need to give your fire
marshal fits, and cut vent holes in the ceiling above the
stove and in other strategic places, thus creating convection
currents around the house.

If you do that, it's a good idea to have closable grates
put in so that the vents are only open when you DO need
to heat the house that way.