Unable to decide whether a stove, furnace, or boiler is better for your home? Here are some of their advantages that can help you decide better! There are many advantages for each, but it is important to decide which is more suitable for your own home.
Stoves
Stoves are typically the smallest out of the three types. Stoves are good-looking units and are designed to give an excellent view of the fire. With a loading door that has a large window, the relaxing fire can easily be watched. Stoves are much more efficient than a traditional fireplace but offer many of the same features. Stoves are made to heat one area of the home, your living room, den, etc. These are technically called room-heaters.
Some coal stoves have a hopper and automatically feed the fire and dump the ash into a pan. These stoker stoves are very easy to operate, they are like a pellet stove but give more heat and require less maintenance. On the other hand, there is your traditional hand-fired stove. They have perforated grates that allow deep and strong fire beds that give up to a 48hr burn time.
Both stoker and hand-fired coal stoves pull maximum heat and completely burn the coal, then radiate gentle heat back into your living spaces. There are built-in heat exchanges that cool the exhaust air system the efficiency is increased with a small blower. Heat gases are forced into pipes that allow the convection blower to release warmer air out of the stove and into your homes.
Stoves provide comforting warmth, as a fireplace, but provide the highest possible efficiency to provide the maximum savings for you! Some stoves have an off-grid oven that allows you to cook and bake without using any electricity. Its temperature can be easily adjusted by the air slides. Some even have an off-grid water heater, so the stove radiates heat to the water tank. This warms your drinking water without electricity. Additionally, some stoves are equipped with a cooktop to cook food!
Furnace
Furnaces can provide comfortable warmth as the furnace will supply very warm air to your entire home, they also provide heat faster than boiler systems. There are controls and thermostats that provide automatic and well-regulated warmth and a quick response when the seasons change. Heating your domestic water is an option as well! Furnaces are the cheapest type of central heater.
Low-cost fuel as it uses anthracite rice coal is readily available and stored. This helps save on fuel bills! These furnaces can last an average of 15 to 20 years which allows you to offset these costs easily. It produces high indoor air quality due to the filtering system in built-in these furnaces.
Furnaces are available as a coal stoker furnace that automatically stokes and self-feeds to further assess user-friendliness. Some come with 250lb hoppers which can last for days without fuel being added! Furnaces are also available as a hand-fired unit, which can burn hard coal or soft coal. At Legacy Stoves we have integrated an oil burner into both our hand-fired and automatic stoker furnaces. You can have the ease of burning oil whenever you would like, with the ability to save money to burn coal all in one unit. Furnaces have low heating bills but still, give off a comforting warmth in your homes.
Boilers
Water is a great medium to transfer thermal energy. Boilers warm homes much more comfortably than forced air systems. For hot-air furnaces, a blower is used hence hot air will constantly be blown around the house which can make the environment a little drafty, and also the heat may not be evenly distributed throughout the house.
On the other hand, heat transferred through radiators will provide better control and the temperature will be more consistent throughout the house as well. As a result, the heat will be more comfortable and gentle during your colder months. In addition, the air quality will be much better as dust and other allergens will not be blown along with the heat throughout your house. Boilers are also less noisy as compared to furnaces.
Boilers have the longest lifespan out of the three types. Our boilers use heavy gauge steel and are built to ASME standards. The pressurized water system needs almost no maintenance. Boilers are often more efficient than other types as well. Heating domestic water is another advantage available and allows you to capitalize on your coal boiler even more!
Boilers are available as coal stokers, too. They automatically stoke and self-feed to further assess user-friendliness. Some come with 350lb hoppers which can last for days without fuel being added! Boilers are also available as a hand-fired unit, which can burn hard coal or soft coal. Just like our furnaces, we have integrated an oil burner into both our hand-fired and automatic stoker boilers. You can have the ease of burning oil whenever you would like, with the ability to save money with coal all in one unit. Boilers are long-lasting, and will pay for themselves 3-5x throughout their lifetime!
Boilers, furnaces, and stoves are all great options when looking to burn coal. Depending on what areas you want to heat and the system that is currently in your home will help determine what type will work best for you and your family.