Wood Stove Boot Saves Lost Heat

Wood Stove Boot Saves Lost Heat ENERGY Wood Burners (65) 6-1-32 "Our wood stove was making use of only about 15% of the available heat. The other 85% was going up the chimney," says Albert Johnson, of Erhard, Minn., inventor of a new "Heat Boot" for wood stoves that captures heat between the stove and the flue exiting the home. "When people come on our farm, they ask what type of stove we use because there's no smoke coming out of our chimney. They don't believe it when we say we're heating our whole house with a small Franklin wood stove. Before we installed the heat boot we could just barely heat one room with it. We used to use about 1,500 gal. of heating oil a year. Last year, we burned just 125 gal.," Johnson told FARM SHOW. Essentially, the Heat Boot consists of 33 small pipes enclosed in a rectangular chamber that mounts in-line with the flue on top of the wood stove. As hot air rises up out of the stove and through the small diameter pipes, a small squirrel cage fan behind the pipes blows air across them and into the room. All smoke and gases pass out of the heat exchanger pipes and into the standard flue pipe exiting the room. "It restricts air flow within the stove so that the wood burns more efficiently. We estimate that we're actually burning 60% less wood while gaining the additional heat. And yet, unlike many of the air restrictive heaters, it almost completely eliminates creosote build-up. In the four years we've had our Heat Boot installed, we've never had to clean our chimney." Much of the residue is deposited in the 33 heat exchanging pipes, which must be cleaned out peridically with a set of pipecleaner type brushes. The brushes are passed through each of the pipes which are reached by removing a top access panel. The whole process takes just a few minutes, according to Johnson. The Heat Boot is 18 by 14 by 16 in. in size. Johnson says it costs him about 13 cents a day to run the thermostatically-controlled fan behind the unit. Johnson also mounted one of his units in the ductwork on his oil furnace, which is an old converted wood central heat furnace. He says it captures enough heat to pay for itself, even though the oil furnace is seldom used. Johnson's Heat Boot is being produced by Concord, Inc., a Fargo, N. Dak., manufacturer. Retail cost is $225. For more information, contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Concord, Inc., 2800 7th Avenue North, Fargo, N. Dak. 58102 (ph 701 280-1260).

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