Hello, evey good peson here,

Many people in my area (Vermont) heat wih woodstoves, which not only can heat an entire house, but are a godsend if the power goes out.I am from NYC, and I never met a woodstove. I am terified of anything with open flame, having been in two fires.

Does anyone use them, and can you offer any reassurance as their safety?

I grew up with a wood stove and we had no problems with it. It's the best, most comforting heat souce IMO. You don't have the sparks spitting out into the room like a fireplace does, the heat is confined and radiates out from the metal as opposed to going up the chimney. It makes better use of the wood that way.  We had both a cast iron stove and a tin stove. The cast iron was better, as the tin stove burned out fast and would get glowing red hot spots if a chunk of wood fell against the side. The are rules of safety in setting it up and keeping the flue clean. I wish I had one now, but in So. Calif. there isn't that much of a need for heat.  Edey

Thanks, Edey.I'm jealous of you living there - it's my dream to be in CA.

Do you know if they make anything like mini-wood stoves, just for when the power goes out?

Seaturtle

I grew up with a wood stove also, and used one for 15 years of my adult life. I'd have one again if I could. In all that time, there was never a problem with safety. You have to use some common sense in operating one (don't burn trash, don't overload, etc.).
When we bought a house, a wood burning stove, or a chimney capable of handling one, was on our list of necessities. We found an old farm house with a central chimney and wound up with a wood heating stove and a wood cookstove. I loved every moment of it. 

By the way, during that 15 years, we had a gas furnace explode. We had kept it as a backup and used it at night at one time. Don't be afraid of something you have control over. 

 Seaturtle, do you have SEVCA in your town. They may be able to help you with advise and finding a small stove. They helped my friend find money to fix her chimney for her wood stove. Might be worth asking. Babs

seaturtle:

Do you know if they make anything like mini-wood stoves, just for when the power goes out?

I've never heard of anything like that.  At one time there were small room sized kerosene stoves available, but here in Calif. they were outlawed because of fume problems. Something you might look into is a pellet stove. It burns like a wood stove but uses small compressed chunks of wood by-products as the fuel. I believe there are different kinds; one continuously feeds the pellets using an auger - that one runs on electricity for the auger, but I think it can also be fed by hand (or shovel as the case may be) when the electricity goes out. The pellets are sold in bags.  Do a google search for "using a pellet stove" and see what you get.  Edey

The house I grew up in had a wood stove beside the oil furnace and tied in so that the heat went through the registers. Unfortunately df wasn't the best about keeping the chimmney clean instead of investing in a brush he used to drop a logging chain down and shake it from side to side in order to break the creosol up which it seldom did. The creosol that built up with the fires caused quite a few chimney fires that never damaged the house or the roof but required the fire department to come put out just the same. I was standing beside df after one fire when the firechief told him that if he heard one more call to our address for a chimney fire he'd let the house go up. Df was ordered to either change to using the oil furnace or hire a chimney sweep, he choose to burn oil but not to hire a sweep. The next time he tired to clean the chimney he decided to use a non work generator from a wrecked car, at the time he didn't realize that the creosol was as thick as it was and the generator got jammed in the chimney to the point we had to tear down the chimney and build a new one. If you get a woodstove either for main or back up heat maintain the chimney getting it swept at least once a year even if you're not burning in it (I'm not 100% sure but think that once a month if you burn it for a main sorce).

We use our fireplace for a short time each fall usually 6 weeks if the weather requires, on Christmas eve/morning and in an emergancy where we loose power. One piece of equipment that I keep on the mantel is a fire extingusher it might not put out a chimney fire but we can use it to put the box out and if any embers miss the fireproof board I have on the floor. Dh &I have taught the four oldest dks how to use the extingusher (dd#2 is to small but will learn when the time comes).

 My husband and I have looked into both a pellet stove and a wood stove. We plan on installing a wood stove sometime.

 Here is the thing with pellet stoves - first, you have to have a steady supply of pellets. Wood I can get free (or almost free) sometimes; pellets would always cost. Most pellet stoves are not good in a power outage because they require electricity - all the ones we have seen do, anyway. They are also more espensive than a wood stove. My understanding, though, is that they burn hotter and longer than a regular wood stove. 

With either option, if you plan on being gone for a few days - or even all day - have a backup heat source available. The larger pellet stoves will last a few days because the hopper is large, but it would be very bad for it to break and pipes freeze. Wood stoves sometimes need fed two or three times a day to keep a house warm. 

Hi ... I have lived with wood stoves since I was little and have not had any problems what so ever. All woodstoves have a door that closes, so the only 'open flame' would come when you physically opened the door. I never leave our fires unattended, clean the ashes into a metal bucket and stir for two days before filling the pit in the back yard, and since I live in AZ now, we have the sweeping done one year, along with burning the 'special log' about every two months - this is not our primary heating source, but we use it ofen from about late Oct. to late April. In our living room, we have mexican brick surrounding the three-sides, to the ceiling, and a raised brick platform for the stove to set upon. There are heat-gloves you could purchase (like BBQ ones, but better) and tools that will help you insert wood pieces, and a long poker to move coals/wood about inside the actual stove. I love our stove and it does keep us toasty, too ...

Here is the goverment EPA site about woodstove use and safety - maybe after reading this, you will begin to feel more comfortable. http://www.epa.gov/woodstoves/efficiently.html   Also, could you visit a friend's home with a stove and do some 'practice' ???

 Hi Seaturtle- I live in NY slightly upstate from NYC. For the past 2 years my husband and I have heated our home with only the wood stove insert. The house came with a fireplace (fieldstone) but the previous owner had put in a propane burner in the fireplace. We removed the propane line and we found wood burning insert on ebay from a guy in PA. We had the chimney relined (we have  friend that does this) and installed the wood stove. Since then it has worked great! we have had no problems. We burn the ceresol logs a couple of times a year  to ensure the chimney stays clean. I still have my oil furnace but have spent less than 100.00 on oil in the past year and half. There is a door on the stove so nothing goes flying out, I would also sugest that you lay a pad of some sort, either concrete or tile around the stove just in case a spark does fly while the door is open you won't damage your carpet or flooring. Wood we have this year managed to get for free. My 14 year old son is getting into great shape splitting logs every day after school. 

I would not worry about the safety as long as you respect the fire and take the right precautions, you will be fine! Stay warm!