How much air does a wood pellet stove use?

The ideal air fuel ratio for wood pellets to achieve lowest emissions is a lambada of 1.2 lean burn with excess oxygen. This is between 10 and 12 pounds of air per pound of pellets, at a combustion temperature of 1000 to 1300 C, with a combustion time at temperature of 1-4 seconds.

One cubic foot of air weighs 0.0807 pounds.

For every 1 CFM (cubic feet per minuet) of draft through the stove either naturally convected by thermal differential in a chimney, or by draft inducer exhaust fan out a vent we get 60 CFH ( cubic feet per hour) which weighs 4.842 pounds. Dividing that by an air fuel ratio of 11:1 the pellet stove would burn 0.44 pounds of wood pellets per hour producing 3,785.563 BTU or heat per hour.

A typical pellet stove that relies on natural convection with a good heat exchanger can achieve up to 84% efficency for a net of  3,179.873 BTU per hour.
A typical wood pellet condensing furnace with draft inducer exhaust fan and an excellent heat exchanger can achieve higher efficiencies by recovering the latent heat of vaporization up to 95%. However it will also produce a water condensate that must be drained off.  Yeilding a net of 3596.285 BTU per hour.

Why the Suomavator? and why is it such an efficent wood stove?

The Suomavator wood pellet stove has many nuances designed into it to perfect its combustion efficiency, reduce its emissions, and optomize it as an ideal continuous heat source to match your needs.

With a continuous heat source such as the SV5 all you need to do is match the heat loss of your home to maintain comfort. This can be done with a much lower output heater than a typical furnace that cycles on and off to a thermostat causing the room temperature to go up and down with its cycling bursts of large heat output and cool down.

Per megawatthour of heat, wood pellets are the most economical, enviromentally friendly, decentralized fuel source to heat our homes and buisnesses throughout the winters. Compared to cord wood, wood pellets allow timber to be milled into higher value lumber and sold at economic advantage vs splitting rounds into firewood. Additionally wood pellets allow for automation in the wood heating of our homes, combustion is more optomized and efficient lowering fuel consumption/cost, and emissions are significantly below that of even the best wood stoves.

For those who own thier own forrest and trees wood pellets still make greater sense than cord wood since the lumber that can be made from the same felled trees bring greater economic reward, and the sawdust of the milling process can provide more effectively the needed winter heat.

Thourough testing of the suomavator was done in 2018 during the camas of Finlands nordic winters. In these tests the SV5 demonstrated its ability to heat a 1958 built 230 square meter home with outdoor winter temperatures at -25C on a fuel consumption of just 30 KG per day of wood pellets (compressed biomass sawdust), it was able to hold the living space at 20c and the bedrooms at 18c at a significant magnitude of savings vs any other form of avaliable heat.

In this case study the Suomavator wood pellet stove was configured as a condensing boiler with exhaust heat exchanger to air that reduced the flue exhaust temps to under 40C. It is estimated in this configuration a 95% combustion to thermal heat exchange efficiency was achieved. It was draft induced with a 3 watt 12 VDC variable speed fan to vent the low temperature exhaust.

At a cost of just 220 euro per tone for wood pellets the SV5 burned 900 KG per month at the lowest cost for winter heating of just 198 euro per month!
Under the same conditions in the same home was measured:
Heating oil consumption of 510 liters per month at 1.20 euro per liter or 613 euro per month
Air source heat pumps (wich really struggle to work at these extreme low temperatures) 3,565 KWH per month at 0.14 euro per KWH or 499 euro per month.
The savings with the Suomavator were obvious and significant.

In the same home at warmer outdoor temperatures of -5C wood pellet consumption dropped to just 19.5 KG per day or 585 kg per month at a cost of just 128.7 euros per month.
Under the same conditions in the same home was measured:
Heating oil consumption was 332 liters per month costing 398.4 euros per month.
With the warmer temps the heat pumps struggled much less using 1,950 KWH for a heating cost of 273 euros per month.

Soon we hope to have the data collected for heating at +5C temps to best fully plot the seasonal curve from fall through winter and past spring. It is anticipated that at about 10C to 15C ambient the cost of the air source heat pumps may match the cost of the SV5 wood pellet stove.

Again heating with the Suomavator is the clear winner in this home heating case study.

SV5 SUOMAVATOR Wood Pellet Stove 10KW Rocket Heater Gravity Feed Modular Tiny Wood Stove

SUOMAVATOR, Wood Pellet Stove 10KW rocket heater TLUD; efficient, modular, compact, ecological.

Introducing the SUOMAVATOR by BEM Design

The SUOMAVATOR is a clean burning high efficiency compact modular wood pellet stove that can output up to 10 KW of heat continuously. This wood pellet stove requires no electricity to operate.

Using a standard stove heat output calculator and a ceiling height of 2.4m:

Poorly to non insulated envelope (10KW*10=100 m3/2.4=41.6 m2)

-volume in cubic meters / 10 = KW of heat needed

Reasonably insulated garage (15KW*10=150 m3/2.4=62.5 m2)

-volume in cubic meters / 15 = KW of heat needed

Well insulated and sealed modern home (10KW*25=250 m3/2.4=104.2 m2)

-volume in cubic meters / 25 = KW of heat needed

The modular SV5 cartridge burner only, weighs in at just 5 KG, it can be used with our many accessory kits and heat exchangers or in custom heating applications. The 3 main ports (wood pellets in, ash down, and exhaust up) use global standard threaded fittings the same as a barrel bung "2" NPT". In fact threading this rocket stove into a barrel is a near ideal heat exchanger for it, thin with a high surface area, and when vented low out the opposite 2" NPT bung hole forms a thermal stratification chamber heat exchanger. Most needed fittings for your installation can be procured from any local hardware store globally. 

Examples of what the SV5 cartridge wood stove has powered:

• Radiant space heater
• Boiler
• Barrel stove
• High efficiency condensing furnace
• High efficiency condensing boiler
• Grill
• Griddle for home, restaurant, hunting, or food truck
• Oven pizza, bread, baking, etc
• Camp stove
• Tent stove
• Cabin stove
• Boat stove
• Tiny home wood stove
• Caravan, trailer, rv wood stove
• Porch heater
• Workshop, garage rocket stove
• Animal shelters and barns
• Thermal Electric Generator TEG
• Sterling engine generator 
• Rankine steam generator

We also build many of the sub assemblies described above to complement the Suomavator wood pellet stove, matching it to your unique needs. As seen on youtube and google images under Suomavator.

This is the eko-conscious or minimalist's off-the-grid dream solution to any heating problems as the pellet stove needs no electricity to run and provides steady, reliable, and continuous heat. No need to chop or collect wet wood and big, bulky storage risking mold and bugs. Very ecological and economic solution. In most configurations with sufficient heat exchangers there practically is no waste heat. When configured as a condensing boiler or condensing furnace SV5 yields a 95% efficiency making chimney requirements simple as a low temperature vent hole. Pellet fuel is clean, and burns hot with very little ash. Since wood pellets are made of clean sawmill residue any ash that is left from the burn can be used in organic gardens. The principal of our innovation is based on compact efficiency, that is, a small amount of pellets is needed for steady heat output.

This little stove can be customized for any of the uses listed above. Just tell us what it's needed for and we can build it to suit your unique needs. Easy installation where an existing chimney is available, no professional expert is required to set it up or replace a lower efficiency stove or burner.

The combustion inside the Suomavator is optimized to provide high temperature complete combustion at over 1000 C, yielding low emissions with little to no: CO carbon monoxides, particulates, tars, and creosote.

Eko-friendly

Compact

Mobile and light weight

Heat fast when needed

Quiet

High temperature combustion over 1000 C

Smokeless and clean low emissions

Ultra low particulate

Ultra low CO carbon monoxide

Minimal ash and cleanup

Easy to light and extinguish

Efficient and economical

Tags: 

suomavator, condensing boiler, condensing furnace, wood pellet stove, rocket stove, barrel stove, portable stove, tent stove, caravan stove, wood pellet rocket stove, gravity fed wood pellet stove, off grid living, emergency prepardness, combined heat and power, combined cycle, tiny home, tiny wood stove, TLUD, top light up draft, low emissions, space heater

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