We installed our Heatmor 200 a year ago. We'd heated with wood most of our lives but we'd used indoor stoves. I work in emergency services and had been to many house fires and had many nightmares of something going wrong with our indoor stove. I do like the peace of mind of still using wood without the danger of someone getting hurt or killed and loosing everything we own.
We choose Heatmor for a few reasons: The warranty was superior, a dealer was 40 minutes away, the stainless steel design, blower hit above and below the fire, ash auger, double doors, and plenty of good references including a family member. The dealer (Mike's Heating in Mahnomen, MN) provided me with a list of customers - unscreened - along with their phone numbers. I actually called a ton of them and couldn't find anyone to say anything bad about the stove or customer service. I had problems with the circulator pump twice last winter, called the salesman Tom, he gave me a new one each time. I think the problem was air bubbles accumulating in the pump as I had it mounted in a horizontal run. I changed it to a verticle run this summer and hopefully it will not seize up again.
The furnace goes thru a lot of wood. Last year I think I burned 23 pickup loads (shortbox 1/2 ton). I'd guess that would be between 10 and 12 cords. There was a lot of junk wood in those loads, but it all burns. I bought a flatbed trailer and put sides on it to get a bigger load home each trip this fall. I filled the stove about every 12 hours during the cold days. I don't think the time committment is much worse with the outdoor furnace vs. indoor stove as you cut the logs bigger, don't have to split them, don't have to load them into the house, and you only have to do ashes once every week or two. The benefits in addition to not burning your house down are being thermostatically controlled, endless hot water, no mess inside, no handling the same piece of wood so many times. I'm heating a 2900 square foot house and domestic hot water for a family of 5. It was our first winter in the house so I didn't have any personal experience as to propane usage but according to the propane company I'd have spent $2500+ on LP. Now we go thru about $400 in propane for the entire year. I calculated my furnace would be paid for in 2 1/2 years, less if propane prices jump another 75 cents next year.
There are several good stoves made here in MN, I think they all have their good points. I really enjoy looking at other models and hearing/reading how folks like them. The biggest competitors to Heatmor here are Woodmaster and Central Boiler, both are really good products and I'd probably be just as happy with either of them.
My wife has already been bugging me to light our stove and it's not even cold yet. I have a bunch of photos from when I did my installation if anyone has questions.