We installed a Natures Comfort NCB250 November of 2012 so we have one season under out belt. I approximated the wood usage between 7 and 9 cords and used it well into April of 2013. The unlimited hot water usage was awesome and the thermostat stayed about 72 even on the coldest days. Needless to say we are very happy with our purchase. I also installed everything myself and found it to be relatively straight forward. We live in northwest Ohio and had an average winter last year. I have about 8-10 cords ready to go for this year and plan to fire it up again in the next few weeks.
Following the topic posts, I also noticed having trouble keeping the wood burning in the back of the stove. The grates are in the front and every morning, I'd have to pull all the charred wood to the front. I was not happy. I talked to my dealer and he said I had to "tune" my furnace to my home. I can only use so much energy. Okay....(scratching my head and adjusting my hat). Long story short, we lowered the temp on the aquastat down to 170 and I closed the damper by half. What was happening was the fire was buring hot for 5 minutes. Full bore air, heat, etc. Then cutting off for hours at a time. This was the cycle that left unburned pieces in the back of the stove. He said I needed to extend the burn. The goal was to gradually build up the fire, let it burn for a while, then let it stand idle for a less period of time. Instead of having hot fires at 5 minutes, I needed to have medium fires for 15 minutes. It worked but I found I could increase the burn time by closing the damper even more and also adjusting the temperature differential down to 15 degrees on the aquastat. My wood began buring longer, coals were hot in the back and I noticed less creosote build-up. This balance allowed me to use less wood and had a cleaner furnace/chimney. The only issue I had is when the temperature outside dropped below 0, the furnace had trouble keeping up. I opened up the damper to half way and solved thie issue. Once the outside temperature raised back up into the 20's, I just closed the damper back down to 1/4, never changing the aquastat controls.
My feeling is the furnace is too big for my home. However, I told my dealer I wanted to eventually heat my garage and possibly the barn. I decided to upsize to be safe. We have about a 2000 square foot home. Once I had tuned my set up for my application, I burned far less wood. the first month or two, it was really working me. Now, I am confident it is working as designed. We are very happy with our purchase.
For what it's worth, we did some considerable shopping around a year or so in advance. We have 2 other family members burning wood, one uses a heatmaster and the other a Shaver. I also have a good friend using a Shaver. We looked at the display models at the county fair. We found the warranty to be the best on the Natures Comfort and a reputable dealer close by for parts if needed. Our commitment was for 10 years and we felt Natures Comfort met our needs the best. I am very happy with the engineering on this stove, the company requtation, and features it offers. So far so good, Feel free to ask me questions or give some advice. I still consider myself a novice.
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Topic: Interested in NC 250. Is anyone using this model? (Read 6216 times)