I have a New Englander....not sure how long we've had it, at least 15 years. Every month or two, you take your shop-vac and vacuum the heck outa the soot/ashes....otherwise, it will get clogged and not circulate enough air. Once a year you have to pull the exhaust pipe and vacuum it. I unscrew the pipe going thru the wall, then I can un-screw the top elbow and I stick my vacuum's hose down in the pipe. Starting about Thanksgiving, it is gonna run for about 3 months straight. It will burn about a bag (about $6 at the City Market) a day when you turn it up. Right now it is running on 1. I lit it at 5p, and it will run till about 11a tomorrow....so, a bag is lasting about 3 days now. It was just below freezing last night, and got up to about 50 today.
This year, so far, we've burned around 6 bags. We have not bought any this year (this heating year), and are burning last years leftovers. We've been burning for at least 2 weeks..
It used to run better turned up, not sure why. I replaced the air-feed fan last year, so it should be getting enough air.
2 years ago, or so, I had to pull it out and clean the screen over the hot air blower.
When it gets cold, I'll set a little fan on the floor and blow air on it....this helps out.
WE have a hot water boiler for baseboard heat. We will use that when it gets cold...when it doesn't get above freezing.
They make them that will have a thermostat...but why? It uses a red-hot, electrically heated, rod that starts it off. Right now, the hopper is about 1/2 full, that way, tomorrow morning, it will shut-off by itself....when the hopper goes empty.
I light it with, diesel, alcohol, Charcoal lighter fluid and if I can't get the others at the Hazardous Waste place at the dump....Vaseline (from the DollarTree). You stick your finger in and get a glob, wipe it off w/TP and then light the TP. My wife prefers to use Vaseline.
It requieres less maintenance than a fire place. More maintenance than my boiler and other set-ups, But, it heats our house for a $1,000 less, a year, than when we were using propane.
But, if the power goes out, we have no heat....but, since 4/2000, that has not happened, when it cold/
It is pretty simple to fix, and NE has pretty good customer service. When the blower went out, it was outta service for about 5 days.
Not sure that I love it, but I am reasonably pleased w/it.