I currently have a 36,000 BTU ventless gas log unit in my fireplace and am contemplating exchanging it for a woodburning heat exhanger. The reason is that the ventless gas insert heats the room it's in but not the rest of the house. I have been told that I can't use a fan with the ventless logs because it can produce dangerous carbon monoxide. Since I don't want to spend a lot of money by getting a chimney reline and woodburning insert (I have an unlimited supply of free wood) I was presented with a woodburning heat exchanger, which comes with a blower to distribute heat throughout the house. I was wondering if anyone has any experience with these and if the benefits will be great enough to justify the cost (around $1500) of replacing the ventless gas logs I currently have. The ventless gas logs obviously use gas, which costs money, so I'm looking for a good alternative for heating the house with free wood, minimizing my furnace use while wanting a payback on my investment in less than 5 years, which a regular woodburning insert would cause.

We have a HUGE wood burning fireplace and we love it. We only use it for a few hours in the winter evenings though, mainly because we love the look, sound and mood in provides. The rest of the day we run a gas Munchkin to heat the house.

Hauling in the logs is a lot of work, cleaning out the ash is also a hassle.
You cannot possibly stack the fireplace to last through the night, you would have to get up during the night quite a few times to keep the fire going.
Once the fire is out, your house would get cold fairly quickly - well, depending on how cold your winters are. Ours is as low as -20F.
If you leave for work in the morning, you will likely to come home to a very cold home, your pipes might freeze etc...
If you are home all the time, you would want the fire to burn continuously (putting logs on it every 2-3 hours or so), leaving you no chance to clean out the ash. It takes over 12 hours for the ash to cool off enough to handle it safely.

Good idea for you to convert? It really depends on your tolerance and on how much you are willing to work in order to save on gas. In my home, I cannot see it working out without the gas furnace.
Best of luck!

When i was a kid we rented a cabin for a weekend in Lake Arrowhead, CA and it was haunted. it was a two story cabin with the master bedroom downstairs and the staircase was in the livingroom on the left side. there was a gas fireplace and a big tub in the master bedroom. the room number was 36 i believe. thanks!
it may have been in blue bird, california.

This website has an article about Bracken Fern Manor in that city.