So, third night in a row, I get the stove running beautifully... but only after three hours of fighting with it. We're currently cruising at 350F stovetop and 1000F on the cat probe, but getting there was no small feat.
Set up a top-down fire tonight at 7pm, with four big splits of hardwood (guess I should've looked closer, but I'm assuming walnut), then some paper and fatwood, and then three small splits of pine. She took off great, and we went right up to 450'ish on the stovetop. 30 minutes later, it was clear my pine was going to be burned up before the big hardwood splits took off, so I added a small split of unidentified hardwood to the top. The fire almost immediately smothered.
The next hour or more was spent cracking the door to get her going again, and then watching it die after I closed the door. Eventually, I got it to burn okay with the door shut, but we hovered forever below 400F stove top, and a fire too weak to bother engaging the cat.
After two hours, I was able to engage the cat, but it hovered only around 500F on the cat probe for another hour. Three hours into the burn, the cat probe finally started climbing, along with the stove top. We got to 500F on the stovetop and 1080F on the cat, before finally lowering the air to cruise as intended.
I assume the verdict is poorly seasoned wood, but would like a more experienced opinion than my own. If so, I can't imagine any solutions to this problem that aren't going to cost me more time than I have, right now.
Set up a top-down fire tonight at 7pm, with four big splits of hardwood (guess I should've looked closer, but I'm assuming walnut), then some paper and fatwood, and then three small splits of pine. She took off great, and we went right up to 450'ish on the stovetop. 30 minutes later, it was clear my pine was going to be burned up before the big hardwood splits took off, so I added a small split of unidentified hardwood to the top. The fire almost immediately smothered.
The next hour or more was spent cracking the door to get her going again, and then watching it die after I closed the door. Eventually, I got it to burn okay with the door shut, but we hovered forever below 400F stove top, and a fire too weak to bother engaging the cat.
After two hours, I was able to engage the cat, but it hovered only around 500F on the cat probe for another hour. Three hours into the burn, the cat probe finally started climbing, along with the stove top. We got to 500F on the stovetop and 1080F on the cat, before finally lowering the air to cruise as intended.
I assume the verdict is poorly seasoned wood, but would like a more experienced opinion than my own. If so, I can't imagine any solutions to this problem that aren't going to cost me more time than I have, right now.