A Progress Hybrid Long Burn

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So in the end do you shut the air all the way down to it's max?

Nope. I had it just a hair above completely closed. I had an interested "poof" last winter at fully closed and haven't really run that way much since. I've tried it a couple times since then and while awake with no problems, but I didn't like it when it happened. I have an oversized (7X7) flue which I think could be an issue at fully closed.
 
Wow, I really am impressed! Something that I noticed is that you mentioned shoveling ashes so I presume you don't have the ash pan. I wonder if perhaps the ash (or some other aspect of not having an ashpan) may also help a bit (?). At any rate, I'm still hoping to get up there in my burn times too someday...
 
Wow, I really am impressed! Something that I noticed is that you mentioned shoveling ashes so I presume you don't have the ash pan. I wonder if perhaps the ash (or some other aspect of not having an ashpan) may also help a bit (?). At any rate, I'm still hoping to get up there in my burn times too someday...

I don't have an ashpan. Maybe there is something to that. There does seem to be quite a range of experiences with the stove and sometimes I'm at a loss as to why. I think it was Rideau that didn't have an ash pan? Hmm...
 
You are correct, I don't have an ashpan.

I do have a long interior insulated chimney...ICC double wall stovepipe, and ICC chimney. I get really long burn times when I try. I don't tend to load the stove very full, and I don't get really high stovetop temperatures. Just ran a load hotter than I usually do, and the stovetop got to slightly over 400.

Last year my son and I tried to get the stove top hot one day...really pushed the stove, and we got to about 500. My PH just sits comfortably at about 350 most of the time. It maintains that temperature from about half an hour after starting a new fire, until about 1-2 hours before the small coals only stage.

My home is 3 stories, 46 x 32, third floor under the roof, but a big floor with a 22 foot shed dormer --three large bedrooms and a bathroom on the third floor. Haven't had the electric heat on since I got the PH, unless I was away from the home for over two days, and it was Dec to Feb. Don't have to worry about the house freezing until at least Dec. (when I'm away). If I am going away, I load for a good fire, usually with ironwood rounds, close the air all the way, or just slightly crack it, and know that the stove will crank out meaningful heat for a full day. House is pretty tight, and pretty well insulated, but tons of 1970's era Pella windows, and brutal Northern exposure. PH handles it well.

And yes, Ironwood is amazing. Need to get a new battery for my scale, and after that am going to weigh my ironwood and figure out how much a cubic foot weighs, then how much a cord weighs. My ironwood is very dense. All my trees have tight rings...I am on limestone bedrock. Roots go down a few inchs, and out a long way. A lot of smallish stuff went over during the Noreaster and subsequent wind...once the snow is on the ground and the ticks are less active, I'll go cut the ironwoods that are down. Two big ones (for ironwood) about 12 inch diameter. Those will heat the house for a good while.

If I put a big Ironwood round in the stove and don't poke it at all, it burns for many, many hours.
When I get back from my son's wedding, I'm going to choose a cold day to load the PH full of Ironwood, shut it down for a long cat burn, and see how long it burns, at what temp, and what the house temps do....

It's fun to play with this stove.
 
I've burned some Ironwood as well, kind a reminds me of how Black Locust burns, hot and long. It will be very interesting to find out how the PH handles a full load of it.
 
I've burned some Ironwood as well, kind a reminds me of how Black Locust burns, hot and long. It will be very interesting to find out how the PH handles a full load of it.

I have about 1/3 cord of ironwood for this winter that I'm saving for the coldest weather. That stuff burns so hot, I'm probably not going to do a full load of just ironwood. Maybe I'll start with half ironwood, half ash and go from there.
 
Well, last night I had my first really good long burn! Hooray! heh. I had been burning chunks throughout the day yesterday, two smallish loads about 4hrs apart just to basically use them up and enjoy playing with the fire. I did my last few at 7:30ish then at 9:30 I had a good bed of coals and (unfortunately) one good size piece of a chunk that was still solid (bad only because it made it difficult to load around). Anyway, I pushed everything to the front and loaded up some of my best oak - 3 years at least, nice rectangular pieces stacked 3 in the back (that took it as high as I could go) then filled up to the front with a few more and pushed it all to the far end of the stove. Stuck a couple more small chunks in the space left near the door as well - all in all got 8 splits in there and a couple small chunks.
Since the stove was already good and hot it was burning before I was done and I pretty much engaged the cat within a couple minutes of closing the door then the air was down to fully closed within 30 minutes. Stove was dark except for edges of splits on top glowing and the big glowing pile at bottom of the stove. Went to bed at 11ish with the same dark stove and a stovetop around 400ish (IR).
At 6a (8.5hrs) there were lots of coals and the house was about the same temp as when I went to bed so I left it alone and took kids to school etc - that would normally have been a time to load stove etc. 8:30 (11hrs) I decided I'd best feed before work (now running late of course) so I opened up and found that one of the back splits was half solid and the coals were more than plentiful. I pushed coals forward and rolled the remainder on top and it burst into flame. Loaded up some fresh wood (1/2 box?) and got going for the day... Very nice.
Anyway, I think the key here for me besides a full box may well be that I had it pre-heated and a good size bed of coals to start. Will be interesting to see if I still have much left of the fire when I get home tonight - it is a short day today so I'll be able to check again at about 5:30 which will put it at about 9hrs, I didn't load a lot of wood in there as the house was already warmed up and it isn't expected to be all that cold today.
 
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Well, last night I had my first really good long burn! Hooray! heh. I had been burning chunks throughout the day yesterday, two smallish loads about 4hrs apart just to basically use them up and enjoy playing with the fire. I did my last few at 7:30ish then at 9:30 I had a good bed of coals and (unfortunately) one good size piece of a chunk that was still solid (bad only because it made it difficult to load around). Anyway, I pushed everything to the front and loaded up some of my best oak - 3 years at least, nice rectangular pieces stacked 3 in the back (that took it as high as I could go) then filled up to the front with a few more and pushed it all to the far end of the stove. Stuck a couple more small chunks in the space left near the door as well - all in all got 8 splits in there and a couple small chunks.
Since the stove was already good and hot it was burning before I was done and I pretty much engaged the cat within a couple minutes of closing the door then the air was down to fully closed within 30 minutes. Stove was dark except for edges of splits on top glowing and the big glowing pile at bottom of the stove. Went to bed at 11ish with the same dark stove and a stovetop around 400ish (IR).
At 6a (8.5hrs) there were lots of coals and the house was about the same temp as when I went to bed so I left it alone and took kids to school etc - that would normally have been a time to load stove etc. 8:30 (11hrs) I decided I'd best feed before work (now running late of course) so I opened up and found that one of the back splits was half solid and the coals were more than plentiful. I pushed coals forward and rolled the remainder on top and it burst into flame. Loaded up some fresh wood (1/2 box?) and got going for the day... Very nice.
Anyway, I think the key here for me besides a full box may well be that I had it pre-heated and a good size bed of coals to start. Will be interesting to see if I still have much left of the fire when I get home tonight - it is a short day today so I'll be able to check again at about 5:30 which will put it at about 9hrs, I didn't load a lot of wood in there as the house was already warmed up and it isn't expected to be all that cold today.​

Nice! So really if you didn't have to leave for work, you probably could have gotten a few more hours out of it? Not bad at all.

I bet you'll have plently of coals still when you get home. Even though you only loaded half it sounds like you still had a bunch of coals in there.

When loading a pretty hot stove, you still should let the load get charred up a bit before engaging the cat. I would probably give it 5 to 10 minutes anyway.



 
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When loading a pretty hot stove, you still should let the load get charred up a bit before engaging the cat. I would probably give it 5 to 10 minutes anyway.​

My concern with letting it burn very long on the hot reload is twofold - first if it gets very hot then it seems to want to keep burning hot which I associate with my failure to get such a long burn. Secondly, if I get it all burning like that (will have full secondaries etc) then turn it down, even slowly) to the fully closed then I have had some puffing. I believe this is because the load is all super hot and outgassing like mad with not enough air to actually flame in the box and it just ends up in a cycle when it hits critical mass to puff. I may be wrong on that theory, but I didn't get any puffing last night at least!
 
I don't have an ashpan. Maybe there is something to that. There does seem to be quite a range of experiences with the stove and sometimes I'm at a loss as to why. I think it was Rideau that didn't have an ash pan? Hmm...

This is something I've wondered about and remember talking to Tom about while at the factory. Sad that I remember discussing this but don't remember much about it. My thoughts were that one could perhaps get more heat and a better burn without the ash pan and that is why we ordered ours without the ash pan. It would certainly be interesting to run two stoves side by side with the same type of wood and see if there was much difference. Probably won't be done though.
 
Slow1:

Did you rake the hot coals to the front and load the back splits without coals underneath?

You are correct about wanting to close down the air before the secondaries really get firing to prolong the burn. But its a fine line to prevent a cat stall. I may just ask Santa for a thermocouple for Christmas! :)
 
I'm surprised that, reaching a 17.5hr burn with coals to spare, you are not eyeing the 24hr burn. Reduce to 1 load/day. Wouldn't that be nice? I bet you could make it easy with longer splits.
 
i just loaded some 16-18 inch, mostly red oak, with some junk poplar mixed in on coals (hidden in ash) after 24 hours. moves coal to front, open draft all the way for a minute, than open and load splits on front and back. i load the smaller looking stuff on the front. shot off like a chimney fire. if you had 21.5 inch red oak dry and loaded this thing up it would be some really solid coals after 24 hours. im burning 16-18 inch red oak mixed with poplar and im getting 24 hours with coals. every 12 hours is no problem for this thing at all. wishing i had some 21 inchish stuff that was dry to load up. so far so good folks! cant say enough good. btw...the cooktop is excellent. we have been using it a lot lately. sort of like a bonus, the stove was already great, than they just threw this in for free. gotta love that!
 
guess i should add, i do have a well insulated 2000sq ft house, closed floor plan, with passive solar design in stove room with thermal mass. also run an active solar space heater i built which contributes heavily when the sun is out of course. got down to 15f couple nights ago and the house was 69f when i woke up. wife is smiling!
 
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I have some 21-22" Beech that's been drying since last fall.
I think its ready.
Stay tuned....
 
I'm surprised that, reaching a 17.5hr burn with coals to spare, you are not eyeing the 24hr burn. Reduce to 1 load/day. Wouldn't that be nice? I bet you could make it easy with longer splits.

Meh. I'm sure I could with longer splits but I really have no problem loading twice a day. I get to see more flames that way!
 
Slow1:

Did you rake the hot coals to the front and load the back splits without coals underneath?

You are correct about wanting to close down the air before the secondaries really get firing to prolong the burn. But its a fine line to prevent a cat stall. I may just ask Santa for a thermocouple for Christmas! :)

I was surprised by the burn because I did have some decent secondaries for a couple hours. They were pretty mild though. I've really noticed that larger splits really seem to keep the secondaries in check. They always light off for me with bigger loads once the cat gets hot, but stay pretty tame with the bigger splits.
 
I have to get permission from Dennis first before I can burn wood that has not been seasoned for 3 years!:eek:
 
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i just loaded some 16-18 inch, mostly red oak, with some junk poplar mixed in on coals (hidden in ash) after 24 hours. moves coal to front, open draft all the way for a minute, than open and load splits on front and back. i load the smaller looking stuff on the front. shot off like a chimney fire. if you had 21.5 inch red oak dry and loaded this thing up it would be some really solid coals after 24 hours. im burning 16-18 inch red oak mixed with poplar and im getting 24 hours with coals. every 12 hours is no problem for this thing at all. wishing i had some 21 inchish stuff that was dry to load up. so far so good folks! cant say enough good. btw...the cooktop is excellent. we have been using it a lot lately. sort of like a bonus, the stove was already great, than they just threw this in for free. gotta love that!

I'm not shocked. If I had a better insulated house, I'd probably be fine with 24 hour burns. As I said above though, I'm pretty happy with 12 hours.
 
I have to get permission from Dennis first before I can burn wood that has not been seasoned for 3 years!:eek:

I wont tell if you don't. ::P

Beech should be ok in a year. Maybe not perfect, but certainly burnable.
 
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oh yeah, i agree with you. its something to see how different layouts and floor plans affect things. wonder how big a difference the longer splits will make? seems like a lot of volume not being used in the 16-18 inch range, which is what ive got for awhile now. gotta love these stoves though right! id say ill be firing 12 hour cycles once we actually get into winter and i dont get as much solar gain. after all, its only nov 26th.

cheers.
 
oh yeah, i agree with you. its something to see how different layouts and floor plans affect things. wonder how big a difference the longer splits will make? seems like a lot of volume not being used in the 16-18 inch range, which is what ive got for awhile now. gotta love these stoves though right! id say ill be firing 12 hour cycles once we actually get into winter and i dont get as much solar gain. after all, its only nov 26th.

cheers.

Yeah, I'm sure the longer splits will make a sizable difference. I am very pleased with the stove! The only thing I didn't like was the screen, which they've fixed perfectly and the cooktop was a great surprise. I do find myself cooking on it quite a bit. I can get 12 hour burns with coals to relight regardless of outside temps, so what's not to like! I'm sure every once in awhile I'll be very glad to be able to get much longer burns too.
 
Waulie

Is your new screen still perfectly tight against the Fireback (rear of the screen?). I had to bend mine a couple times after the first few fires to keep it snug against the flat plate.
 
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