Condor prob off by 350F !

We have been having a few issues with the draft on the new stove or so we thought ! Today I got so tired of looking the stove over and over trying to find the problem that I stuck the condor in the oven at 200F then put a meat thermometer next to it . The condor was at 550F while the oven was set for 200F the meat thermometer was at 200F give or take 2F. How in the world can it be off 350F ! That is totally nuts for a $30 probe thermometer what a wast of money that was. Next time I am testing it in the oven before I use it!

Pete

cozy heat said:

Is this a thermocouple probe? Any chance the display unit is set for a different thermocouple type than is attached at the probe?

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No it is a insert probe with a spring. I have been looking at a thermocouple probe but have not convince myself that they are better yet ! ( till tonight that is ) Do you have any experience with them or any knowledge about them?

Thanks
Pete

pen said:

The problem with sticking the probe thermometer in an oven is that the entire unit is submersed in the same exact heat. By design, the probe part is meant to be hot and the face should be cooler since it is outside of the environment that it is measuring the temperature of. In other words, it's not meant to be used or read accurately in an oven.

With that said, I'm not claiming that your probe does or does not read as accurately; but rather the test you just put it through is flawed.

Here's a bunch of info that relates to what I found out with these. https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/51149/ If you care to read through it you'll see some of the ways us guys on here tried testing these as well as condar's response. At the end of the day, condar still claimed that in their test situations that their probes (even the exact one I was questioning) read accurately. However, they did end up changing their packaging sometime in the last year or so to no longer recommend its use on single wall stove pipe.

pen

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Thanks Pen I must say thats a lot of info to digest at once! I guess my stroke of genius was not so genius after all. :lol: Well at this point after craming all that into my brain I am thinking we are going to be getting a digital flue probe for our pipe. My faith in the condor is gone now and I don't feel safe using something that is off by such a large amount in the high end. Thank you for all your research Pen.

Pete

Edited sorry the spell check likes to miss spell and change words on me lol

Here is what is going on with my flue Pen maybe this will help out.

1) fire up stove and get a good coal bed Temps 350F stove 450F ish flue
2) load er up to the top of bricks
3) starts burning good reads 600F flue 500 Stovetop
4) shut air down 800F flue within 10 minutes
5) if I do not shut air All the way down the flue will hit 1100F while stove is 600 max

I installed a damper which helped at first but now it does nothing. As the flue was running away the other day I shut the damper and made sure the flue was shut. The secondary was going to town and the flue dropped to 800F with the air all the way down and the damper shut completely then stayed there for 4 hours almost. I checked all the gaskets on the stove and they are all tight as well as all the pipe connections they are all good too. This is pretty common it works great some days and others it is off for the races and I can't stop the flue. Here is the kicker the stove never goes over 600F !! I would imagine if it was a super draft then the stove would go nuclear and have a failure somewhere.

Yesterday I talked to my father and he said that he thinks there may be a pressure issue above the flue causing the hot air to stay in the pipe ! Wouldn't that be a downdraft ? I have on one side of the pipe a second roof to my house which is taller than the flue on the other a tall neighbors house which is fairly close and in front a very large tree 15ft chimney total from the stove up.

That is a very good point! I will fire the beast up again and see what happens then.

Pete

Backwoods Savage said:

Pete, I know we've talked about this but have you checked into getting the IR? You can always borrow ours if you wish.

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I would like to borrow it Dennis thanks! That way i can see if I like it first ( sure I will anyways )

Pete

Thank you all for the help ! I figured out our draft problem today and fixed it the stove burns fantastic better than I thought possible First off the condor is off by about 250F when it is at 800 and above. The flue was not drafting enouph the manual states .05 but I had to go up a pipe now it is .07 and perfect the flue hangs at 700 and hasn't passed 800f at all. The fire is the most beautiful thing I have seen in any stove now it just works perfect and the house is very warm now. Buy the way I checked it with a magnahelic gauge to be sure.

Pete

OK I have a question, you added chimney pipe and it lowered your flue temp, I have high flue temps and wondering if this might help me out.

Oldspark I have a annoying problem with our setup lol. We have a tall house on the west side a tall second roof on the east and a tree on south. With each new stove we get very odd draft issues to figure out which is very annoying. If your chimney is not tall enouph you may not be drafting very well and the heat will not escape fast enouph. If it is too tall it will draft to well and could get hot from sucking the heat out of the stove really fast. These are problems we have had in the past!

Pete

burnout said:

Pallet Pete said:

Thank you all for the help ! I figured out our draft problem today and fixed it the stove burns fantastic better than I thought possible First off the condor is off by about 250F when it is at 800 and above. The flue was not drafting enouph the manual states .05 but I had to go up a pipe now it is .07 and perfect the flue hangs at 700 and hasn't passed 800f at all. The fire is the most beautiful thing I have seen in any stove now it just works perfect and the house is very warm now. Buy the way I checked it with a magnahelic gauge to be sure.

Pete

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Hey Pete, I am assuming that the .05 and .07 are D/P readings, is this correct? Is that inches of water, and how did you get your Magnahelic to connect to the stove? I would like to take some readings on my stove as well. Also, how long was the pipe you added?

One last question for the group: Can you put a thermometer into a double walled pipe? Just drill through the side into it?

Sorry for all the questions.

Glad to see you up and running well!

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You will have to insert it right above the collar on the stove through the pipe which means convincing yourself it is worth drilling through your double wall. In our case we have had draft issues before so I figured what the heck why not it saves much time and money in the long run if it works. Do not leave the probe in the pipe to long while it is burning or it could harm the probe and be sure to do the test when the pipe and stove are heated to the your normal running temps. Yes they are inches of water readings your manual should tell you what it should be at for your stove if not call the manufacturer first. As for the thermometer you have to drill to different sizes for the condor outer hole is larger than the inner then a eyelet and a magnet insert in and cover the holes to prevent smoke leakage. I am sorry I do not remember the sizes right now!

Good Luck
Pete