Dollar bill test. How tight?

Not like the bottom sweeper on an entrance door to your house.
You should get two pieces when you are done with the test.

I say it depends on the stove and the draft. The tighter, the better - but tight enough is good enough in most cases. Since stoves are negative pressure appliances, small cracks suck in as opposed to leaking smoke. So, unless this small amount disrupts the combustion process or makes the stove unable to be controlled, it is not a biggie.

How thick is a dollar bill?

Webmaster said:

I say it depends on the stove and the draft. The tighter, the better - but tight enough is good enough in most cases. Since stoves are negative pressure appliances, small cracks suck in as opposed to leaking smoke. So, unless this small amount disrupts the combustion process or makes the stove unable to be controlled, it is not a biggie.

How thick is a dollar bill?

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2.61 inches wide and 6.14 inches long; they are .0043 inches thick and weigh 1 gram

HomeFire......
Well, it is like I have said before. It is amazing what you will learn on Herath.com!

DavidV said:

If I do the dollar bill test on the stove door, how tight should it grab the dollar. Shoudl I be able to slide the dollar out or not?

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Note, most of the below comes not from looking at stove gaskets but at other gaskets on engines and all sorts of other things. The details might differ, but I'd be surprised if the general concepts changed....

I'm not the expert, but I would expect it to depend somewhat on how "squishy" the gasket is. You are basically trying t oensure that the door closes tightly enough that there isn't airflow around it. That doesn't require crushing pressure, and for many gaskets that might not even be desirable. Remember that we are not trying to restrain high pressures, this isn't like the head gasket on an engine, but more like the door on your fridge. You just need to squeeze it enough that the air doesn't get through.

I would look at it as a judgement call, and look at how compressible the gasket material appears to be and whether it is worn out looking or not. If the gasket seems fairly springy, I would accept a heavy drag. OTOH if the gasket looks ancient and crusted with creosote that has permanently molded the shape of the opening into it, I'd look for more resistance.

I would also look at how the door felt when I was closing and latching it. Certainly if there is any slop or rattle when the door is latched you have a problem. A door that closes firmly, and feels like the latch is squeezing it down onto a seal is more likely to be OK.

A visual inspection will also probably help. The sealing surface on the opening should be smooth, without obvious gaps or irregularities. The gasket should look reasonably good - any impressions from the opening should be clean and consistent all the way around, there shouldn't be any gaps or missing spots in the gasket material, the material shouldn't be crumbly and degraded looking, and so on. Unless brand new it probably won't be pristine, but it shouldn't look like something out of the tar pit either. I would also be suspicious if I saw any unusual streaks or shadows inside or outside the opening or on the door surface. that looked like there was different heating in the areas around the door If there's either a streak of soot or a streak where the soot is burned away that starts at the gasket, that would suggest to me that there is a leak at that point, or possibly that point is sealing and the rest of the opening isn't.

Gooserider