A2,
Sorry you're having such a rough go with your insert. Something has got to be wrong with your setup if you can't heat a house of that size with a 550. What was your old unit? I had a Vermont Castings Insert that projected out from the fireplace, so it had a lot more iron "in the room" radiating heat as well as the fan. We used it for several years until we added a large edition to the house and the beat up old VC could not keep up with heating roughly 1500 sq feet.
I got a lot of excellent info from the tips and tricks thread. There was also a link somewhere in that thread where someone details their best method for starting a fire, and more importantly what they did to keep it running well and load it up for the night time burn. His ideas helped me learn this stove real quick and I've been very happy with heat output I get.
Our wood isn't perfectly seasoned and dry, so I use 2 Envi blocks to build a platform (with approx 12-16 inches in between them) for my splits every AM. We run it all day like that.
Around 10:00PM I rake all the hot coals forward, I throw a nice big split into the hollow in the back and then load it up for the night. I have never had a night that I didn't have a nice bed of coals waiting for me in the AM.
I did end up insulating around the stove pipe with a layer of Roxul, and that really forced the heat to the surround so it radiates quite a bit of heat on it's own. It also got the chimney nice and warm!
Most mornings the chimney is still radiating a ton of heat into the room.
I'd also suggest that you look at whatever convection patterns you have in your house since the new stove. They're probably different than your old stove's patterns. I've always used 1 small 6" fan to move air around, but with the new insert I had to move it a few feet and it made a big difference.
Lastly, this site is full of really knowledgeable, helpful people. Post up some more info about your situation, keep an open mind and maybe they can help you get better results.
Jon
Thanks for the support, Jon. Had I come across this thread before making the purchase, there is no way I would have bought this unit.
My old insert was fit very snug into my fireplace opening, and very little of it stuck out into the room. It may have been a Vermont Castings, but since it was so old, it was hard to tell. Over the years of use, I/we did many upgrades including an insulating blanket around the stove pipe which was the final step in making it such a great unit for me, overall. I was chucking a lot of wood into it's massive firebox though. The is the one and ONLY good thing about this Jotul Rockland 550...I am burning way so much less wood than I could ever really even imagine.
From what the installer (toolshed of a guy), and salesman (indifferent to say the least) have checked out, all is set up properly now. I should say I am not new to heating with wood. I have heated over the years in different locations for about the equivalent of 15 years or so. I am having no problem starting the fire, and getting the unit extremely hot over the course of an hour. I do stoke it with a "V" pattern on the bottom after raking the coals to the sides and from the back of the unit. Then I put a reverse "V" on top of the initial restarter kindling/wood. If need be, I use a couple of sticks of fatwood to help start everything back up. Then I lay one or two larger pieces (3-5 inch splits) across the "V" and continue to build from there as everything heats up and burns hot. I keep the door propped open just a tad, and then when it is too hot to the touch, or I know it is all heated up, I close the door, but keep the damper all the way open for a while longer, like up to an hour, and keep adding fuel.
I chock it as full as I can for the night and dampen it down to about 1/4 or so shut, and at times, all the way shut. When I wake up about 5 AM, there is a nice bed of coals, and I start it back up for the day since I leave around 6 AM for work. It should be noted that even though my brick and the unit is warm to the touch when I wake up and check it out in the morning, my house is usually in the high 50s, from being in the mid to high 60s before going to bed. It heats the house fairly quickly to a couple or four degrees warmer within an hour, but to get any type of real heat out of it, there is no way. I am not retired and don't have another to check out the fire throughout the day while I am at work.
I do get home somewhere between 4-6 PM so I understand and have no problem with me coming home to a cold house (56-58 degrees) at the end of the day. My main complaint is that it never really warms my house back up again as my old insert did. In fact, I would have to sometimes throw the covers off in the back bedroom where I sleep because it got nice and toasty in my house overnight. There are sometimes in the middle of the night when it does feel as if my house is nice and warm, something one can just sense, and there is good heat output, but whenever I get up and check it out, all is about the same, and I add some more fuel to the fire.
All external floor fans have served to do with this insert is make my house colder. I have ceiling fans that I have used for all the years I am burning 24/7 with this set up, and at times, a floor fan in different places to help direct the air into the other parts of my house. I have even pointed the floor fan at the insert from the adjoining room to force the cold air from the floor into the unit so that more air can be warmed up and recirculated. Again, all this really serves to do is make everything colder.
So hindsight is 20/20 and in retrospect, I should have just searched around and found some sort of replacement fans for my old insert, like the friend I sold it too did, and gone about my business. I do find this forum and the people who post up on it very very helpful, and have given me ideas and tricks to try in order to maximize the little this thing has to offer and failed to deliver. Keep the ideas coming, and I will keep researching it out and tweaking. I will probably invest in a stove pipe insulating blanket again after this burning season is over. Thanks again! Jon...
P.S. One flaw that I forgot to put out there and ask is that there is a three inch gap at the bottom of this unit from each side of my fireplace box walls. Even with my continued prodding about maybe this one is too small and they mismeasured or misordered or misdelivered, they tell me that all is OK and this spacing doesn't matter and shouldn't effect the output and performance of the insert. My gut begs to differ and I am about to stuff a bunch of insulation in between just to check it out and make sure, including laying some insulation right on top of the unit, then putting the surrounds back on. Thought?