From an old smoke dragon to an ESW 30-NC

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jreed

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Jan 13, 2010
69
MD
Just replaced my old kodiak wood stove with a 30-NC. The stove is located in my basement and I rely on the air to move upstairs. This has served me well in the past. My stove sits at the bottom of my basement steps. What Ive noticed with the 30-NC is that the air doesnt move like it used to with the old kodiak. I did purchase the large room fan which seems to blow more than my old fan so Im not sure what the problem is.

One odd thing I notice is that there is a 5* difference between the temperature in the top of stairwell and the room it joins to. It's like the air isnt moving from the stairwell into the room like it did with the Kodiak.
 
Was the old stove about the same size or bigger?
 
We've burned it for 2 days now. Seems to heat the basement nicely....just can't get that air moved enough.
 
My experience with the 30 and large blower is that it blows the air straight across the room instead of rising near the stove. Doing that it isn't gonna let heat rise up the stairs. Turn off the blower and see what happens.
 
You blowing air down the steps or up?
 
BrotherBart, good advice....Ill try that. Does the blower that came with it work any better for this purpose?

hotcoals....trying to get air upstairs.
 
jreed said:
BrotherBart, good advice....Ill try that. Does the blower that came with it work any better for this purpose?

hotcoals....trying to get air upstairs.
Click to expand...

I understand that. Some guys have decent results blowing colder air down the steps to force hotter air up.
Sort of sets up a exchange.
I bet some can explain it better.
Try no fan like was said just for giggles.
 
Heat was born to rise. Let it do what it does. The blower just puts it somewhere else in the basement instead of letting it rise naturally. Like the Kodiak did.
 
Gotcha.

I did have a small fan the kodiak but no where near as powerful as the englander. Ill give it a shot. Thanks all for the advice!
 
With that variable control on the large room air blower you can experiment with really slow speeds also to find the sweet spot if needed.
 
The other option is if you have any means of sucking air from above into the basement from another location than the stairway it would help to start a circulation of air throughout the house pulling cold and heavy into the basement and replacing it with hot and light.

I, too, replaced my old VC Defiant with a 30 last year and found it to not be better with regards to it's ability to heat my space(The Defiant is a big heater) but it does at least an equal job in a safer, more efficient manner. Burn times may be a little longer with the 30 although that certainly could attributed to better wood. The predictability is no comparison. A "set it and forget it" Vs. "is this thing going to go nuclear again" comparison.
 
Last edited:
LOL, Ive definitely noticed the predictability. and efficiency. Im not loading as often and the loads are much smaller. I can also throw a few pieces on in the morning and away it goes. With the old kodiak, it would be cold to the touch by morning.
 
How hot are you getting the 30? With no fan on, the top should be in the 550 -650 or slightly more temp range. ( 750 won't hurt it but I am a bit leary at that temp but man does it crank then) That's where it will really crank out the heat, depending on your fuel couple hours maybe of that and it will slide down to the 400 + range for a few more then to around 250+ in the coaling stage. 250 or less you can add more fuel if you want. Takes a pretty long time to burn the coals down, I open up the air to max at that point if I am around.
 
Blow the cold air on an angle down the stairs. I had the same exact problem and I tried to:

push the hot air from down stars to up, no good

pull the hot air from hooks in door way at top of stairs, sorta good

from reading here, i pushed the cold air down at floor level, AWESOME!

I rigged up a wire from the fan handle to a hook and angle the fan on the same plane as the stairs.
 
BrotherBart said:
With that variable control on the large room air blower you can experiment with really slow speeds
Click to expand...
That has been the trick for me in the basement, move the air very slow so it has its own natural ability to rise.

Todd
 
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