Too much draft coming from the insert...

I had my installer shove some Roxul insulation inside of my fireplace ash dump door that the insert sat on top of. My installer wasn't going to but I made sure he did. My ash pit access door is on the outside of the chimney and I knew it would make my room colder without being blocked off.

Eugene,

I have a similar issue and my setup seems to be similar to yours. I do not have a block off plate and after a while, I can feel cold air coming from around the blower assembly and also from inside the stove itself.

I asked a question about it a few weeks back, so please see this thread:


A couple of points:
- Keeping the fire going all the time will prevent a backdraft but in my case it's not practical since I'm gone 12+ hours a day and the stove is a secondary heating source (I have a high efficiency nat gas furnace)
- Insulate with some roxul or build a block-off plate, which I plan to do in the summer.

Another thing that works for me (as a temporary solution!) is keeping the door slightly open when the stove is not in use. This obviously is going to send some heated air outside the house which is counter-intuitive but probably still better than having a serious downdraft.

As to getting lots of smoke in the room, try "reversing" the draft by sticking a piece of lit news paper as far as you can up the flue. In my case that is always enough heat to give me the right draft to start a fire.

Hope that helps.

There are several possible sources for that draft, it could be a genuine exterior air leak on the outside of the liner or it could be a convective current down the same space. Those are easily eliminated with a block off plate, but certain homes (e.g. mine) have a natural downdraft in the liner if the fire is not lit. It is not possible to completely close the air supply on a EPA stove, so there will always be some air coming out the air inlet. Most homes don't have this problem, they simply lose hot air up the liner, in fact even with photographs, I couldn't convince some people here that it was possible at all. Initially, I would plug my liner with a rag at the end of burning season (with a note in the firebox to remind me), but later I modified my air supply to allow me to completely close the air.

TE

Wow great question , I was sitting in front of my Osburn today while the kindling was getting going and I felt cold air coming from the blower , I was like what the hell, I pulled off my surround and felt around my liner and felt warm air as the liner was warming up . I have Roxul around the back and sides of the insert and stuffed up in the smoke shelf as a block off plate, but I still felt cold air coming out of the louvers from the blower , I pulled the blower off and still felt cold air , I chalked it up to I need to insulate the crawl space under the insert but I'm not sure that will fix it .

You could be feeling cold air being used from the room at floor level, it will feel quite cold since it is rushing to the warmer stove, the air intake is in that area on most inserts.

mellow said:

You could be feeling cold air being used from the room at floor level, it will feel quite cold since it is rushing to the warmer stove, the air intake is in that area on most inserts.

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Im an idiot!