Winter Advice

BrotherBart said:

And the questions are?

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From the very top

Just seeing if anyone has any pointers or opinions on things that could help me this winter. I don't care about your EPA stove, I prefer old school.

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- 3 pre-EPA stoves? Split more wood.
- Make sure the other stoves are installed with enough clearance to combustibles and according to their hearth requirements. If they are not UL listed (no tag on stove) look for clearances of unlisted stoves.
- Tell your home insurance about the stoves and ask if an inspection is required. Do the same with your local code authority.
- Split more wood.
- Buy a chimney brush and poles or a Sooteater and clean your flues regularly.
- Make sure your shed holds about 10 cords. You may need as much for 3 pre-EPA stoves.
- Season your oak at least for another year. Get more dry wood.
- If in doubt have a certified sweep check your chimney installations: http://www.csia.org/search Better do it in any case.
- Use plenty of kindling and either newspaper or an approved firestarter (e. g. Supercedar) to light your fires. Don't use any flammable liquids for that!
- Did I mention you will need a lot of seasoned wood?

Good luck.

Put a gasket in the top of that boxwood stove and glue it shut (along with the pot inserts) with stove cement. It works nicely to load wood (a long as you don't open it too far and it falls off! Glue it shut.) but lets in way too much air. Before you add that gasket put a piece of 1/4 inch sheet steel or thicker in the top fo the stove to act as a baffle. Just measure the width, (there is a place where you can see that a baffle would sit nicely) and have it cut to about 2/3's the depth of the stove. This would fit toward the back of the stove at least a few inches below the top. A baffle will make the fire and smoke travel a longer path before it leaves the stove, giving more time to transfer the heat into the room as well as more time and heat to burn up the volatile gasses and more time between loads (big difference in burn times). Ceramic insulation on top of that new baffle would really get it to burn even more smoke too. Put a gasket around the top and sides of the door as well. Check the clearance to the ash pan/air inlet and file the door hinge pins to make it fit properly. Just a little at a time until they both operate without dragging but you've closed it up as much as possible. Those stoves like to run away due to the multitude of air leaks they come from the factory with but those leaks can be mostly contained with just a little due diligence. Use a damper in the flue pipe as well, on all your stoves. On the boxwood after the stove gets going you'll want to damn near close it off as the stove will do its best to draft like a jet engine. the pipe damper is really the control on that stove, though it's job is lessened somewhat with the sealing of the firebox.

Seeing as how the only thing in your shop that is wood is the rafters and eaves I'd be careful to locate the stove further from the eaves (think central to the building) and use the approved ceiling pass through box instead of the wood. The wood may work for a while but the heat will cause the wood to decay in a way that brings the combustion temperature down to the point where it will certainly catch fire. No doubt in my mind about that. I hate to say you have to patch the roof but...Or you could go up and out the wall at least 3 feet below the center of the eaves (and then up above the peak (depending on your local codes) to remove the possibility of starting the one thing in the building that can catch fire on fire. It's really not that hard to put a thimble in a concrete block wall at all. Does that stove have firebricks in it? It looks like it should and they will help it to retain/transfer heat and burn longer as well. Also being a radiant stove it will spend too much time heating that concrete wall behind it and not the room which will cause the wall to crumble over time and freeze your butt off as well when you're out there.

A baffle would work well in the Old Mill stove as well if it doesn't have one already. I wonder if the "Mill" on the front is the famous "Old Mill" in Guilford County, NC? I used to live only a minute away from there, and that sure is what it looks like. Cool stove!

The woodshed looks good but you might think about putting some vents in the rear bottom and top to help it not retain moisture and slow the seasoning process. No sense loading wood in there if it rots the stuff in the bottom at the back.

As for starting fires a propane torch sure comes in handy and doesn't make nearly as much smoke as burning paper will, plus it lights faster and doesn't stink. I used to start my shop stove like that as it wasn't used much but needed instantly when it was. Obviously the normal practices to stay safe when using a torch are necessary, but the safety Sallys might not like it anyway. Three wood stoves will burn quite a bit of wood no matter how "efficient" they are. But hey, chopping wood is a great workout and is probably the most manly form of meditation available. Most people pay to go to a gym and get on some weird machine where they watch tv for a couple hours. That's no fun. I recommend you try to run the Old Mill stove first and foremost and get used to it's quirks. Stay close by and get yourself a C02 fire extinguisher or 2. Frankly I'd put the shop stove inside and the boxwood stove outside. I like the look of the boxwood stoves but I don't trust them myself. I am a bit biased against Chinese anything made from metal though as my experiences have shown them to produce poor quality metals. Really I'd toss the boxwood outside in the shop or get rid of it. Just look at how the front legs mount and you'll see what I mean.

Good luck with everything. Sorry for the long rambling post but I wanted to discuss a little more than the proper installation (which is important but misses the point), and how your gonna burn a gazillion cords of wood and should instead go out and spend 12 grand all at once on 3 stoves and "professional" installation. Don't mind the trolls though, ignore them and move on. I hope to hear how things are coming along when the time comes to crank up a stove or two so keep in touch.

Well If that's the best place in the shop that's just how it is, I understand that. In that case a good heat shield will help to keep the wall from sapping the heat away. Just use a piece of sheet metal and space it out from the wall (and up off the floor) about an inch with ceramic spacers (although I'm not sure using a block wall if using ceramic spacers matters so much, probably better anyways though and goes well with the idea of overdoing things so there is no chance it won't meet code). As for the rafters, it may work most times but it doesn't work everytime. Imagine that pipe glowing red from a chimney fire, it wouldn't be a good thing at all, especially in a home that's had a stove pipe ran that way for a few years. There is a process, the name of which has slipped my mind, that causes wood to ignite at temperatures as low as 170 degrees. It happens due to exposure to heat over time. The wood slowly off gasses the sap contained within, it's similar to making charcoal but without the volatile gasses coming out under high heat it doesn't blacken the wood or effect it structurally as much. Although one knot in the wrong place could mean a fire before this process ever occurs, and pine of course is the fire log of the forest, it's full of sap. If your cool with keeping it like that at least give it a good look and see that there's no sap wood or knots close by.

Also since the Old Mill stove is in the house and will be the main stove it would be wise to put a ceramic insulator of some sort on top off the baffle to stop it from transferring heat through it and out the chimney. It would be cheaper (if you had to buy wood) and be less work as more heat getting into the house means less wood.

I just paid $19 dollars for the Rutland fire bricks, 6 to a box. This is the third of such boxes and I'm fairly certain I am two bricks short of what I need for to replace the old fire bricks, plus a few more to make sides for my baffle so I'm looking at spending close to $80 on fire bricks. Pretty stupid but at least I bought them over 6 months time so it hasn't been one big hit.

Thanks bholler. I've seen it firsthand, after the fact. The house I moved into is a log cabin, built with pine logs around 8 inches, debarked and set with chinking in between. The mantle is not that old but when I moved in there was a center support that had caught fire (looks like it smoldered). an area around 3 inches square was gone and the area around that had turned to charcoal about an inch deep. It didn't appear that it had been touched either, and the homeowner was obviously unaware when I pointed it out. It has been removed (too close for clearance issues to the old stove). I'm thinking now I should replace the entire thing. The hearth is just an oak log (14 inches wide or so) split down the middle and a flat was made on the bottom. It's probably 8 inches thick. The supports are poplar, and I now suspect the side supports are likely in bad shape. I think I'll take it down just in case. That mantle log sure will burn good, I know that. Gotta run it by the landlord first but a large cedar (18 inches?) fell out back during a big ice storm this past winter so I have a good replacement ready and waiting pretty much. LOL, just realized a friend of mine owes me a favor since I put fuel pumps in both his vans ('94 Chevy short box and a 2005 Chrysler). Looks like time for an upgrade.

Everyone is smarter than the guy they ask to do a job they don't know how to do themselves. It's like a curse on the mechanically inclined.

zaroot86 said:

The exterior class A pipe is getting another section added, to raise it 36" higher.
The wood box out inside has two metal angle clips that are connected to the pipe, I have 2" spacers holding the wood off the chimney.
The truck is just parked there for now, I wouldn't fire up a stove with a $400 super swamper tires sitting 3' away.

Thank you all for the updates and advice, I will utilize all of your knowledge. And yes, I need more wood!

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If your wood is not so seasoned try to get some bio-bricks or hot bricks to mix in with the wood.They burn so hot it'll get the not so seasoned wood going well.