I have been burning some really hard, primo oak. It had been stacked and largely forgotten back in my woods for at least three years. I scraped off about an inch of punk/rot on many of the splits and found rock hard and heavy core wood. When I did some fresh splits I got a Moisture content of 17%. This is what I have been burning for the past couple of weeks.
At bed time (2300 or so) I load of the stove with several new splits on top of hot coals or whatever is still in the stove. Usually the griddle temp is around 400-450 at that point. I set the damper into horizontal burn and set the thermostat so that the flap is just touching the back of the stove. And I go to bed.
The next morning (say around 0800) will sometimes have a near cold stove with nothing but ashes. Other mornings will have some really big coals or perhaps a nearly intact split left over. This morning when I got up the stove had a 400* griddle temp and the box was half full of well charred glowing red hot splits.
With the same wood from the same tree and identical burning conditions, The splits are pretty much all the same size. And, FWIW, two nights ago I put in a huge split that barely fit in through the doors of the stove, then topped it off with several other large splits. I figured it would definitely give me a good overnight burn. NOT! Nothing but fine ash in the morning.
I don't understand the large differences in the overnight burn from one night to the next.
Any thoughts?
At bed time (2300 or so) I load of the stove with several new splits on top of hot coals or whatever is still in the stove. Usually the griddle temp is around 400-450 at that point. I set the damper into horizontal burn and set the thermostat so that the flap is just touching the back of the stove. And I go to bed.
The next morning (say around 0800) will sometimes have a near cold stove with nothing but ashes. Other mornings will have some really big coals or perhaps a nearly intact split left over. This morning when I got up the stove had a 400* griddle temp and the box was half full of well charred glowing red hot splits.
With the same wood from the same tree and identical burning conditions, The splits are pretty much all the same size. And, FWIW, two nights ago I put in a huge split that barely fit in through the doors of the stove, then topped it off with several other large splits. I figured it would definitely give me a good overnight burn. NOT! Nothing but fine ash in the morning.
I don't understand the large differences in the overnight burn from one night to the next.
Any thoughts?
