Avalon Olympic insert advice please ?

Welcome to the forum!

Not sure if this particular insert is a current model or old, but sooner or later someone with an Avalon Olympic will chime in, I am sure. If you modify your post to reflect that you are looking for advice on that particular insert, you will likely get more hits.

In any case, check in your manual to see if you have a secondary combustion air supply to your stove and/or if it is EPA certified. If so, then you will want to start your fire with primary air only (i.e. lots of air initially). Then, when your stove top gets up to about 500 degrees F, slowly over a period of 30 minutes or so reduce the primary air which will also increase the secondary air. This will slow the burn down to extend the temperature over a longer period of time, and also result in the cleanest burn with the least smoke and less chance of creosote forming in your chimney. As you get more experienced, you might find that you can shut the primary air down faster, or if your wood is not dry enough, it may take longer. You'll know you have secondary combustion when the flames are purplish and coming from the top or the middle of the stove.

As far as how many splits to put in, start small. You need a minimum of three splits, and four is better. Make them small splits in the beginning as you learn your stove. Reload when the stove top temperature falls to about 300 degrees F and you have just coals. As you gain experience, you might re-load earlier and hotter, but I wouldn't do that yet.

If you don't already have a stove top thermometer, you'll want to get one from your local hearth store.

Good luck with your insert, and take it slow.

This may be a good place to to start, it's a free download that covers the basics of wood burning.

https://www03.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/catalog/productDetail.cfm?csid=1&cat=3&itm=94&lang=en&fr=1261170544892

Also look around for a link to the video from Vanessa, it's here somewhere. I encourage you to do lots of reading on this website there is so much good info here. If i find the video I will come back and edit this post.

Cheers and congrats on the new home.

'bert

Grab a thermometer from Rutland and put it on the stovetop. This will help you burn your stove a little better. I had the Olympic...I miss it badly but I simply could not have 2 woodstoves in this time of my life. But my father in law has one and the secondary burns are very impressive, actually the nicest I have seen so far. You can surely load 3 splits, east to west preferably. Always open the top bypass damper before you load her up, this will open up the stove and stop an puffbacks that could happen when opening the door. After the bypass is open, open the door and load 2 or 3 splits, char the wood and shut her down to about 15-20% open, pulling out the main air adjustment. This is too be done with a good bed of coals of course. Initially you want to heat up that stove with smaller pieces to get it to around 500-550F, having the primary air adjustment all the way in during that first burn of the morning/day.

This stove is simply remarkable, one of the best I have seen and I have been envious of many stoves....my name is JFK and I am a wood stove addict..

Enjoy!

I have the olympic and am very happy with it. do exactly how jfk explained and you should have no problems. make sure you get a temp gauge, when it gets goin close the bypass and choke er down. this stove cruises and i'm sure you will be very happy when you get use to it. might want to get the chimney swept if you have'nt already since it's a new house. Happy New Years everyone!!