Help me with my Harman TL300

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bigbear

Member
Jan 3, 2010
30
PA
Hey Guys,

I just signed up today so forgive me if this has been posted before. I bought my first house this summer and had a Harman TL300 put in this fall. The gas company doesn't need any more of my money...Anyhow, I've been burning pretty much non stop since late October and now that its cold, daytime highs in the teens, my stove is eating wood like crazy!! I think I'm using almost a complete face cord of seasoned beech and hard maple per week to heat a 15 year old 2200 (1100 ft on each floor) square foot ranch home, and its not over 70 degrees upstairs. The stove is in the partially exposed walkout basement at the one of the house. The only other thing in the basement is the staircase leading to the upstairs about 1/3 of the way across the room. In order to at least get temps in the mid to high 60's upstairs I must keep the front draft control at the middle notch when the afterburn kicks in. I usually load the stove up around 1030 over a good bed of coals, let it catch good and get in afterburn, then close the front draft to the middle, and by morning I have just enough coals to get it going again. I would love to close the front control, more but its too cold upstairs to do it. I have a fan in the staircase to blow heat upstairs and another fan in the basement to help push the heat to the opposite end of the house. I cut 12, 4"by 12" floor registers in the floor upstairs to help as well. My bedroom which is at the opposite end of the house from the stove will be in the high 50's when I get up in the morning. I don't like it hot upstairs, but after working outside all day, everday, it feels nice to be warm. Am I missing something or does everything sound ok.

Thanks for any advice!
Brandon
 
bigbear said:
Hey Guys,

I just signed up today so forgive me if this has been posted before. I bought my first this summer and had a Harman TL300 put in this fall. The gas company doesn't need any more of my money...Anyhow, I've been burning pretty much non stop since late October and now that its cold, daytime highs in the teens, my stove is eating wood like crazy!! I think I'm using almost a complete face cord of seasoned beech and hard maple per week to heat a 15 year old 2200 (1100 ft on each floor) square foot ranch home, and its not over 70 degrees upstairs. The stove is in the partially exposed walkout basement at the one of the house. The only other thing in the basement is the staircase leading to the upstairs about 1/3 of the way across the room. In order to at least get temps in the mid to high 60's upstairs I must keep the front draft control at the middle notch when the afterburn kicks in. I usually load the stove up around 1030 over a good bed of coals, let it catch good and get in afterburn, then close the front draft to the middle, and by morning I have just enough coals to get it going again. I would love to close the front control, more but its too cold upstairs to do it. I have a fan in the staircase to blow heat upstairs and another fan in the basement to help push the heat to the opposite end of the house. I cut 12, 4"by 12" floor registers in the floor upstairs to help as well. My bedroom which is at the opposite end of the house from the stove will be in the high 50's when I get up in the morning. I don't like it hot upstairs, but after working outside all day, everday, it feels nice to be warm. Am I missing something or does everything sound ok.

Thanks for any advice!
Brandon
Click to expand...

Hi Brandon.

I have the Harmon Oakwood and it uses about the same amount of wood with the air intake lever in the middle of the scale. I fill it to the top with red fir or tamarack at 11:00 pm and have to load it again around 4:00am. When the outside temp is around 20 our 1700 SF single level house is 65 to 70 if I tend the fire every 5 to 6 hours. I connected a 500 CFM fan to some 8" duct to push heated air into the main living space, it really helps. Another option is to push air with a duct fan into the heated room, you will need to play around with the system so don't bolt anything down until your are sure that it works.
I heated a 3500 SF house in BC Canada with a small Regency stove and installed a small furnace fan (about 2000 CFM) because the heat just stayed in the basement. The fan pushed the heat out of the wood stove room and effectively heated the whole house. I think a HVAC person could tell you what the problem is, or you could get one of those laser temperature readers to see where your heat is going, or not.
The Harmon Oakwood instructions recommend using a bed of coal to get those long burn times- I didn't know that even though I did tons of research prior to purchasing.
Good luck, you will be warmer soon.
 
bigbear said:
Hey Guys,

I just signed up today so forgive me if this has been posted before. I bought my first this summer and had a Harman TL300 put in this fall. The gas company doesn't need any more of my money...Anyhow, I've been burning pretty much non stop since late October and now that its cold, daytime highs in the teens, my stove is eating wood like crazy!! I think I'm using almost a complete face cord of seasoned beech and hard maple per week to heat a 15 year old 2200 (1100 ft on each floor) square foot ranch home, and its not over 70 degrees upstairs. The stove is in the partially exposed walkout basement at the one of the house. The only other thing in the basement is the staircase leading to the upstairs about 1/3 of the way across the room. In order to at least get temps in the mid to high 60's upstairs I must keep the front draft control at the middle notch when the afterburn kicks in. I usually load the stove up around 1030 over a good bed of coals, let it catch good and get in afterburn, then close the front draft to the middle, and by morning I have just enough coals to get it going again. I would love to close the front control, more but its too cold upstairs to do it. I have a fan in the staircase to blow heat upstairs and another fan in the basement to help push the heat to the opposite end of the house. I cut 12, 4"by 12" floor registers in the floor upstairs to help as well. My bedroom which is at the opposite end of the house from the stove will be in the high 50's when I get up in the morning. I don't like it hot upstairs, but after working outside all day, everday, it feels nice to be warm. Am I missing something or does everything sound ok.

Thanks for any advice!
Brandon
Click to expand...

Brandon, I don't know where you are in PA, but in the Bucks County area it has been 10-15° colder than usually for the past 2-3 weeks with a lot of wind over the past two weeks. After a slow start to the winter the last three weeks have really made up for it as I have been blowing through wood.
 
Thanks guys. A family member suggested building a collector box, sorry if thats the wrong term, above the stove and putting a small fan in it like was suggested above into some duct and running to my registers in each room that additional heat is desired. From what I can gather, that is probably the best route for me to go. If I get too much heat upstairs I can always close the registers. I sure don't have that problem now.
 
A month ago I purchased a TL300 to replace my Hearthstone catalytic (burned out) stove. I am very impressed with it. I use the same setup you have, stove in 600 sqft basement, registers/ open stairway to upstairs, 1200 sqft. I burn this stove hot with seasoned oak wood, 85degree basement, 75 upstairs. Do you have the basement door open? That is where most of my heat travels. Registers will not transfer enough heat by natural flow.
 
My basement door opens into the garage and I only open that if some smoke escapes from the wood stove. After cutting a hole in the floor for a vent the cool air descended through the floor vent to the basement, this was not what I had planned especially when temps in the basement are 110 to 120 deg F. So I put in one 8" 500 CFM duct fan with reducers to fit on a 6" duct. The duct fan is directly over the stove and pushes the heated air into the family room which is where we spend most of our time. Caution: the duct fan should not be exposed to temperatures over 130 or 140 deg. F. Next year I will install a cold air return duct and another fan if needed. I would prefer a small furnace fan over the duct fan so I can install a filtering system.
In my previous house I had to install a small furnace fan to push heated air upstairs because the heated air would fill the basement but would not go up the open stairway.
On another note- Be very careful when you clean the combustion package of your TL300. I used a soft bristle upholstery attachment on the vacuum and that was a bit too much for the high temperature foam. The holes in the combustion package need to be clean, I vacuumed the holes several times per heating season. I think your TL300 has an access panel on the back so the combustion package can be removed and cleaned, you may want to do this once a year. Be very careful, this material is VERY fragile. There is a thin 1 inch thick layer of foam on the front bottom of the combustion package, don't touch it, it will break!
Hope this helps.
 
bigbear said:
Hey Guys,

I just signed up today so forgive me if this has been posted before. I bought my first house this summer and had a Harman TL300 put in this fall. The gas company doesn't need any more of my money...Anyhow, I've been burning pretty much non stop since late October and now that its cold, daytime highs in the teens, my stove is eating wood like crazy!! I think I'm using almost a complete face cord of seasoned beech and hard maple per week to heat a 15 year old 2200 (1100 ft on each floor) square foot ranch home, and its not over 70 degrees upstairs. The stove is in the partially exposed walkout basement at the one of the house. The only other thing in the basement is the staircase leading to the upstairs about 1/3 of the way across the room. In order to at least get temps in the mid to high 60's upstairs I must keep the front draft control at the middle notch when the afterburn kicks in. I usually load the stove up around 1030 over a good bed of coals, let it catch good and get in afterburn, then close the front draft to the middle, and by morning I have just enough coals to get it going again. I would love to close the front control, more but its too cold upstairs to do it. I have a fan in the staircase to blow heat upstairs and another fan in the basement to help push the heat to the opposite end of the house. I cut 12, 4"by 12" floor registers in the floor upstairs to help as well. My bedroom which is at the opposite end of the house from the stove will be in the high 50's when I get up in the morning. I don't like it hot upstairs, but after working outside all day, everday, it feels nice to be warm. Am I missing something or does everything sound ok.

Thanks for any advice!
Brandon
Click to expand...

you have fans and registers in the house, but do you have factory blower on the stove?
 
The Oakwood has the same firebox configuration but its a little smaller, the Oakwood does not come with an optional blower on the stove. I've had blowers before and used them when it was very cold out. I found that the blower helped pull cool air down from upstairs and allow a hotter fire because it dispersed the heat away from the stove. Before you order the blower you may want to take a stick of incense (or something that smokes) and hold it near all of your floor vents just to be sure the air flow is going in the right direction. In my previous tri level house I had to create a system that heated the house- that included a small furnace blower that pulled air down through 2 floor vents that were in the floor above the room with the wood stove and pushed heated air through the basement and up the open stairway. I had to have a cold air return system or the heat just stayed in the basement. The wood stove room lost heat through the concrete walls so I put up heavy steel panels(floor to ceiling) to direct the heat toward the furnace blower, not pretty but effective. One steel panel was hinged so I could load the stove. If you record the temperatures at the floor vents or anywhere you can think of you will see the changes in temperature when you make a modification. For example: One steel panel gave me a 3 degree room temperature increase upstairs.
 
I am in my second season with the TL-300 and it continues to amaze me. Im heating a small house under renovation About 1150 Sq feet. I have to keep the TL-300 on the lowest setting or ill roast. THe house is not even insulated yet .0 insulation,getting ready to blow cellulose in the walls.
Once i insulate ill have to open the windows to let the heat out. I have the optional blower and it really helps disperse the heat. Saving a fortune in Gas bills.
 
Grateful- What Hi-temp foam are you talking about? Would that be on the outside of the firebrick reburn system? And why would that need to be cleaned? The coals cover the botton reburn holes, and I like to fire 24/7. How often do I need to clean out those holes? I am new to this stove model and appreciate this thread. This stove is a serious heater and I am finding that I get more btu's from the same amount of wood than I ever did with any other stove. One thing, us guys in PA have better wood choices, I only burn dry seasoned oak and a little ash. I have an excellent draft and this stove will overfire for me on the middle draft notch (when fully loaded with dry oak wood) the andirons get red hot. I burn in 2nd notch form left. When fire is down in morning I reload & open ashpan door for 1-2min. Wow, don't want to walk away with that thing open, it will burn the house down.
 
Thanks for suggestions guys and to answer a couple questions. My stove does have a blower, which I have been running. I keep my stairway door open as well. I have since tried putting a small fan in my upstairs directly over one of my floor registers to blow down to the basement as a form of a cold air return. Seems to have made a small difference. I would bet if I had another setup like this it would work even better. I think the next step I'm gonig to try is mounting a fan off the floor joists close to the stove because obviously thats where most of the heat is trapped and hopefully I'll be able to blow some heat to the other end of the house where I want it.
 
The high temperature foam is referred to as the combustion package, it is about 14" wide, 12" high and 8" deep and is removed via the back panel. Open the front door and the high temp foam is in the back of the stove behind the fire brick, you will see some small holes in the foam, vacuum the holes very carefully if they appear plugged. I remove the fire brick every 2 months and clean the entire inside of the stove. You may not need to clean that often due to the low resin content of your wood. I removed the combustion package a few weeks ago and it was loaded with ash after 6 months of burning. I suggest you wait until summer to remove the entire package, or wait until you have a burning issue. Make sure the small holes in the front of the package are clear. Harmon does not address cleaning the combustion package in the operating manual for obvious reasons- the foam is almost to fragile to touch.
 
Do you think it would be advisable to vac the firebox side of the combustion package then poke a thin pencil or nail in the holes to make sure that they are open and not even worry about cleaning the insulation side? Last night we had a warmer 50° night; I filled stove at 9, this morning at 6 the house is 80° and the stove is still half full of wood. I really like the tl300. It gets twice the heat out of my wood that my last stove got.
P.S. I have an uncle in Eastern Wa. north of the Grand Coulee dam along the river on the edge of the res toward omak. Is that close to you?
 
You can vacuum the firebox side of the combustion package if it needs cleaning, do not poke anything in the holes and be extremely careful with the vacuum. The high temp foam will disintegrate if you are too aggressive. Just take a look in there, if the holes are covered with ash gently vacuum the surface without actually touching the foam with the vacuum tip- the suction of the vacuum is all that is needed.
Omak is about an hour away. Not much over that way, just desert and rock. Spokane is similar but we have hugh ponderosa pine trees. I drove through Omak for 25 years on my way to relatives in BC Canada.
 
Thanks for the tips, I am starting to get the general idea on how to handle this stove. You have the right area in mind in WA where my relatives are- all rocks dirt & sagebrush. He has a fish farm on the river & they irrigate if they want anything green. He has old apple wood to burn though.
 
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