very simple woodstock question

I usually open mine within a minute or two after I disengage the cat and open the primary air...

In the morning I wait about as long as it takes to walk around the stove (I have a left side door so the controls are still on the right) In the morning I just don't see the point in waiting very long really. Once I get the door opened I'll push the coals into a pile and close the door again as I select my splits for that load, then they are generally good and hot by time I load up (nice blue flames or even more, depending too many factors to list).

If there is any serious chance of smoke in the stove and I want to warm up the flue to get more draft flow going I may wait a couple minutes for coals to get going - but that is more of a mid-day sort of thing.

I open the door right away most of the time, stir up the coals and rake them forward and throw more wood on. I guess if you have poor draft it may be a good idea to wait a few minutes.

If the stove is down to coals, I simply flip the cat lever, turn the draft to full and open the stove. No waiting necessary.

As you can see Flint, we are pretty much in agreement on this. It is nothing to be worried about at all.

A minute or less.

I open the bypass and crack the door open so it will ignite if there is some wood in there and slowly open it.. No waiting needed really...

Ray

Shut off cat-open up air-open door. Total maybe 5 seconds. Open door a little slow to judge is smoke is present.

Flint, I don't think there is too much worry about thermal shock on these things. Also, when you are opening that door to reload, the inside of the stove is not that hot...or shouldn't be. Good luck and enjoy.

FLINT said:

ok, awesome. Thanks guys. I had read about thermal shock to the cat, and didn't want to cause anything like that by opening the door too soon after disengaging.

Click to expand...

Disengaging the cat lever bypasses the exhaust from the cat so there won't be any harm done while reloading. Thermal shock is mostly caused by wet wood and engaging the cat too soon which causes relatively cool steam to get sucked up through a much hotter cat and causes stress on the ceramics.

Or you could do like my "helpful" wife did and just open the door throw 2 logs in, shut the door and not even touch the cat or draft :bug: Got lucky on that one, I had her read the manual when I got home, and she said oops.

We have an older Fireview (1991) and a Classic (2007). Neither have the newer draft controls I read about here.

Before I open the stove's door I disengage the catalytic combustor. I open the sliding draft control fully and then open the "dial" draft control fully. I give it a few seconds and then crack the door for a few seconds. If the day is raw, chilly, and still... usually in the 40s for me, I'll go over and crack the sliding door before cracking or opening the stove's door fully. Low overcast, "still" days when it's not really cold are the days when backpuffing is most likely to occur for us. On those days I give the stove time to evacuate the smoke before adding fuel.

If the fire has burned all night and I know there is nothing but coals in the firebox I'll open the door right up after disengaging the cat. and opening all the damper controls. Once the smoke is gone you're home free and if you're certain the stove is just incubating coals after an all night burn there will be no smoke to speak of in the firebox.