Hi all! Posted a topic about a week ago about a friend who had a problem with smoke spilling from the firebox of his new NC-30. Long story short, he had installed an old pipe damper from his previous install and it had locked in the 1/2 closed (or open!) position. He removed the damper and replaced the pipe and no more smoke problem. Issue solved.
But.....I new that he didn't have well seasoned wood, so as we were preparing to figure out the problem, I brought a good load of bone dry red maple - just to see how it burned in his stove (I thought the smoke spillage might be due to poor wood). By the time I reached his house, his wife has added a few splits of his wood to the fire. It was not burning well, and I goofed around with the air settings to see if I could get the load to burn a little better. At wide open, the load would catch flame, but as soon and I shut the primary, the fire would begin to smolder. I left the primary wide open and burned down the splits for about 3 hours. Finally had a good bed of coals and then loaded about 6 mid-sized splits of the maple, N/S. Before the last split was in, the wood was on fire, I shut the door with the primary wide open. Within 5 minutes, I began to dial down the primary. Within 15 minutes, had the primary nearly closed (left it at ~ 10% open to give the airwash a boost - his glass had become quite dirty). Had beautiful secondaries for at least 2-3 hours and the stove was throwing some serious heat. Burned that load and he was very impressed with how well his stove good burn. Stayed a good long while (a good day for brews) and after the fire was down to coals, we added about 6 splits of his wood. Same issue as before - poor burn, hard to catch, hard to keep flame, hard to reach good temps, etc.
A few main points I brought home from the outing:
1) Never had a chance to burn poorly seasoned wood in an EPA stove. I know the importance of well-seasoned wood (from this site) and I've managed to get 4 years ahead and I'm burning 3 year seasoned wood now. All the problems related to wood burning that you read on this site, and the constant talk of the need for dry wood and the problems of wet wood are absolutely dead on. No surprise here - just interesting to see what it is like to burn poor wood and all the problems associated with doing so.
2) The NC-30 is a beast. Massive, deep fire box and it can (with dry wood!) throw some serious heat and for a long time. I had recommended this stove to him, and I'm glad I did - very well made and is good looking IMHO (he has the legs, rather than pedestal).
3) Although you can preach dry wood till your hoarse, it seems to not quite sink in with some folks. My friend saw the difference first hand and agreed with the major difference in ease of managing the fire, heat output, etc., but never seemed to indicate a strong desire to change the way he gets his wood (buys it late).
Burn on my well-educated wood friends!
Cheers!
But.....I new that he didn't have well seasoned wood, so as we were preparing to figure out the problem, I brought a good load of bone dry red maple - just to see how it burned in his stove (I thought the smoke spillage might be due to poor wood). By the time I reached his house, his wife has added a few splits of his wood to the fire. It was not burning well, and I goofed around with the air settings to see if I could get the load to burn a little better. At wide open, the load would catch flame, but as soon and I shut the primary, the fire would begin to smolder. I left the primary wide open and burned down the splits for about 3 hours. Finally had a good bed of coals and then loaded about 6 mid-sized splits of the maple, N/S. Before the last split was in, the wood was on fire, I shut the door with the primary wide open. Within 5 minutes, I began to dial down the primary. Within 15 minutes, had the primary nearly closed (left it at ~ 10% open to give the airwash a boost - his glass had become quite dirty). Had beautiful secondaries for at least 2-3 hours and the stove was throwing some serious heat. Burned that load and he was very impressed with how well his stove good burn. Stayed a good long while (a good day for brews) and after the fire was down to coals, we added about 6 splits of his wood. Same issue as before - poor burn, hard to catch, hard to keep flame, hard to reach good temps, etc.
A few main points I brought home from the outing:
1) Never had a chance to burn poorly seasoned wood in an EPA stove. I know the importance of well-seasoned wood (from this site) and I've managed to get 4 years ahead and I'm burning 3 year seasoned wood now. All the problems related to wood burning that you read on this site, and the constant talk of the need for dry wood and the problems of wet wood are absolutely dead on. No surprise here - just interesting to see what it is like to burn poor wood and all the problems associated with doing so.
2) The NC-30 is a beast. Massive, deep fire box and it can (with dry wood!) throw some serious heat and for a long time. I had recommended this stove to him, and I'm glad I did - very well made and is good looking IMHO (he has the legs, rather than pedestal).
3) Although you can preach dry wood till your hoarse, it seems to not quite sink in with some folks. My friend saw the difference first hand and agreed with the major difference in ease of managing the fire, heat output, etc., but never seemed to indicate a strong desire to change the way he gets his wood (buys it late).
Burn on my well-educated wood friends!
Cheers!
