Air leak at stove collar

[rdrcr56]

Last year we installed a new Hearthstone Homestead. I put the pipe adapter into the collar and screwed it down and then finished installing the pipe and then about half-way through the winter I got a new infrared thermometer and was playing around with it. I noticed that you could see flame down in the gap between the adapter and the collar, so I thought no big deal, I'll fix it next summer when I clean the pipe out. So in the summertime I filled the gap, which is about 1/4" with gasket cement and what a difference it made in running the stove. Now I can run the air control lower and the flue gas temperature will be at 600 degrees where last winter it would be at 400 degrees with the air control in the same place. The way I can tell where the air control is at is I measured the intake opening which is 21mm so I closed it down 7mm and put a mark on the hearth looking straight down at the air control, then closed it another 7mm and put another mark, closed it another 7mm and put another mark. That way I can set the air control in the exact same place all the time. This way I have marks at 3/4 open 1/2 and 1/4 open, so far it seems that the stoves efficency is way up just by fixing that air leak on the exhaust.

 

[begreen]

Good info! Modern stoves are tightly balanced. A little air leaking in at the wrong location can be quite disruptive.

 

[jtp10181]

We found a similar problem on a rear vented Yosemite. Single wall pipe was used and once I fire was going you could see the glow of the fire through the first pipe joint. Sealed that gap up and the customers drafting problems ended.