'burn your wood across the firebox, or straight in?

I burn a Firelight CB. I cut my wood only about 14" long, so I can easily build the fire with the logs straight in. Since it's a "front to back" primary airflow, I don't get the higher logs rolling forward onto the doors/glass when the lower wood collapses. This sometimes happened when building the fire with the wood across the box.

I can shut down a hot-but-waning fire at 10 O'clock, and the coals will be hot enough to light new fuel in the morning -- all with lodgepole pine.

How do you set your fires -- straight in, or across the box?

Straight in is usually called North South, or "NS", and sideways is therefore "EW". Theory is that EW burns longer, NS burns hotter. Loading NS is easier for me, but I try to load EW at night.

same here

front to back i dont need anything rolling out.

Full time North to South, burns times are plenty long enough.

AP,

If I have a right side door and airflow is front to back, is straight in still NS or is it then EW? Is it based on door entry or airflow?

could someone explain this "theory" to me, how is this sposed to work??

Skinny,

Take a look at the following link, this is referred to about 3/4 down the page.

http://www.woodheat.org/tips/biglistoftips.htm

ok that was my next question about where the air enters on modern stoves. I always thought that on my quad it enters the fire box from the sides from behind the fire blocks.

I thought it came in from the bottom and was directed to the sides.

let's see, if my back is toward the stove, south is to my left.....no. no, east is to my other left. Wonder if they make a combo stove thermometer/compass?

..but my door is hinged on the north side ie. left side.

Now I get it, will be turning the stove around 90 degrees tomorrow, that should work.

My stove is a glenwood built in 1880, will I need to make an allowance for the change in declination?

Mike, that's got to be a record on this forum for an old stove. Is it for looks or do you still use it?

Hey Fossil...

At airports, they paint runway numbers based on the runway's magnetic heading (direction it points relative to mag. north.) They do this rounded to the nearest 10 degrees: A runway pointed at 134.4 degrees will be numbered "13". You will occasionally see the magnetic variation (declination) drift enough, e.g., .15 degrees drift west, that they'll actually re-number a runway. But that has little effect on the efficiency of wood-fired, steam-powered aircraft.

I burn NS. That was a primary requirement for the EPA stove that replaced my older Vestal (it too was NS--actually it was whatever it wanted to be with a 6+c.f. firebox). Logs don't roll out and good combustion, especially at start up. Now for those really cold nights (10 to 20 below) I do both. I run the 18" splits NS all the way to the back (24" deep stove) and I run 3-4 splits EW across the front right behind the glass. I don't know if it burns any longer that way because I get 8-12 hr burns with just NS. But, it does put more pounds of wood in the stove to better utilize the full 3.44 c.f. and that equals maximum heat.

That's a BIG stove, Ron