Burning down coals

[DavidV]

I love coals. Blood red coals. Tonight is one of the first real cold nights we've had, I had the stove burning at 700 for about an hour and a couple hours later(20 minutes ago) I Opened her up and stuffed more wood in. The thick bed of glowing rubies is fantastic. super super hot. you just open the door for a minute so it can get air and then load it up. makes the wood catch quickly. my favorite way to find the stove.

 

[KateC]

First year with the stove last year I was just obsessive and kept putting too much wood in too soon. Just because the flames died doesn't mean you're not getting a burn.
That said, if I still get too big a coal bed and/or for whatever reason I want or need to re-load I move the biggest coals to the middle of the box and build a 1-story 'log cabin' with small/thin splits of poplar or pine around the mound and run in about 60-75percent open, then leave it for as long as I can stand not to poke at it.
Another thing I found is that I was trying so hard to get the longest burn possible I was running it too low and not benefitting as much from the hot coals as I could have been. I find now that if I 'suck it up' and run it a bit hotter and not 'mother-hen' it so much I'm shovelling ashes and coals alot less often.

 

[axleman]

I'm not the most experienced burner here by any means, but here is my 2 cents...

In my insert, I have found that wood type, dryness, and burning habits will determine how bad your coaling problem will be. Last winter I had bad problems with it, but I was reloading more often than I should have been trying to make up for underseasoned wood.

This year all of my wood is well seasoned. I burn hickory, oak, and some cherry (or so I was told it was). The oak is my favorite. Burns great and leaves very little coals. The hickory burns long but leaves a good many coals. The cherry not so long, but a lot of coals (its not seasoned quite as well I think). I try to burn whichever wood suits my needs at the time. I will usually load some hickory for overnight to insure I have good coals in the morning. Oak mostly during the day. I also tend to let the stove burn down more now instead of reloading when the temps start dropping. I don't poke at it either. I set it up to burn and leave it alone (other than occassional air adjustments) until its down to coals (ok, down to log shaped coal pile thingies).

One thing I have noticed is that my wood consumption is a good bit lower this year. I think that experience eventually teaches you how best to run your stove efficiently and get the best performance out of it.

 

[Hogwildz]

Hog it looks at though we have similar houses. Mine is a one story ranch however. I don't know the r value in the walls but they are 2x6 and insulated. r-15 maybe?

As far as two buckets of ashes. We aren't talking all white powder. They were really unburned chunks. I really cleaned it out good this morning because I was thinking the ash bed was hurting me.

Normally a 2" x 6" wall is lined with R19 insulation. Thats good. And also added is any additional wood sheathing, foam board under the siding if there is any etc. Not a whole lot more. My walls have all materials added together are about R25.25, the addition does not have 1" foam board on the outside of the walls so it will be less, 20.25.
Not the top eco house, but not too shabby for insulation. Windows are all Anderson and relatively new. Mostly casements.

I am not sure what the problem or solution is for you. It seems your beast it putting out the heat, but the house isn't retaining it well. If you can get to your attic see what you have for insulation up there. Thats a biggest heat loss spot since heat rises. Check your windows & doors for drafts. In my addition, the brand new French doors I put in leak air bad at the bottom, the factor threshold seal is not low enough and doesn't really tough the threshold. When I get near completion, those will be replaced. And some point I have to deal with the basement. Have to fix a few shoddy workmanship problems from the previous homeowner who didn't have a clue how to run siding, J channel and do capping so it all ran with the water instead of bucking water.

 

[tutu_sue]

My chimney, double wall Class A, is about 19 feet through the wall and another 5 feet of stovepipe inside. I felt I had too much draft on very cold days. Now my fires are more controlled and lasting longer.

 

[Hogwildz]

Problem there is, he has an insert, so no access to install a damper.

 

[karl]

My fires last plenty long enough. After 10 or 12 hours I still have loads of coals in there for a relight. I'm going to let it run about inch more open on the draft control tonight and see what happens.

 

[tutu_sue]

More air will help a lot, especially at the back of the firebox. I actually run more air with the key damper and get flames for a longer period than when I turn the air all the way down.

 

[JimWalshin845]

Problem there is, he has an insert, so no access to install a damper.

Yep... Craig asked for suggestions as per new forums. Maybe a good idea to get the insert and Z-cans into their own forums like what happen to the pellet-heads. Huge difference burning a stove versus an insert/z-can.

Maybe a good idea?

 

[karl]

Well, I left the air open a bit more than usual last night. I want to say that it helped, but I'm not too sure. I think it helped bit, but I still had a fw inches of hot coals in there and lots of little black chips.

I don't have a problem putting a damper in it, and I could fabric a push pull rod to open and close and it. I would just need to know that it would help alot before I go to all that trouble. I'm thinking that insulating the liner and maybe adding a few feet to the chimney would help.

How many Summit stove owners use this damper? Also how many Summit stove owners run 15-16 foot chimneys?

The insert forum could help, except in the case like mine where the same stove is sold both ways.


thanks

Karl

 

[Hogwildz]

I'm running 22' or insulated double wall rigid to 5' uninsulated flex at the bottom from 1st old flue tile to insert. So def no draft problems here.
I assume your running the splits North to South?
Here is what I been doing. I load 3 large splits on bottom, I mean large, they take up just over 1/2 the fire box or more. The center one, I rest on top of the ash lip inside the door, so there is a gap under it where the intake air comes in. The rest I load as normal, packing whatever mediums & then if any room, smalls on top of the 3 large.
The gap over the air intake lets the air jet straight back similar to a cave burn and burn all the way back to the rear of the box as it burns down. The sides eventually fall inward toward the center of the box once the center burns away, which always does first this way. I bet your black coals are in the back and more to the sides? Try to load it as I described and see if that burns more coals out and leaves less charcoals. I have been more patient and just let the remaining coals burn to an acceptable level. Its working out pretty well. At 8 hrs the coals are just right for reloading. It is a lil tougher in the single digit weather with below 0 wind chills last few nights, but was 69 when I woke up this morning, so not too shabby. I still say your producing the heat fine, and for good time lengths, but the house is not retaining the heat long enough to wait for the coals to burn down to a decent level. If your continually adding splits, your going to get way too many coals, there is no way around that. What temps are you reaching?

 

[marky_mark896]

I have a lot of big coals left after my burn has died out too. I'm trying to stack them all in a pile near the air intake, and put air full on and burn them down. They are supposed to be good fuel right? So right now with the air on full, I have blue flames shooting out of the pile. We'll see how that goes.

I don't know how long this coal burn will last, but there are white hot coals in the center of the pile, and blue flames shooting out in all directions. Looks amazing.

 

[bokehman]

stack them all in a pile near the air intake, and put air full on and burn them down. [...] So right now with the air on full, I have blue flames shooting out of the pile.

That's a waste of fuel. You are wasting more heat up the chimney than you are producing. The coal phase needs least air to maintain combustion.

 

[DiscoInferno]

stack them all in a pile near the air intake, and put air full on and burn them down. [...] So right now with the air on full, I have blue flames shooting out of the pile.

That's a waste of fuel. You are wasting more heat up the chimney than you are producing. The coal phase needs least air to maintain combustion.

Are you comparing what goes up the chimney to what goes into the house, or to the total heat created by burning the coals? The latter doesn't seem possible: what goes up the chimney is limited to some (perhaps large) fraction of what the coals produced (not counting the relatively small amount that comes from inside supply air without an OAK). You'll still get radiant heat off the stove.

In any case, outside temperatures sometimes dictate keeping the stove continuously hot, and waiting hours for oak/hickory/whatever coals to slowly burn down with 250 degree stove temps won't cut it. And some wood (cherry and hickory for me) seems to need a lot more air to sustain coal combustion than others (locust, maple). The technique I settled on in our recent cold snap was to dig as wide a north-south trench in the coals as possible, stick 2-3 medium splits east-west across the trench, and leave the air mostly wide open. This burns the splits on both sides, reducing new coal formation, and lets the air flow across the coals underneath to burn them off at the same time. Worked like a charm, albeit requiring more frequent raking and loading.

 

[KeithO]

If the coals don't burn fast or hot enough (particularly with bad draft) you might try cracking open the ash drawer. With my Morso the air comes up from below and stokes the coals up like crazy. I normally might do it for a minute or 2 at a time if the stove cooled down a lot and the draft has dropped of and I need to ignite a few big logs. I find that if I crack the door the inrush of air over the coals just seems to cool the chimney, whereas the air through the ash drawer fires the coals up like crazy.

If your draft is poor, you might be able to burn longer with the ash drawer open (at least until the chimney heats back up).

 

[marky_mark896]

Sort of on the same line as this thread... I am into the 4th hour of a burn. I loaded my stove with different sized splits north-south. The biggest split was put in the back of the stove. I had all the red coals raked up to the front. The middle set of logs were one on top of the other, and the log closest to the door was sitting on the inside of the door frame. The first two layers burned up completely, but the split at the rear of the stove, while it looked like one big coal, was for the most part unburnt. I pulled it away from the back wall, and it is flaming up great now. This isn't the first time this has happened. What am I doing wrong that I cant get the log at the back to burn well? I'm running a Lopi Freedom Bay insert.

Thanks,
Mark

 

[Hogwildz]

Sort of on the same line as this thread... I am into the 4th hour of a burn. I loaded my stove with different sized splits north-south. The biggest split was put in the back of the stove. I had all the red coals raked up to the front. The middle set of logs were one on top of the other, and the log closest to the door was sitting on the inside of the door frame. The first two layers burned up completely, but the split at the rear of the stove, while it looked like one big coal, was for the most part unburnt. I pulled it away from the back wall, and it is flaming up great now. This isn't the first time this has happened. What am I doing wrong that I cant get the log at the back to burn well? I'm running a Lopi Freedom Bay insert.

Thanks,
Mark

Front to back = North to South. Side to side= East to West

 

[DiscoInferno]

Front to back = North to South. Side to side= East to West

And just to be completely unambiguous, the directions (as used on this board at least) refer to where the ends of the splits point, and not the order in which the logs are placed. (Although I admit this seems equally logical to me.)

 

[marky_mark896]

Sort of on the same line as this thread... I am into the 4th hour of a burn. I loaded my stove with different sized splits north-south. The biggest split was put in the back of the stove. I had all the red coals raked up to the front. The middle set of logs were one on top of the other, and the log closest to the door was sitting on the inside of the door frame. The first two layers burned up completely, but the split at the rear of the stove, while it looked like one big coal, was for the most part unburnt. I pulled it away from the back wall, and it is flaming up great now. This isn't the first time this has happened. What am I doing wrong that I cant get the log at the back to burn well? I'm running a Lopi Freedom Bay insert.

Thanks,
Mark

Front to back = North to South. Side to side= East to West

Oops sorry, I meant east-west, it was late. BTW, does anyone have an answer as to what I did wrong that the log at the back didn't burn completely but just glowed red and didn't turn to coal?

 

[Hogwildz]

Sort of on the same line as this thread... I am into the 4th hour of a burn. I loaded my stove with different sized splits north-south. The biggest split was put in the back of the stove. I had all the red coals raked up to the front. The middle set of logs were one on top of the other, and the log closest to the door was sitting on the inside of the door frame. The first two layers burned up completely, but the split at the rear of the stove, while it looked like one big coal, was for the most part unburnt. I pulled it away from the back wall, and it is flaming up great now. This isn't the first time this has happened. What am I doing wrong that I cant get the log at the back to burn well? I'm running a Lopi Freedom Bay insert.

Thanks,
Mark

Front to back = North to South. Side to side= East to West

Oops sorry, I meant east-west, it was late. BTW, does anyone have an answer as to what I did wrong that the log at the back didn't burn completely but just glowed red and didn't turn to coal?

When you pull all the coals up front, there are no coals to get that rear split burning. When loading east to west, you are also blocking the intake combustion air from reaching the back of the stove. So two things needed to burn that pc back there are not back there. It merely takes the heat from the burn in front of it and charcoals that split. You can try making a small trench front to back in the center of the coals then load as you have been. I load North to South myself and don't really run into this problem. I think it is more East to West loading with the coals raked forward oriented. Unless a N-S loader rakes coals forward, load a split in the back east to west, then the rest of the load N-S. Then I have seen that back split just charcoal.

 

[iceman]

i don't know what the problem is but i just can't get these to burn down
today i am raking all of my coals to one side to see if this will change things i think it maybe becuase my chimmney isn't to long as someone mentioned earlier

HOG when you installed your insert did you leave your ash trap open??

 

[Hogwildz]

i don't know what the problem is but i just can't get these to burn down
today i am raking all of my coals to one side to see if this will change things i think it maybe becuase my chimmney isn't to long as someone mentioned earlier

HOG when you installed your insert did you leave your ash trap open??

There is no ash trap, or cleanout on my old fireplace.
You can also try raking the coals into the center from front to back, then load your wood North to South on each side and on top of the coal pile. Since the boost air comes in through those front vents, it will burn the coals from front to back there.

 

[iceman]

i don't know what the problem is but i just can't get these to burn down
today i am raking all of my coals to one side to see if this will change things i think it maybe becuase my chimmney isn't to long as someone mentioned earlier

HOG when you installed your insert did you leave your ash trap open??

There is no ash trap, or cleanout on my old fireplace.
You can also try raking the coals into the center from front to back, then load your wood North to South on each side and on top of the coal pile. Since the boost air comes in through those front vents, it will burn the coals from front to back there.

tried same thing it seems if i use less wood i get a better burn which is okay until i try to go overnight

 

[Hogwildz]

You positively sure the wood is dry? I had a problem similar to you last year. But I knew my wood was on the wetter side. Had no choice as it was all I had.

 

[iceman]

You positively sure the wood is dry? I had a problem similar to you last year. But I knew my wood was on the wetter side. Had no choice as it was all I had.

its very dry and light as a feather!... i tried what you said about the big split on the ash lip but i did all three it seems to be helping for now but once you get to the half way point i don't even think its burning in the back of the stove ... my secondary is going like crazy and temp is about 625 as the wood burns it will fall apart blocking the front and the back i will still have the same problem.. but hopefully this will work