Hi all. This was my first season burning wood. Ive been lurking forever & cant thank you all enough for the great advice. My Lopi has been good all winter. But.. it'd been shut down for a few weeks until I fired it up for a surprise April storm the other day. I threw in 3 well seasoned pine splits. It came up to 350 pretty fast so I closed the bypass & tapped the damper in a bit. As soon as I got coals I threw in a 4" round & 3 big splits. It was hot quick so I shut all the way to 1/8 open. Then 750deg like that so I tried to shut down completely & get control. The main fire went out but the reburners kept going & going... & going. 2hrs later, holding 750 if not climbing & looking like a main fire was about to light, I doused the coals with water. That stopped the reburners but the coals went strong for another 6 hrs. Granted, there was ALOT of fuel. All I had to do was open the door & It would fire right back up again. I just let it smolder out with both dampers closed. Took all day. All winter Id been able to shut it down at any point it seemed. Maybe I was wrong. Could something be loose? Am I over reacting.. Did i just over fuel too quick? We had high winds & a 30 deg snowy temp drop. Had also been extremely dry here.. Huge forest fire not 5miles away a few days before. Thanks for any thoughts..
Could not shut down 1750i
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BrowningBAR
Minister of Fire
Agreed. You might need to close the air down a little sooner, but 750 though hot, is not panic time. This is assuming the thermometer was even correct.
Where is the thermometer located?
Where is the thermometer located?
Backwoods Savage
Minister of Fire
Welcome to the forum Auzco.
And the high wind could very well have had some effect. Also if all that was pine it does sound like a big load for all pine.
And the high wind could very well have had some effect. Also if all that was pine it does sound like a big load for all pine.
tfdchief
Minister of Fire
+1 My thoughts exactly. High wind and wood like pine......I have to be careful.....those conditions, I keep the load of wood small until I see what she is going to do.
Thanks for the replies. Good to hear a little backup on the winds. I guess a high wind cap is something I should look into. Just a little disconcerting to watch flames over the hill one day & not have control of my fire the next!
BeGreen, the thermometer is a stovetop model.. Ive checked it against an i.r thermometer & they seem to match up. I found the hottest place is as close to the top center as I can get, though the directions say to check at the top center of the door, which is cumbersome & seems indirect. 800 is overheat. Wish I could do a flue temp but its an insert. Any more advice would be appreciated..
BeGreen, the thermometer is a stovetop model.. Ive checked it against an i.r thermometer & they seem to match up. I found the hottest place is as close to the top center as I can get, though the directions say to check at the top center of the door, which is cumbersome & seems indirect. 800 is overheat. Wish I could do a flue temp but its an insert. Any more advice would be appreciated..
MarkinNC
Minister of Fire
Did I read that right, you have elected to put the thermometer on the hottest spot instead of where Lopi recommends? I would consider over firing when you hit 800 degrees where Lopi says to put the thermometer. They have the lab, engineers and product to stand behind. I would feel very comfortable with that. By changing the factory standard to your new standard, it may have created a little anxiety on your part.
In my 2 years of experience, I found that it takes a lot of heat to get a stove up to 750, holding it there somewhat less, but still a decent fire. I can sort of tell by looking at the fire when I shut it down what temp the fire will be. Now the point I really want to stress is I think there is a big difference between 750 and 800 i.e. you'll need a big fire to raise the stove temp the last 50 degrees. I guess if you had some hellacious secondaries it could do it. But you were holding steady and wood is going to outgas pretty quick at those temps.
From your original post it was hard to interpret, but did you have a hard time closing the air control all the way? I have found it is hard to push in but easy to bump with my palm. I noticed you used the term bump. I seem to recall that this is not a part that we can lubricate though I wondered about high temp antisieze personally.
I wonder if there is a remote stack thermometer? I really like mine. It helps me know when to shut the bypass and how to set my fire for an optimal long burn.
So move your thermometer to where Lopi recommends it. And realize the main problem if you do hit 825 is not that your house will burst on fire, but heat cycles like that will shorten the life of the stove. Now if you get that thing a nice cherry red...
Good point. Thanks MarkinNC. The factory spot is consistently 30-40 deg cooler. I tend to forget that to stay on the safe side. But even so I was at 710 adjusted temp, completely shut down, with strong secondaries I couldnt put out that were trying to light a main fire over lots of really hot coals. Ive only burnt pine but it feels like I can go from 600-800+ like that. I wonder if hardwood is less volatile? Thing is Ive always been able to kill the flames at any point until now. The air control closed with a nice clean thunk & I moved it around to try & make sure it was closing all the way(A lube would be nice but stoves throughout history have lasted & i dont think anything would stand up to ashes!). But there had to be air getting in somewhere right? Fire cant go without it.. Right?
Yeah remote flue temp would be great.. What temp do u close the bypass? How did you figure that out?
Yeah remote flue temp would be great.. What temp do u close the bypass? How did you figure that out?
Wood Duck
Minister of Fire
I have a Lopi 1250 and it gets to 750 F all the time without any damage or worries. That is 750 on a questionable stovetop thermometer placed in the middle of the top.
The air control never closes off the air supply completely in an EPA stove. They are designed to prevent smokey smoldering. Your stove is behaving normally. Pine/fir has a high oil content. When it is very dry it is often more volatile than equivalent hardwood. Though there are exceptions, eucalyptus burns with similar vigor. 710
on the stove top with a full load of dry pine is pretty normal.
Thats interesting. I would've thought they'd want us to be able to shut it down. Thanks for the comfort. I agree 710 is fine. it was just the climbing nature of the situation that scared me. I will give pine a bit more respect.
Backwoods Savage
Minister of Fire
lopiliberty
Minister of Fire
I'm on my second year with a lopi liberty and 750 doesn't even phase me at all now, although I tend to keep a more close eye on it because sometimes its starts to climb alittle more. If it does I usually turn the ran on to cool it down alittle. The first year it got to 760 and i was freaking out. Perfectly normal for a lopi loaded with good dry wood to reach high temps for a while, but as you said it stayed there for hours as does mine and I'm taking hours. I just take that as I am burning good dry wood. When the temp starts to climb above 800 or outside of the insert starts to glow, thats when you should start to get concerned. Sorry missed the part about pine splits. Been there done that and they burn hotter than anything I have ever seen.
MarkinNC
Minister of Fire
I close mine at 150ish. It is 2 feet up on the stack (because there are machine screws the safety wire can grab on to). If I am running a really hot fire it will read 300 and will burn out quickly. I find I get long burns in the 600 range with the stack temp at 200. Those longer burns usually mean 3 loads a day in the coldest weather here (with 100 percent white or red oak). I guess I figured it out over time. I added the stack thermometer the 2nd season.
There is another trick that maybe you did not stumble across yet. Do you have the fan option? Running the fan on high will bring down the stove temp as well.
Cool. Thanks for the concurrence LopiLiberty. I guess its a good thing they run hot for so long! Its nice to hear someone had the same experiences though. Mark, I love that ability to fine tune with the stack temp. Its always been
a guess as to when to close the bypass. But Im not seeing any remote therometers that would work. I'll have to keep looking. In the meantime I think you are saying to shut it down as quick as possible to keep the flue temp down. Those flue temps seem really low compared to my buddies freestanding non epa btw. Are we harnessing that much more heat? Ive always kind of wished my stack were exposed to grab that extra heat. But yes I need to bite the bullet & buy the fan. Id forgotten that it will cool the stove.. Puts the heat where I need it. Im finding it harder than I thought to spread heat around my small but poorly insulated cabin.
a guess as to when to close the bypass. But Im not seeing any remote therometers that would work. I'll have to keep looking. In the meantime I think you are saying to shut it down as quick as possible to keep the flue temp down. Those flue temps seem really low compared to my buddies freestanding non epa btw. Are we harnessing that much more heat? Ive always kind of wished my stack were exposed to grab that extra heat. But yes I need to bite the bullet & buy the fan. Id forgotten that it will cool the stove.. Puts the heat where I need it. Im finding it harder than I thought to spread heat around my small but poorly insulated cabin.
MarkinNC
Minister of Fire
I am not advocating shutting the bypass as soon as possible actually. I have found the stove will take off nicely with a stack temp in that range for me (the draft is established). All my temps are for double wall pipe btw. I looked for some remote thermometers last night and they do exist in a form that is adaptable. They seemed too be costly from what I saw though, like $200.
Do you guys have access to the secondary air inlet? I keep a wad of aluminum foil near the stove to stuff in the secondary inlet if things get a bit uncomfortable.
neumsky
Minister of Fire
You had me going MarkinNC... We've got a PE Spectrum with a probe temp gage about 2.5 feet above the stove top and if my temp is'nt up to 600 to 900 degrees it is'nt haha. I have also been told that the temp in the stack can run hotter than the stove top. I have not verified that yet. 65 degrees out and have a fire going right now. ONG...kiss my petuty haha.
I got a used Avalon 1190 in 2010 (the sticker is dated 2007) and it likes it at 350 – 450. I am very happy with it. I use only oak that is over 2 -3 years cured. I have a 1200 sq foot home and we use it 24/7 in the winter. Before I got it I needed over 400 gallons a year of propane, now I use a fraction of that. I have got it once up to 800 and a couple times to 750 and it didn’t faze it, but of course I was freaking out those times until it cooled down to 750 within 30 mins. The year I am going to install a new set of baffles and the burn tubes and I have already installed the new gaskets for the door and I am good to go.
It seems to be the trick is not to put too much wood depending what the outside temperatures is. If it 20’s it needs more wood. If it is in the 40’s it needs less wood. If you add too much wood based on the outside temperatures, you will over fire it and you can’t control it.
Robert
It seems to be the trick is not to put too much wood depending what the outside temperatures is. If it 20’s it needs more wood. If it is in the 40’s it needs less wood. If you add too much wood based on the outside temperatures, you will over fire it and you can’t control it.
Robert
neumsky
Minister of Fire
You know Robert MCW...that's interesting you say that cause I called PE & they said that you should be able to load it up and not worry about it. They said...less air...less heat....Hmmm. Will tell you this winter as we just got ours 3 months ago and still experimenting! I think every stick is different!
Nice stove. I know they say that, but if that is true, then why can you over fire a stove?
Robert
Robert
neumsky
Minister of Fire
That has to be taken with a grain of salt and definitely doesn't apply to all stoves. The Spectrum is a bit unique. It regulates both the primary and secondary air with the air control. Still, that is with an ideal flue setup and needs user judgement. If the stove is not smoldering and sending up smoke, then fine. Otherwise burn a smaller load of fuel and give it a bit more air until it is not smoking.
It has been kicked around on other posts about EPA stoves designed so the primary cannot be shut down. I personally do not like that and it can lead to over fires on tall chimneys or on windy days. I used to stuff a pop can crushed down in the secondary of my Magnolia when it got crazy on me.
tfdchief
Minister of Fire
Now you got me started.....I am to dumb for the government to let me be able to shut my stove down all the way, in an emergency
I understand that there are stupid people who ARE NOT smart enough, but I really don't like being penalized because of them. In all my years of dealing with stupid, I have come to the conclusion that you can't fix stupid! Oh, I wish you hadn't got me all riled up.
I understand that there are stupid people who ARE NOT smart enough, but I really don't like being penalized because of them. In all my years of dealing with stupid, I have come to the conclusion that you can't fix stupid! Oh, I wish you hadn't got me all riled up.
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