cmcramer said:
A brand new $2000 stove should not have an air leak, but I will certainly test for this. How do I test ? In Everburn mode, do I stick a smoking cigar under the stove? What's your suggestion?
Probably not a bad idea, although I would start with the traditional "dollar bill test". Starting to sound like a broken record now, but again there seems to be a problem with Vermont Castings manuals, my manual has a section called "Test and Repair the Door Gaskets" but the Encore manual doesn't seem to have the same. Anyway, it says:
"Air leaks can be caused by low spots in the door gaskets.
To locate such low spots, close each door on a
slip of paper and attempt to pull the paper free. If the
paper slips out without tearing, the gasket isn’t snug
enough at that spot.
If the seal cannot be improved by adjusting the door
latch, try shimming the gasket. Pack a small quantity of
cement or a smaller diameter gasket into the channel
beneath the gasket to lift the main gasket and thereby
improve its contact with the door frame.
If shimming does not improve the seal, replace the
gasket following these steps..."
cmcramer said:
Another part of the Everburn operations is raking the hot coals to the middle rear around the refractory everburn shoe.
I believe you.....but this is news to me. Not in manual. Never heard of such a thing before. I will test this out in up coming days.
Once again this is something left out of the manual, but mentioned to me by a CFM technician. My manual says:
"Once the fire is burning steadily, continue
adding fuel until a thick bed has been established on
the grate. The bed should be about 2” (50mm) deep
and should cover the throat opening into the secondary
combustion chamber that is located in the lower center
fireback."
OK - that's all fine and good, but how long is it going to take to establish a 2" deep coal bed across the grate? You can accomplish the same thing a heck of a lot faster by raking the coals toward that throat opening they mention. If you have a big bed of coals later, you don't need to mess with the coals, just reload and close the bypass. If the fire has really died down, I rake ash away from the throat opening and fresh coals toward the opening before reloads. This works well. And again hating to sound like broken record, but all of this info could be useful if it were in the owners manual.