firing he stove hard tonight

[steeltowninwv]

got home his evening house was 64..been running her hard ....go emps up o 74 now....toughest thing ive encountered with this stove is when i fire i hard..lots of hot coals...and when i bank it down for the overnight....i dont get the burn time i should...any suggestions?

 

[shawneyboy]

What kind of wood are you using ? Is it properly seasoned ?

 

[Dakotas Dad]

We ran hard last night also, down to 4 this morning when I walked the dogs, wind chill around -10. Loaded at 11pm, 2:30am and 5am. Ran the air near full open the whole time..
:-S

House at 67 when I got up.

When we have to run the stove as hard as we did last night, we will get coal buildup, but I have found doing a good rake to the front and getting as much of them as possible out from under the new load will help them to burn down with that burn/load. Good thing is I am pretty sure the flue is clean..

 

[shawneyboy]

We ran hard last night also, down to 4 this morning when I walked the dogs, wind chill around -10. Loaded at 11pm, 2:30am and 5am. Ran the air near full open the whole time..
:-S

House at 67 when I got up.

When we have to run the stove as hard as we did last night, we will get coal buildup, but I have found doing a good rake to the front and getting as much of them as possible out from under the new load will help them to burn down with that burn/load. Good thing is I am pretty sure the flue is clean..

I think with the Hearthstone Homestead you are sending a great deal of heat up the flue if you are running it with air near full open the entire time. That is IMHO

 

[corey21]

Right now my stove has been running hard to keep up with the temps. I ran out of good wood last week now i'm burning so so wood but its keeping me warm that's all that matter with these temp.

 

[BrotherBart]

Yep. The big dog got to eat last night. Fifty pounds of oak. In the teens and wind chill of six at bedtime. Loaded at nine and woke up at eight with the same outside temps and seventy in the house. Just reloaded because the day doesn't look much better.

 

[Dakotas Dad]

We ran hard last night also, down to 4 this morning when I walked the dogs, wind chill around -10. Loaded at 11pm, 2:30am and 5am. Ran the air near full open the whole time..
:-S

House at 67 when I got up.

When we have to run the stove as hard as we did last night, we will get coal buildup, but I have found doing a good rake to the front and getting as much of them as possible out from under the new load will help them to burn down with that burn/load. Good thing is I am pretty sure the flue is clean..

I think with the Hearthstone Homestead you are sending a great deal of heat up the flue if you are running it with air near full open the entire time. That is IMHO

Maybe, but it also keeps the top above 450°F, which is what it takes to keep this house warm when the weather is that cold. At "1/2" air, it will cruise about 325, which is fine when it's warmer out, but on a night like last night.. you gotta do what you gotta do.

 

[oldspark]

I know there are a lot of varibles but if you want the hottest fire possible efficiently, where would you set the primary air in comparrision to a fire for overnight?

 

[Dakotas Dad]

I know there are a lot of varibles but if you want the hottest fire possible efficiently, where would you set the primary air in comparrision to a fire for overnight?

"hottest fire possible efficiently" when I set my air control for a long overnight burn, that's what I get, except for the hottest part. My stove will cruise happily for hours at 325 or so, but it won't cruise higher until I give it more air.. if I close the air as far as it goes, it will drop down to 300 or so. I am burning well seasoned wood, but nearly all cherry. Just not as many btu's in there as other woods.

 

[certified106]

We ran hard last night also, down to 4 this morning when I walked the dogs, wind chill around -10. Loaded at 11pm, 2:30am and 5am. Ran the air near full open the whole time..
:-S

House at 67 when I got up.

When we have to run the stove as hard as we did last night, we will get coal buildup, but I have found doing a good rake to the front and getting as much of them as possible out from under the new load will help them to burn down with that burn/load. Good thing is I am pretty sure the flue is clean..

I had about the same temperatures here (6°) last night and I also have to run the stove pretty hard to maintain at this temp. I loaded up at 10pm and when I got up this morning at 5am the first floor was at 67° and upstairs was at 64°. I know my house is well insulated as it has 6" walls with blown in insulation and low E windows and 16" of insulation in the attic but my stove still struggles at 0° temps to keep 2400 sq ft warm. Hats off to those of you who have it 75° at theses temps.

 

[Slow1]

I know there are a lot of varibles but if you want the hottest fire possible efficiently, where would you set the primary air in comparrision to a fire for overnight?

You said it in the first part - too many variables.

My experience is that as it gets colder (only time we have to run that hard of course) the draft really increases. I can tell on reloads particularly as when I move coals to front and close the door to get some wood the ash blows off them and they leap to life even when my air is set to 2 (out of 4). On lesser days (like today - 22 outside) they will liven up and be nice and hot by time I have the wood in hand to feed the stove, but it is far from the same experience.

However to try and answer your question for my stove - for overnight my goal is to consume all the fuel (wood and coals) with just enough coals to re-light whenever I start up in the morning. At least when it is cold outside that is my goal (shoulder season has different rules of course). Thus I will set my air to about 3/4 or +/- 1/8 depending on wood and draft etc. This air setting will remain constant as nobody is watching it through the burn...

In contrast if I'm going for maximum heat / fastest reload time, I will start out much the same but perhaps run the stove with initial air setting of about 1. Then once the active flaming has ended (could be 2-3 hours, depends on wood) I'll start increasing the air to keep the wood/coals red hot and that blue 'ghost flame' going. Eventually air will be at 4 (full open). During this time the coals will burning down much faster than an overnight burn and the heat from the front glass will be intense (until the last bit of course) and the sides of the stove will be hotter than the top (not much in the way of smoke to burn in the cat). The flue temp generally will stay at around 250-275 during the high burn then 200ish during the remaining part and below 200 during the coals burn-off. I can push the stove to burn a full load down in 5 hours (less if less dense wood of course).

Essentially for me if I want to burn it quickly it takes watching the stove to increase air somewhere after the initial out gassing events have happened to get the coals more air. Between the two extremes described here of course there are plenty of variations...

 

[shawneyboy]

We ran hard last night also, down to 4 this morning when I walked the dogs, wind chill around -10. Loaded at 11pm, 2:30am and 5am. Ran the air near full open the whole time..
:-S

House at 67 when I got up.

When we have to run the stove as hard as we did last night, we will get coal buildup, but I have found doing a good rake to the front and getting as much of them as possible out from under the new load will help them to burn down with that burn/load. Good thing is I am pretty sure the flue is clean..

I think with the Hearthstone Homestead you are sending a great deal of heat up the flue if you are running it with air near full open the entire time. That is IMHO

Maybe, but it also keeps the top above 450°F, which is what it takes to keep this house warm when the weather is that cold. At "1/2" air, it will cruise about 325, which is fine when it's warmer out, but on a night like last night.. you gotta do what you gotta do.

I understand what you are saying, I am just wondering if you have tried open full, reach temp, then close down say halfway or so, to keep temp but extend burn? I know because of "so many variables" it may or may not work for ya. Just wondering.

 

[oldspark]

The most efficient burn for a non cat is always at the lowest setting, I would think you could have a hotter fire and still have secondaries with a little more primary air. Been dinking around with this lately, in the morning when the house is cooler I want heat and want it now, I know some of you use different woods or size splitts for this, is that the answer and the settings remain some what the same?

 

[steeltowninwv]

yep... i have good seasoned wood....woke up to it..70 in the house this morning..but she wont be there long gonna fire it hard again...winchills below zero here

 

[steeltowninwv]

yep... i have good seasoned wood....woke up to it..70 in the house this morning..but she wont be there long gonna fire it hard again...winchills below zero here

 

[shawneyboy]

yep... i have good seasoned wood....woke up to it..70 in the house this morning..but she wont be there long gonna fire it hard again...winchills below zero here

Good seasoned wood, good. Just wondering what species? As far as those coals go, If you have some softwoods, pull em forward, put a good split of softwood on top, burn em down but get use out of those BTUs. Waste not want not.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

got home his evening house was 64..been running her hard ....go emps up o 74 now....toughest thing ive encountered with this stove is when i fire i hard..lots of hot coals...and when i bank it down for the overnight....i dont get the burn time i should...any suggestions?

Steeltowninwy, your problem is one that many encounter. We never had that problem until we got the new stove and at first was puzzled. However, it did not take long to learn how to do away with the problem.

First, realize our wood is very dry (mostly been burning wood 6-7 years since split but now into some 2 year old wood; no difference) as most people should also burn. If your wood is not ideally dry you will have more coaling than you get with good dry wood.

Here is what we started doing; Just before the fire reaches the coaling stage, that is, there is still just a very little unburned wood or I should state the last log hasn't yet busted up, we dial the draft to full open and leave it there. Most times that will burn down the coals enough by the time it is ready for a reload. For example, yesterday was really cold and breezy. I came in from plowing snow and I was cold. My wife has a tendency to not keep the house as warm as I like so I added some fuel and turned it up a bit. The stove was running mostly between 500-550 and it was just right in here. When the stove temperature started dropping, or when I noticed it, the temperature of stove top was 450. I opened the draft full. Then the next time I noticed it getting a bit cooler, I added wood and the coal bed was just right.

Later in the day I usually try to time the fires so that the stove is empty when I need to load for overnight. To time it, twice I added one piece to the fire and the timing worked out great.


With not so dry wood, one should usually add some kindling on top of the coals or a split or two and burn it on full open draft to get rid of the coals. It does take some adjusting or getting used to but once you try it and it works, it will become habit. For sure, I do not recall one time having a big coal bed that was a problem since our first year with this particular stove.