How Full Do You Load Your Stove?

[leeave96]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

 

[BrowningBAR]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

If I am doing a full load, I load it the same way whether I am near the stove, asleep for the night, or away from the house. Only difference is that I cut the air back on the Vigilant as it is a harder stove to 'lock in'. So I go with caution when it comes to burn temps for away and night time burns with the Vigilant.

 

[thewoodlands]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

The first picture is about 3-4 splits on a good bed of coals and the second picture is loading up for the overnight burn.


zap

 

[havermeyer]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

The first picture is about 3-4 splits on a good bed of coals and the second picture is loading up for the overnight burn.


zap

Jealous of your N/S packed stove! The Declaration has a long fire box but not very deep so its been only E/W for me. Also, need to figure out how to pack my stove efficiently. I think I need to use smaller splits...

-Andre

 

[ROBERT F]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

The first picture is about 3-4 splits on a good bed of coals and the second picture is loading up for the overnight burn.


zap

Jealous of your N/S packed stove! The Declaration has a long fire box but not very deep so its been only E/W for me. Also, need to figure out how to pack my stove efficiently. I think I need to use smaller splits...
-Andre

The liberty in the pic ia a e/w stove by design as well, but much like zap I cut lots of 14 inchers to load n/s as it seems to be more effecient.

 

[Flatbedford]

Except in the shoulder season, I load the Fireview to the gills every time a reload, day or night, home or out.

 

[Dune]

Depends on the outside temp. If it is warm I put a few splits at a time.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

Bill, much depends upon your stove, your fuel, the weather, how much area you are heating and how long you want the stove to give heat.

At this time of year we never fill our stove. However, when cold air comes, and it will, then we fill the stove for overnight burns or if we are to be gone a good part of the day. Usually daytime burning though amounts to 3 splits at a time.

If you want a hot fire and are not concerned about length of burn time, then small splits are the way to go. For overnight fires, bigger splits and even some rounds will work nicely. I hope this helps.

 

[joshlaugh]

I use small to medium splits during the day and use less dense wood like silver maple and pine during the day. Night time I throw on the bitternut hickory that I split larger to get longer burn times.

 

[corey21]

When you are with the stove vs. piling it full for overnight or extended daytime while you are away burns, how full do you load your stove when you are in and about the house? Small, medium or large splits?

Just courious.

Thanks!
Bill

The first picture is about 3-4 splits on a good bed of coals and the second picture is loading up for the overnight burn.


zap

Nice!!

 

[fbelec]

this is kinda off the original posters question but it relates a little. zap if you load your stove with the same amount of wood left to right instead of front to back does it change the burn time?

 

[rdust]

When it's colder out it's always a full load. I like to keep a mix of split sizes, I don't use anything bigger than 6 inches in my stove. I find a good mix of sizes works better for filling the gaps.

 

[flyingpig]

....
Jealous of your N/S packed stove! The Declaration has a long fire box but not very deep so its been only E/W for me. Also, need to figure out how to pack my stove efficiently. I think I need to use smaller splits...

-Andre

And that weird 5 sides firebox...you'll need multiple size of splits in order to pack it. I'm still learning to pack mine too. We'll have our first frozen night tomorrow and it'll be the first time I try overnight burn too. We'll see how much can I feed it.

Cheers.....Som

 

[thewoodlands]

this is kinda off the original posters question but it relates a little. zap if you load your stove with the same amount of wood left to right instead of front to back does it change the burn time?

fbelec I think that we get longer burn times n/s compared with east/west. The Lopi Liberty will take 24 inch splits east/west so it would be nice to find out which would give us the longer burn time, 14.75 inches loaded n/s or 24 inch loaded e/w.

The only problem with overnight burns loading e/w is you have to worry about the splits rolling on to the glass.


zap

 

[rdust]

Snapped a picture tonight when I loaded. Not packed tight/full but pretty close.

 

[SolarAndWood]

The only problem with overnight burns loading e/w is you have to worry about the splits rolling on to the glass.

I agree. I also find I can get a lot more fuel in the box and is much easier to rearrange if necessary NS. To the OP, I load fully every time. This time of year I pack the punk, cutoffs and uglies in as tight as I can. When its cold, it gets packed with denser species, consistent length, straight and larger splits.

 

[firefighterjake]

Depends on the heat . . . if it's cold outside and I really need the heat and longer burn times it gets fully loaded with bigger stuff. If it's not quite so cold I don't load it quite so full and use medium wood. If I'm popping in and out most of the day I'll use my punks, chunks and uglies and load the stove, but not load it up to capacity.

 

[leeave96]

As I gain more experience with the Keystone, I am finding myself loading this thing to the gills just about all of the time - just to save time. I get home from work and have a few hours to enjoy the firebox view, so I load it up and use the damper to keep the heat under control. Same for getting things going in the morning - get the wood in the stove, get it burning and off to work!

On the other hand, when my boys are home during the day, they load the stove with about 2 splits, let it burn down and load again. I think they like tinkering with the stove more than anything!

I am also burning all shapes and sizes - first come, first burn. I bought a couple of canvas shopping bags at Tractor Supply and fill the woodstove out of those things to keep the debri from falling all over the house when carrying wood through it - works great. But, my boys load the bags while I off to work and sometimes they have the desired size wood on top and other times it's on the bottom - so I burn first come, first burn

For the final overnight burn, I try to find a solid round to set in the back of the stove and then pack the stove full.

Bill

 

[corey21]

So it want like burn the house down if i was to load my stove to the top of the firebricks. and then turn it down.

 

[nate379]

All depends on the temp. The last few days was pretty warm, in the low 30s so I just put 3-4 pieces. Today it's 10* so it's full. Oh yeah, heats 1400 sq ft no problem with it set on low.

 

[CodyWayne718]

The only problem with overnight burns loading e/w is you have to worry about the splits rolling on to the glass.

I agree. I also find I can get a lot more fuel in the box and is much easier to rearrange if necessary NS. To the OP, I load fully every time. This time of year I pack the punk, cutoffs and uglies in as tight as I can. When its cold, it gets packed with denser species, consistent length, straight and larger splits.

So it doesnt matter if the wood is on the secondaries? J/C

 

[ecocavalier02]

shouldnt hurt anything stacking it right up to the secondaries. in our stoves (the blaze king) we load pack whaterver we can get in there. cuz we jst crank her down to what we want for heat.

 

[thewoodlands]

The only problem with overnight burns loading e/w is you have to worry about the splits rolling on to the glass.

I agree. I also find I can get a lot more fuel in the box and is much easier to rearrange if necessary NS. To the OP, I load fully every time. This time of year I pack the punk, cutoffs and uglies in as tight as I can. When its cold, it gets packed with denser species, consistent length, straight and larger splits.

So it doesnt matter if the wood is on the secondaries? J/C

I keep try to keep our wood off the air tubes.

zap

 

[BrotherBart]

I don't load above the firebrick. Over the last four seasons with the stove I have tried six hundred ways from Sunday. For the night load the joint stays just as warm and the coals are just as there the next day that way as with stuffing the sucker all the way up to the baffle. That combustion room up there was designed for a reason. To burn the gases coming off the wood. Not for the burn tubes to be toasting the top of splits.

That's my story and I am sticking with it.

When I am home during the day I burn three splits N/S. Gives four or five hours of heat then I repeat.

 

[SolarAndWood]

The only problem with overnight burns loading e/w is you have to worry about the splits rolling on to the glass.

I agree. I also find I can get a lot more fuel in the box and is much easier to rearrange if necessary NS. To the OP, I load fully every time. This time of year I pack the punk, cutoffs and uglies in as tight as I can. When its cold, it gets packed with denser species, consistent length, straight and larger splits.

So it doesnt matter if the wood is on the secondaries? J/C

Unless I am burning hot, this is often all I see in the stove. There will be some glows from the wood but that is about it. This was fully loaded to the bottom of the cat enclosure with shoulder season junk a little over half an hour ago and will easily burn until tomorrow evening. That glowing grate you see is the little box above the wood in my previous picture.