How hot should you let your stove get ?

I recently installed a multi fuel stove. I got magnetic thermostat sold to put on wood stove flue put it on right next door on top right. I forgot to fill the hopper last night got up 3 degrees outside 64 in the house. First time it has been cold enough in here to crank it up. I set the fuel and air as high as it would go. I got a great fire and in about 30 min my stove temp was up to about 400 degrees and I was getting plenty of heat. I turned down the fuel one level left the air same stove temp leveled out bout 425 degrees. After an hour of that had to turn it down was 80 in house. I know my stove has a high temp kick out but how hot is too hot ? I can not see my self running this stove any hotter. How hot do you guys run your stoves ? thanks for any replies

Thank you for getting a magnetic stovepipe temp gauge! Now we can compare. They are so inexpensive,I wish more would invest,even if they are out by 50 degrees,it is at least an indication of what is really going on. I have my gauge stuck on the front next to the heat exchanger tubes,where there is a flat surface,and nearer to the top of the firebox.
So, for me, at the lowest setting and with really good pellets, my temps can hover between 350 and 400 degrees. Other pellets would give a consistant 300. In the mornings,I alternate between the number 3 and number 2 setting,but 600 degrees is not out of the norm on number 3 and I have had it as high as close to 700,but only briefly. There are six settings and I would never consider running any higher, and I doubt the manufacturer expected higher temps that I am gettting on number 3. All that said, I think one must consider that a pellet stove is really a wood stove, and any stove that is durable should be able to stand the heat that it was designed for,and no less. F.Y.I., my stove is rated at 45,000 B.T.U.'s. As I have mentioned so many times before in my posts ,draft control is essential and a sloppy draft that does not allow for good air control is no good,and I applaude anyone who attempts to modify it to tighten it up. I will not suggest I have done so,I still have warranty time left.

I've had my stove up to 500 degrees. The heat exhchanger tubes got a little warped but no other issues.

I just got an inexpensive IR temperature measuring gun, and started to take reading of my Enviro Mini at various heat settings. Trying to figure out if Heat Setting 4 out of 5 is more efficient then running it at 5 out of 5. By efficient I mean if I run at setting 5 with a "hot" burning pellet am I exceeding the capability of the heat exchanger to extract heat. I figured that measuring at the vent adapter right at the back of the stove would give me an indication of how much of the heat is going up the flue. At setting 4 it's about 260F. I'm not seeing is much higher at setting 5, although the flame is bigger.

Measuring at the metal on the front of the stove that is in the flow of the convection blower gave a similar reading on setting 4 and 5. I'm attributing this to the fact that on setting 4 the convection blower runs slower then on setting 5. So on setting 4, less air volume is moving past the tubes allowing the metal to get warmer then it would if the convection blower was able to run at max speed (even on heat setting 4).

Don't know if I'm making any sense here, but I guess I'm wishing that the convection blower had some kind of an override that would de-couple it from the heat setting.

Carl

I too got one of the IR Temp Guns (Ryobi) from Lowe's, and it works great.

I got the IR Gun when we did some pellet testing. We wanted to find out which brand of pellet would provide the most heat for us when burned in our stove. We followed J. Takeman's advice and always get the temp readings from the same place on the stove.

At a med low setting (two green & one yellow lights on a Lopi Yankee stove) we get readings that range from 300 to 315 degrees (while burning Greenway Pellets).

So far we have never had to set our stove any higher. :coolsmile: