How to extend your stove's burn times

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Interesting thread, perhaps another angle to consider in extending burn times is stove insulation.
On my Regency I added some additional insulation behind/under the firebrick. I used 1/4" kaowool, I was able to fit it in easily. I have the smallest model, it has a 1.4 cf fire box, with the extra insulation, the stove seems to run with good secondary burn with the air control closed all the way down.

It is a simple mod, and easily reversible.

If I load it right with good dry wood, I can have enough coals left for a relight 12 hrs later.
 
That is interesting also but my side and back bricks are held in by brackets that I don't think would allow much if any play. How do you think the secondarie burners are burning longer with this set up?
 
Stove Nut said:
That is interesting also but my side and back bricks are held in by brackets that I don't think would allow much if any play. How do you think the secondarie burners are burning longer with this set up?
the theory is that keeping temps up inside the box will allow the secondaries to burn longer. I don't know anything from experience on adding insulation to the stove, but my stoves don't have a great way to add any behind the bricks, either. If I did cram some koawool in there it would be compressed to the point of not being able to offer much insulation.
 
I did the same mod to my fisher except I was able to fit 2 layers of 1/4" kaowool. My Regency had plenty of room behind the bricks for one layer.

The bricks on the Fisher are held in by welded tabs, I just bent the tabs out a little to get a bit more room.
 
Did the higher temps in the box deteriorate the bricks faster?
 
Stove Nut said:
Did the higher temps in the box deteriorate the bricks faster?

I just added the mod last fall, so I have only one season with the extra insulation installed.
I really doubt it will have any effect on the bricks.
 
I had a private request for photos of this so I thought I'd post it.

Here are a couple pics of the secondary air shutoff control I made for a Jotul F602, kludged together from stuff I had laying around. It’s about 21†long so it can be operated from the front of the stove. It attaches to the stove bottom by removing the bottom heat shield and using its mounting screw through the hole in the center of the shaft. The hole is elongated to allow enough front-to-back movement for the control to operate.

The angled piece at the rear fits in between the plate and the secondary air inlet at the rear of the F602.

Not beautiful, but it’s simple, and it worked. I could easily get 10-12 hour burn times with softwood in the my F602 with this control.
 

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Precaud,

I have found and others have posted that using a pipe manual damper can have a similar effect.
 
Hunting, it's partially true. But pipe dampers
: don't close completely.
: they don't give you the safety feature of being able to cut off the input air supply to a stove if it starts running out of control.

Another advantage to having a secondary air control is when you have to burn down a pile of coals that have built up. There's no need for secondary air when doing that, it only cools down the stove.
 
I'm currently burning just a fireview cat stove at the moment, but I find this thread interesting. Prior to the fireview as my 24/7, it was a harman oakwood, down draft stove. Going to having one single air inlet was the best single thing I could have done!

I had done some modifications to the air inlets on my oakwood when I was running it, ( strong draft) and the stove had some other issues.

Frustrating to wake up to no coals, cool house and going through long restarts. For me it was a combo of a pipe damper and some better air regulation.

I view these stoves as 1960's cars, where there is a group of us that cannot help but make it "go down the road" just a tad bit better. Reminds me of operating a carburetor in the mountains, and having to re-jet them. Use of safe common sense goes a long ways.
 
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