In need of help/advice?

[Roospike]

Looks like in the pics that your loading your wood East to West ? If you load your stove front to back / North to South your stove will run different and N to S you can get more heat out of your stove as the front air inlet blows air at the logs as well as between the logs.

EDIT: Ha Hogwildz , we posted at the same time ...........we are thinking the same brotherman , now I'm getting worried ! hehehehe

 

[acosta2269]

What black pieces of paper? The black things in the insert are charred wood. What does loading it "front to back" mean?

 

[Hogwildz]

I'd also be careful about that stocking hanging there. Kinda close.

 

[Roospike]

I keep trying to attach, but it keeps giving me an error message that the size of the attachment is too big.

Yeah , the pics cant be too large otherwise it wont let you add them , you can go to "paint" program in your computer (windows) and make the pictures smaller.

If you cant figure out how to change the picture size you can send them to me and i will edit them and send them back to you at a smaller size ... [email protected]

Hes not getting hot enough, I am guessing he doesn't have the door problem LOL

nope , I would say the door issue is OUT with this one.

 

[Hogwildz]

What black pieces of paper? The black things in the insert are charred wood. What does loading it "front to back" mean?

ok on the charred pcs.
Front to back means one end of the split is facing front, the other end facing back. Oppsosite the way they are in the photos. As Roo said, the air intake is in front, If you put the wood in front to back, the air will pass through between the splits and get more air to the back for more fire & heat. Rather than hitting a wall of wood.
Leave about a 1/2" gap or so between the pcs of wood from eachother.

 

[acosta2269]

I understand now. Sorry for all the newbie questions.

I have been burning 24/7. In the morning there is a nice bed of coals and she usuallys starts right up. I have let her get completely cold a couple of times when we weren't going to be home for a while and to give it a good cleeaning, but for the most part it's been 24/7.

 

[Roospike]

What black pieces of paper? The black things in the insert are charred wood. What does loading it "front to back" mean?

loading the wood stright in . When loading wood in sideways (east to west) the air hits the front first log and doesnt really get to the back logs for full burn.

< see pic for front to back / north to south loading >

Your PE Summit owners manual suggest loading wood front to back for proper burn.

 

[Roospike]

What black pieces of paper? The black things in the insert are charred wood. What does loading it "front to back" mean?

ok on the charred pcs.
Front to back means one end of the split is facing front, the other end facing back. Oppsosite the way they are in the photos. As Roo said, the air intake is in front, If you put the wood in front to back, the air will pass through between the splits and get more air to the back for more fire & heat. Rather than hitting a wall of wood.
Leave about a 1/2" gap or so between the pcs of wood from eachother.

Damn ...........I'm slow to post again , Hogwildz ..........thats twice now bro. LOL :lol:

 

[Hogwildz]

Ok guys, Roo you know this better than I, its real late here I need sleep. Roo knows Summits, listen to his great advice!
Night guys.

 

[Hogwildz]

What black pieces of paper? The black things in the insert are charred wood. What does loading it "front to back" mean?

ok on the charred pcs.
Front to back means one end of the split is facing front, the other end facing back. Oppsosite the way they are in the photos. As Roo said, the air intake is in front, If you put the wood in front to back, the air will pass through between the splits and get more air to the back for more fire & heat. Rather than hitting a wall of wood.
Leave about a 1/2" gap or so between the pcs of wood from eachother.

Damn ...........I'm slow to post again , Hogwildz ..........thats twice now bro.

LOL,Yeah but you have the fancy diagram Besides, your the Summit pro LOL, I am a pro newb.
I gotta sleep. My eyes are burning. I'll check in in the morn. Night gentlemen

 

[acosta2269]

So for the most part, it sounds like I just having been using the insert properly? I will try loading it front to back and managing the controls better. Could it also be the wood I'm burning?

 

[Roospike]

What black pieces of paper? The black things in the insert are charred wood. What does loading it "front to back" mean?

ok on the charred pcs.
Front to back means one end of the split is facing front, the other end facing back. Oppsosite the way they are in the photos. As Roo said, the air intake is in front, If you put the wood in front to back, the air will pass through between the splits and get more air to the back for more fire & heat. Rather than hitting a wall of wood.
Leave about a 1/2" gap or so between the pcs of wood from eachother.

Damn ...........I'm slow to post again , Hogwildz ..........thats twice now bro.

LOL,Yeah but you have the fancy diagram Besides, your the Summit pro LOL, I am a pro newb.
I gotta sleep. My eyes are burning. I'll check in in the morn. Night gentlemen

Cool beans brotherman ............check ya back in tomorrow. Hogwildz has left the building .......

 

[acosta2269]

Gentlemen,

Thank you for all of your help tonight. I will try your suggestions and let you know how I make out.

Have a happy and safe New Year!

 

[Roospike]

So for the most part, it sounds like I just having been using the insert properly? I will try loading it front to back and managing the controls better. Could it also be the wood I'm burning?

Sure , could be the wood ......... that can a will make a huge difference in how you stove will run.

They say ............ When adding a new load of wood to hot coals your wood should lite off and start burning on its own with in at least 90 seconds . ( i think it should be more like under 40 seconds )

Does your wood bubble and hiss out of the ends of the splits ?
Does your newly added wood lite right away when added to the coals ?
Do you have to leave the air damper open for what seems a long time to get the wood burning ?

My rule of thumb for the HARD woods is to be cut, split and seasoned for 2 years to burn at its best.

You need at least 9 month to season low hard woods and med. grade woods.

Cutting a dead tree down 2 months ago and getting to splitting at some point does not qualify as good seasoned wood.

If the wood come from a wood dealers and you are told it si "seasoned wood" does not mean its is really seasoned wood.

 

[Roospike]

Gentlemen,

Thank you for all of your help tonight. I will try your suggestions and let you know how I make out.

Have a happy and safe New Year!

Good deal , keep us updated and we'll be here all week sitting around the "fire pit". %-P

 

[seaken]

Can't tell from the pictures - where is your fireplace located in the "L"? Is it on an outside wall? How much of the masonry mass outside the building as opposed to inside the building?

Also, do you have a proper block-off plate installed? An insulated liner? And yes, your wood could definitely be a contributing factor. The more energy it takes to boil off the moisture the more energy is lost up the chimney.

Can you take more pics? Outside view?

Sean

 

[mikenr1c]

There is no way to prevent your wife from wrapping in the blanket. My wife does this in August. - regards, Mike

 

[Robbie]

acosta2269, most of the wood pros have checked in it seems.

I am not a pro, but this is my second season burning wood.

Just for a reference for you, and surely not to brag...............

I have an Avalon mission wood stove (see pic/link) with a mouse cage type blower on the rear. My house is 1850 sq ft, standard ceilings, 2 story cape cod style with 3 br and 2 full bath, 1 upstairs with 2 full br.

http://www.warmingtrendsstoves.com/mission_ws.html

My stove temp (damper slightly closed to prevent over burn) usually stays at an easy 350 to 450 average all day/night burn temp.

At these temps my entire house stays at around 76 to 78 degrees, and easily can go to 80 if I let the stove heat up to about 500 degrees...........this is with my blower on 1/4 turn on (LOW) on a reastat control.

I can honestly say the temps coming off the top of my stove from the blower are so hot at a distance of 2 to 3 feet that it could probably burn your skin easily if you held it more than 1 minute or so.

I think there is something wrong with your operations, but it's really hard to guess, I wished one of these pros lived near you and I bet in a minute they could look at your stove in operation and tell youy exactly what the problem was.

You should feel VERY hot heat coming from that big of a stove, if it's cranking like it should be.

Please do a good check inside your stove to make sure all your bricks etc. are all in the right place.

When you get your stove loaded with wood, and it is really going, do you almost hear a roar from the fire sucking oxygen into the stove and you should see very large rolling flames over the entire fire box, at this time you should be watching very closely the temps of your stove, not to exceed your stoves reccomendations etc.

At this time, you should feel REALLY hot air, I mean so hot it feels like it will burn you, this is when you should make this thing talk to you (and your wife) at a cautious, controlled burn, for the next couple hours, during this time you should be pumping a lot of heat into your whole house.

This may need to be done for several hours to bring your home up to a toasty temp, where walls and everything within your home is now warm, and you and your wife are nice and warm...............then you can sit down and enjoy your stove.

You sometimes have to make that thing honk if it's cold outside, in other words, kick that four barrel in for a few miles and see what happens...................carefully controlled long hot burns produces a very warm house.

I am a firm believer in getting your entire house warm inside first, this includes furniture, walls, all appliances etc, it all has to be warm or your house can never get as warm as it could. The only way to do this it to keep that heat coming, once you reach upper temps. it's much easier to hold that heat.

If you try this and it does not work, then break it down and tell us what parts did not work.

Sorry for the long post............


Robbie

 

[G-rott]

I agree with Robbie,

I think many people burn too little wood on start up in order to conserve. Get the heat out into the house, warm her up good then, and only then, damp'er down and maintain.

This is also a problem with the comfort level and programable set back type thermostats in forced air heating systems... the house always feels cold. The air temp may be 74 but the walls and furnature are still 65 frome the night time set back.

Try cranking that monster up for a while.

Garett

 

[acosta2269]

It's been a while since my last post, and I continue to have heat issues. I've been loading the wood better and have sealed up some drafts, which made a small difference, but not much. I put a thermostat on the face of the insert (over the door) and for the most part it reads between 400 - 600 degrees. The hottest I've ever seen it was 625. I came across the followingis thread which is a bit different setup than mine. https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/6037/ Can I have a similar problem? One thing I do notice is that once I stop feeding the fire, the stove cools off fast. My fireplace has what looks like an outside vent directly off to the side of the firebox. It also has 2 vents (holes) on the sides of the chimney on the inside of the house (maybe for venting????). Could either of these be the problem?

I'm going to contact the retailer/installer and ask him to take a look at it. What specific questions about the install should I ask him to help determine if there's a problem?

 

[BrotherBart]

At 600 degrees that stove should be tossing some heat with the blower running. Do you clean all of the ashes out of that insert often?

 

[acosta2269]

I clean it out daily (every morning), leaving an inch or two of coals to get the morning fire going. I usually clean out the ashes and throw a log on top and the fire starts right back up. The stove's been running 24/7 for weeks now. It seems like the stove is getting hot (600 degrees). I'm just not sure where the heat is going (maybe up the chimney).

 

[BrotherBart]

I clean it out daily (every morning), leaving an inch or two of coals to get the morning fire going. I usually clean out the ashes and throw a log on top and the fire starts right back up. The stove's been running 24/7 for weeks now. It seems like the stove is getting hot (600 degrees). I'm just not sure where the heat is going (maybe up the chimney).

Bingo. Believe it or not leave a couple of inches of ash in the bottom of the stove at all times and it will heat up faster and give off heat better and longer. I am not sure anybody can explain why, except that it insulates the bottom of the firebox, but all old wood burners know it to be true. Leave a couple of inches in there next time and give it a shot.

 

[acosta2269]

I've tried leaving more coals at the bottom. I've left 2", 3", 4", 5" and more. I haven't noticed if it effects how the wood burns, but it didn't make a noticable difference in the heat output.

Could I be losing heat up the chimney? Could it be a draft or liner problem? I've been in homes where you couldn't walk in the same room as the stove without breaking a sweat. On my insert you can stand RIGHT in front for a long while before it gets uncomfortable (if ever).

 

[Roospike]

NOT THIS THREAD AGAIN !

hahaha , Just kidding ......... I'm going back through and re-reading the thread.

You have 1000 sf front room and kitchen , cathedral ceiling in the front room . (w/Ceiling fan)

big cubic feet to heat , big stove to heat it .

I put a thermostat on the face of the insert (over the door) and for the most part it reads between 400 - 600 degrees.

One thing I do notice is that once I stop feeding the fire, the stove cools off fast.

This sounds very odd , once that stove is up to 600° with all that mass it takes a long time to cool down.

**********************************************************************

Question#1 what were your heating bills before the wood stove ?

Question#2 does the insert have a block off plate in the chimney?

Question#3 Do you have and out side air kit installed on the stove?
is there an outside air supply to the fireplace?

I am wondering about the cathedral ceiling , insulation , the hearth ............and why the summit is cooling down fast.

What do you mean "once I stop feeding the fire, the stove cools off fast." Sounds like your feeding the stove like a coal train .