kayakkeith said:
So now that its been alot colder - 8 degrees at night/ 25 during the day - I am into a new learning curve. So for awhile I was loading up stove to the max - getting into cat engaged cruise temps at around 400 or so then letting the coals burn down real low and then reloading.Now I have not been letting the coals get down real low but most all of the wood is burned to coals
So today had load in morning that went to about 1PM and when burned down to a good coal bed reloaded and it went to about 6 or so - reloaded and now its cruising at around 500
Probably will be able to get it down to coals by 11 or so and then load for the overnight
2 questions: Does this sound like a good burning schedlue considering its colder and I have to load a little earlier because I dont want the coals to go down real low?
Is it wrong to reload when you may still have some wood burning and not letting it get down to just coals?
oh and 3rd? - I seem to be able to the stove really hot now - is that something to do with it being alot colder outside??
I think your burning schedule will vary with the outdoor temp and the various quality of wood. Also, your burn schedule will depend on what you want out of the stove. When I turn down my Keystone for an overnight burn, the room temperatures drop with it and I have a cool living room to heat-up in the morning - but I have a large bed of coals to re-kindle the fire.
During the day, we are cranking the stove in an effort to keep our furnance off - so far so good. But, when the temps drop and we are trying to heat our house and the stove top temps are crusing between 500 and 600 degrees - plus lots of flames in the firebox, I can get a quality burn of 3 to 4 hours before reloading. Keep in mind that my wood is cut from old dead wood so it is riddled with holes and a bit of rot from natural decay while in the woods. I think that if I cut solid green oak and let it season for 3 yrs, my hot burn times would be much better. For an overnight burn, it's 4 splits and at 8 to 10 hours later - lots of coals. I think I could go 12 hrs and re-kindle without lighting a match.
As far as reloading with hot stove temps, to me, if you are trying to crank out the heat with a soapstone stove, then momnetum is the key. I want the stones to keep the heat output going, but the stones alone are not enough to sustain temperatures by themselves. If they are giving-up heat to the room and the fire dies down, then when you reload, there is a period of time that the stones need to get re-heated and your room temps (and stove temps) will cool until the stones are saturated with heat, else they will be busy storing heat instead of radiating it. I said all of that to say this - yes, I reload hot. I don't pile wood on top of burning wood. I do reload the stove with a large hot bed of coals and a stove top temp of 400 to 500 degrees heading down. What I try not to do is reload when the coals are burnt down so that there is not enough coal's heat in the stove that would have a hard time to quickly light-off the new splits. Also, when you reload to a full stove with hot coals, the coals in the bottom don't tend to burn down to ashes as quickly as an overnight burn. If I get up to the glass in hot coals, what I do is put one large split in the stove to keep a flame going and crank the stove. By the time the split has burned down, I've got most of the coals burned down to ash and can rake the ashes into the ash pan - WHICH I LOVE
One thing to note with regard to reloading hot and that is I have found with my cat stove, I can manage what amounts to pouring fuel on a hot fire. I haven't had any issues with being able to control the stove temps, however, I have read on this forum that reloading a non-cat stove - stoves with secondary burn tubes and make for a run-away fire in the stove.
Keep tinkering and learning your stove - that's what I'm doing.
Bill
