Every season there are always many questions/comments/people pulling their hair out over how to maintain a continuous sequence of load burn cycles while avoid coals buildup. The best technique will vary by stove, wood species, piece size, etc. But I thought I'd show how I've learned to do it best with my Quad 2100.
Every time I burn this stove by stuffing it full-up, getting the whole thing burning, adjust the burn rate down, and burning through the load, I'm left with a huge pile of coals when it's time to reload. I then waste 20-30 minutes burning down the coals (which isn't very efficient) before I can reload it.
So I've developed another approach. It attempts to answer "Can I adjust everything so that, as each load burns, the previous load of coals burns completely down too?"
The basic trick is to adjust the piece size, load size, and burn rate that the stove can maintain so that the coals will burn down in the same time that the load burns. As you know, coals require exposure to air and time to burn. So that's the variable that determines how I'll load the stove. And, as it turns out, the load size must be smaller. Then, the size of each piece in the load can be larger to extend the burn time.
The pic below shows what works best in the Quad. It's really simple. Two large pinon rounds (no bark) loaded N/S, 15" long, as big in diameter as can fit in the stove, is all it takes. These will give an amazingly steady flaming burn of 2.5 to 3 hours. Look at it 30 minutes in and then again two hours in (when this photo was taken) and the flame looks the same. The thermometer on the pipe sits at 350º the whole time, tailing off to 300º toward the end. When it's done burning, chunk them down into a new coals bed, reload, and repeat as often as desired. I call it my "sustainable burn."
As you can see in the pic, the rounds shrink as they burn. When first loaded, butted right up against each other, these two had about an inch of space on each side. Once or twice in the cycle, I have to open the door and nudge them back closer together, otherwise the flame diminishes due to the widening gap between the rounds.
If I use splits instead of rounds, the burn is hotter, not as long, and not as easy to control. It tends to 'take off' toward the end of the cycle.
The downside to this method is that the heat output, while constant, isn't adjustable. Each stove will have an output rate that comes with this sustainable burn cycle. So if you're going to use this technique, choosing a stove size based on it's "cruising" burn rate is the way to go, not on it's maximum output.
I haven't yet been able to optimize this same technique for the Nestor Martin. It's a completely different animal. On it I just use the underfire air control, which feeds air up through the grate, to burn the coals down, just like a coal stove does. It works really well. My hunch is, sustainable burns are trickier to pull off with an E/W burning stove.
Every time I burn this stove by stuffing it full-up, getting the whole thing burning, adjust the burn rate down, and burning through the load, I'm left with a huge pile of coals when it's time to reload. I then waste 20-30 minutes burning down the coals (which isn't very efficient) before I can reload it.
So I've developed another approach. It attempts to answer "Can I adjust everything so that, as each load burns, the previous load of coals burns completely down too?"
The basic trick is to adjust the piece size, load size, and burn rate that the stove can maintain so that the coals will burn down in the same time that the load burns. As you know, coals require exposure to air and time to burn. So that's the variable that determines how I'll load the stove. And, as it turns out, the load size must be smaller. Then, the size of each piece in the load can be larger to extend the burn time.
The pic below shows what works best in the Quad. It's really simple. Two large pinon rounds (no bark) loaded N/S, 15" long, as big in diameter as can fit in the stove, is all it takes. These will give an amazingly steady flaming burn of 2.5 to 3 hours. Look at it 30 minutes in and then again two hours in (when this photo was taken) and the flame looks the same. The thermometer on the pipe sits at 350º the whole time, tailing off to 300º toward the end. When it's done burning, chunk them down into a new coals bed, reload, and repeat as often as desired. I call it my "sustainable burn."
As you can see in the pic, the rounds shrink as they burn. When first loaded, butted right up against each other, these two had about an inch of space on each side. Once or twice in the cycle, I have to open the door and nudge them back closer together, otherwise the flame diminishes due to the widening gap between the rounds.
If I use splits instead of rounds, the burn is hotter, not as long, and not as easy to control. It tends to 'take off' toward the end of the cycle.
The downside to this method is that the heat output, while constant, isn't adjustable. Each stove will have an output rate that comes with this sustainable burn cycle. So if you're going to use this technique, choosing a stove size based on it's "cruising" burn rate is the way to go, not on it's maximum output.
I haven't yet been able to optimize this same technique for the Nestor Martin. It's a completely different animal. On it I just use the underfire air control, which feeds air up through the grate, to burn the coals down, just like a coal stove does. It works really well. My hunch is, sustainable burns are trickier to pull off with an E/W burning stove.
