Regency 5100 heating questions.

[NovaScotian902]

TL; DR I seem to be burning through a ton of wood in my old drafty house, probably 3 or 4 decent size logs an hr.

OK so I am only into about my third or fourth month on experience burning wood for heat. We have a new Regency 5100 80'000 BTU wood stove. I'll explain my habits and than questions. I start all fires with poplar softwood to get nice big hot coals started before placing seasoned dry hardwood after. We live in a 60 year old farm house with more than a few drafts. We have 4 cord of wood in our shed. In order to get the house to a comfortable temperature (20-23C) I find I have to run it wide open for about 2 hrs and in that time I'll usually burn about 6 good size pieces. From that point I can close the damper down about halfway and carry it through the day (albeit my wife forgetting to feed the fire and having to restart it once in a while). Night time burn is a struggle, I've not figured out how to get it to carry heat through the night, there are coals in there in the morning but almost no heat retained in the house. Our stove room is on the main floor facing the hallway to the stairs and next to our dining room. We have placed one fan next to the stove to push heat around. Our main living room is adjacent to the dining room. Is this stove acceptable for a main heat source or should we be supplementing with oil. My father runs a wood stove right in his living room in a small home with one straight shot hallway to their bedroom. He seems to think I'm excessive in my wood burning thus far and that I will easily burn through 4 cord. The heat travels upstairs easily enough but is this just going to be the norm? Wide open and half damper all winter?

 

[Jags]

The most obvious issue I see is the fact that you need to burn wide open throttle for two hours and only after that can you shut the primary to 50%. Thatsallotaair. You are shooting half of your heat up the stack. Is your stove connected to a pipe all the way, or are you a chimney install?

Edit: and please give details on fuel. How long has the wood been cut, split, and stacked?

 

[NovaScotian902]

Cut the wood in march, all split by mid April and sat outside to dry until September, stacked in the shed since mid September. Our wood shed is quite damp and has some drips in it as well. Using hardwood for fuel, softwood for initial startup in the morning(poplar). My secondary never seem to kick in either. Went outside last night and there was a great deal of smoke coming out the chimney. The stove has an elbow coming off the top with a 2 ft pipe connecting it to the wall. Tile on the floor and brick on the wall.

Edit:The pipe off the elbow to the wall is 1ft. I also have a wood rack inside in the stove room that I stack a fair amount of wood on to take any dampness out of it that has accumulated while in the shed.

 

[Jags]

Welp - in my opinion ya got a couple of issues working against you...
I doubt that your wood is really ready to burn. Or at least not optimal. A cheapo moisture meter and a few resplits will confirm or deny that.

Second...sounds like you are dumping into an oversized chimney. This will affect your draft quite drastically. The only real fix is a liner and preferably an insulated one for that issue.