So I almost burned my house down.

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RoseRedHoofbeats

RoseRedHoofbeats

Feeling the Heat
Oct 7, 2010
374
San Antonio, TX
I tried to do a top down fire tonight. Put two splits on the bottom, made the log cabin on top of that, got up to full size chunks just fine. Went to go and rake the coals around, everything's fine, then POW. A huge ember exploded and flew about two feet back. Luckily I wasn't burned and I got them all up before they burned anything else. But dang! I'm guessing the coals were just blocking the air intake on the bottom and then when I went poking around the air got through in a hurry. So, is it just a bad idea to do a top down fire in my stove, or is there something I can do differently?

~Rose
 
It was in a cold stove- it hadn't had a fire in about 18 hours. So when everything else but the splits had burned and those got down to coals and I was going to add more wood, I raked the coals to get the new wood started. What was I supposed to do?

~Rose
 
Are you starting to see some 500+ stove top temps now?
 
Yes, I've gotten up to 500- and it very quickly roasted us out of the living room! =P I can't win. I've been playing around with different ways to load the wood and when I choke the damper down and when I add more wood, hence the top down experiment... It was going swimmingly up until I tried to do anything to it! My manual says to rake the coals to the back and sides so the air intake isn't blocked and then put new wood on top of that. It takes a lot of finangling to get more than two splits in there at a time without either smothering the fire or them falling against the door. I've started sawing a lot of my wood short to load it N/S.

~Rose
 
Hahaha. That's funny. Good to hear that you are staying warm. If the LR is getting too warm, try blowing cold air from a cool part of the house towards the LR. It will warm up the remote area and cool down the LR.

Don't worry, the rest of this heating season will be a learning experience. That ember pop is just part of it. Sounds like you are having lots of fun. Still waiting to see the remodel and new stove. Did you get the camera working yet?
 
I am indeed having fun. =D Hence why I haven't been on the boards as much- I have a new stove to play with! Plus the smell of the fire masks whatever phantom smells my pregnant nose picks up and it doesn't smell like rotting food or mildew so it helps with the nausea. =P

I've been just letting it cruise around 400, since that heats the living room up fine and I use less wood that way. Is that too low? I'm just making smaller fires, not choking the air down low and my glass isn't getting sooty or anything. Except sometimes when I load it for the night (still have yet to figure out the perfect combination that will get me an overnight burn!) my glass is really sooty in the morning. I let all the wood burn until it's nicely charred before I choke it down about halfway.

The burn tubes are COOL. Sometimes the wood just sort of glows like charcoal and the flames shoot out of the tubes. I keep calling my husband over and he's like, "It's a fire. Okay?"

Is there anything I can do to get around the ember-popping thing? Because it was a LOT of embers, it broke into about 12 pieces the size of quarters and a lot of sparks. If that had happened when I was any closer I would be very unhappy right about now. I also haven't installed my pretty laminate floor yet and short of building another three feet of hearth, how do I protect the floor?

My camera works fine, I just don't have a computer with an SD card reader so I can't load any pics! And my webcam won't take any good pics of the fire. Boo. I'm hoping my real computer will be fixed soon.

~Rose
 
RoseRedHoofbeats said:
I am indeed having fun. =D Hence why I haven't been on the boards as much- I have a new stove to play with! Plus the smell of the fire masks whatever phantom smells my pregnant nose picks up and it doesn't smell like rotting food or mildew so it helps with the nausea. =P

I've been just letting it cruise around 400, since that heats the living room up fine and I use less wood that way. Is that too low? I'm just making smaller fires, not choking the air down low and my glass isn't getting sooty or anything. Except sometimes when I load it for the night (still have yet to figure out the perfect combination that will get me an overnight burn!) my glass is really sooty in the morning. I let all the wood burn until it's nicely charred before I choke it down about halfway.

The burn tubes are COOL. Sometimes the wood just sort of glows like charcoal and the flames shoot out of the tubes. I keep calling my husband over and he's like, "It's a fire. Okay?"

Is there anything I can do to get around the ember-popping thing? Because it was a LOT of embers, it broke into about 12 pieces the size of quarters and a lot of sparks. If that had happened when I was any closer I would be very unhappy right about now. I also haven't installed my pretty laminate floor yet and short of building another three feet of hearth, how do I protect the floor?

My camera works fine, I just don't have a computer with an SD card reader so I can't load any pics! And my webcam won't take any good pics of the fire. Boo. I'm hoping my real computer will be fixed soon.

~Rose
Click to expand...

Rose what kind of wood are you burning there? Some pops more than others. But either way, I think what you experienced was a one-off aberration. (Sounds horrible!) I've not heard of that happening to anyone else here, so it's surely not a common occurrence. But it's why one shouldn't leave the room with the stove door open.

I've had the occasional tiny spark fly out, but nothing like what you describe.

Some stoves are better than others at keeping the glass clean. Mine is very good at it, but still sometimes a chunk will slip down overnight and rest against the glass, which leaves me with some blackening in the AM. That's probably what happened with yours.
 
I've got about half hardwood (oak, ash, maple) and softwoods (pine, aspen, birch). I had to buy my wood this year so there was no getting around softwood, since I live in a pine forest. One of the splits I put down was pine, so that might be why. Also we had a serious snowstorm that blew some snow into my woodshed and then it melted, so some of the wood was wet on the surface.

~Rose
 
RoseRedHoofbeats said:
I've got about half hardwood (oak, ash, maple) and softwoods (pine, aspen, birch). I had to buy my wood this year so there was no getting around softwood, since I live in a pine forest. One of the splits I put down was pine, so that might be why. Also we had a serious snowstorm that blew some snow into my woodshed and then it melted, so some of the wood was wet on the surface.

~Rose
Click to expand...

There you go. Pine seems to be a major offender. Being in the East, I don't have it for firewood, but I do occasionally buy bags of "kindling" at a local hardware store-- basically small sticks of extremely dry kiln-dried wood. It used to be great stuff, but a couple years ago the company stopped using the rock maple they had been using and switched to pine, and it pops and sparks like crazy.

Best I can say is to be real careful and ready to jump on anything that flies out. But all the folks on the forum here from the NW burn softwoods, so they may have a suggestion or two. You might start a new thread with a question just about that spark-popping wood and see what advice you can get about how to deal with it so it doesn't happen again. But I still think popping as bad as you describe isn't something that happens very often.

Wet on the surface won't result in popping, at least not with hardwoods. Can't really imagine a mechanism for it to do so with softwoods, either. It really is just on the surface and dries up in minutes in the stove, so won't be lingering around in coals. I would suggest, though, bringing in snowy or water-wet wood to the house a day before you need to use it so it dries out before you throw it in the stove.
 
+1 on Gfalcons advise on bringing in the snowy wood a day or so before you plan on burning it. Rose, what's your interior RH? If you're like me, you're running mid 20's, pretty low. The surface moisture goes away pretty quick. Your problem will be finding room to store enough wood inside. Can't help there, but you'll figure out a rotation. As far as the popping wood, now you know what can happen, so open your door just enough to stir/level the coals, then let it settle. It'll pop and spark sometimes, but not often. And, I gotta know- where are you finding oak/ash/&maple; up here? Are your sellers trucking it in?
 
I got it from a tree service- a lot of residential areas have planted oaks and maples and then they can't handle the climate so they die and fall down a lot. It's definitely oak bark, I grew up in Texas where you can't swing a stunted cat without hitting an oak tree, so I lucked out.

~Rose
 
Consider yourself lucky, you mention Ash or oak around here and people start talking furniture. BTW, I've never swung a stunted cat, but that sounds like something I need to add to my "bucket list". is it a good time? ;-P
 
Ah, solved is the great mystery of why the stunted cats are heading out of Texas as fast as their short little legs can carry them . . .

I think you'll find not only are the smells of mildew masked, but your domicile will dry out some and moisture-related problems will go away. We used to keep hopping mopping windowsills in this weather, but not any more. I like.

It took me awhile to stop roasting myself out with the by-the-book fires that the stove manufacturer recommends. It's a three-legged stool: stove, wood, location, with the variables of weather thrown in. You'll get to be the expert on your own situation, given time. I've learned, in general, that moderate-ish to small-ish fires give me more even heat throughout the house.

Good that our esteemed moderator got a nice chortle about the pregnant lady being attacked by a fireball in her living room. Some people are easily entertained. ;~}

Congrats on newest addition to the family. And I hope the pregnancy is going well, too. As far as Mr.-it's-a-fire-okay? is concerned, some people just don't get it. Like being color-blind. Or dumb. Take him home and love him for what he is. We, for what it's worth, get it and can celebrate with you. It *is* a fire! Wahoo!
 
I live smack in the middle of the Great American Desert. Except for snow, which is dry as flour, there's no moisture to be had. I have run HUMIDifiers in my house to keep it from drying out too much! Not to mention pregnancy gives you nosebleeds and dry air makes it worse.... >.< I was so confused when I first moved here from South Texas and my skin was dry and itchy. Lotion? What's lotion?

Thank you so much for the well wishes! I'm doing very well, except I have wicked cravings for all of the wonderful food back in Texas. Utahns can't cook for beans.

It was kind of funny, actually- There I am, poking my coals around, feeling smug about how well I've got my stove going, then "AHHH CRAP BRING ME THE SHOVEL QUICK MOVE YOUR ASS." I wanted to try the top down fire because I thought it might be more space efficient to put some large splits and then I wouldn't have to juggle how to get them in on top of the coals. Oh well, that's what I get for thinking. =)

So I was letting my fire burn down to coals, then it went out and the firebox filled up with smoke. ACK! The splits that were on the bottom weren't even charred all the way on the sides. Covered my nose with my shirt, opened it, threw in some burning paper and kindling and got it going again.

It seems to me like whenever the bottom of the stove (and the air intake) is covered with wood or coals, the fire goes out before all the wood is burned up, and I have to open the door and blow on it and add more small pieces to get it going again. This sort of precludes stuffing my stove up with wood. What do I need to do differently?

~Rose
 
Two suggestions:

- to protect your floor, buy a hearth rug (they are fire resistant and can be removed when the stove isn't in use);

- for split fingers, try a can of Bag Balm (works as well as Aquaphor and is a lot cheaper)(we lived in SW Colorado for six year, same climate).

I can't help with the stove...
 
Do you open up the air intake in the later stages of the fire to help burn up the coals?
 
+1 on the Bag Balm, if you can get your wife to stand the smell!!

Sparks.............ah yes...........those pesky things that threaten your house............sometimes you just can't contain em!!

-Soupy1957
 
Bag Balm smells bad? I had some udder cream and it smelled OK.
 
soupy1957 said:
+1 on the Bag Balm, if you can get your wife to stand the smell!!
Click to expand...

She IS the wife, Soupy. :lol:

Don't let that errant "pop" scare ya off. You didn't do anything wrong, it just happens. The top down method should work just fine for you, if you choose that method. Been there, done that and went back to bottom up. I just get a box full of flame faster (and yes, I timed it a couple of times), but that could just be me. I use very little kindling also.

Consider the rest of this year a training session. Try different things. By the time you get it figure out, we should be warmer. Then next year...look out, baby. (<--intentional ;-) )
 
RoseRedHoofbeats said:
It seems to me like whenever the bottom of the stove (and the air intake) is covered with wood or coals, the fire goes out before all the wood is burned up, and I have to open the door and blow on it and add more small pieces to get it going again. This sort of precludes stuffing my stove up with wood. What do I need to do differently?

~Rose
Click to expand...

You definitely don't want to have your air intake, called the "doghouse" for some insane reason, get blocked. It's usually fairly hard to do that because it's not down near the floor of the stove but up just below the lip of the door opening. If you haven't done it already, next time the stove is cold, stick a mirror in there or just fell around with your fingers to find exactly where the opening is.

I can't stuff my stove to the gills with fresh wood and have it burn right, either, though it helps if I've got a really thick bed of hot red coals and very dry wood. But I usually have to do it in a couple stages-- make sure a smaller amount has ignited well before filling the rest up. (Welder's gloves are essential for that.)

And if the top-down fire-starting doesn't work in your set-up, use the old bottom-up. It doesn't work for me, either, and doesn't for a lot of folks here who've experimented with it. Literally every set-up is different from every other one because there are so many variables.
 
gyrfalcon said:
Literally every set-up is different from every other one because there are so many variables.
Click to expand...

Yep. I would rather be lucky than good.
 
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