That fine line...

[hareball]

...between "Now that's some good fire there!" and "Holy crap! I better bring this down"?

500 degrees gets me up off the couch pretty quick. I just don't really like that there is nothing between the fire and heat and the pipe on a Grandma Bear.

 

[pen]

do a search for Grandma Bear Fisher Baffle and in those results you'll see a thread that's about 5 pages deep talking about just that in these old stove.

pen

 

[Jags]

500 degrees gets me up off the couch pretty quick.

Huh, 500 degrees won't even register a blink for me. Now the 1100 internal stack temp and 800 stove top I saw a couple of days ago, that got me in motion REAL fast. :red:

 

[Backwoods Savage]

I don't get excited until about 650 degrees.

 

[LLigetfa]

I don't get excited, period. Never had a stove thermometer, never will. It would just be an OCD enabler.

Back in the old days we gauged how hot the stove was by the colour. Cherry red was OK, orange was caution, and yellow was YIKES! Same sort of thing with the noise... never wanted to hear a freight train.

My RSF has a bi-metal thermostatic air control and so self-regulates. You'd have to do some real stupid stuff to seriously overfire it.

So, anyway... I'm wondering about why someone would have to dance on the "fine line". Is it because they need so much heat for the home and the stove is sized too small? Perhaps a bit impatient expecting the stove to warm up the house too fast? Less than ideal wood that's fussy to get going and then goes nuke after the initial moisture burn off? Maybe a bit of pyromaniac thrill seeking? Or maybe a control freak, needing it to be 500, not 480, not 550, 500!

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Well, we simply do not do things like we did in the "old" days, thank God for that.


There is nothing wrong and very correct to monitor what a heating unit is doing. I highly doubt any of those things you've posted represents anyone on this forum. I agree some get a little too fussy or anxious but we have to remember that many on here are new to this. They simply do not have the experience as some others. Therefore it is good that they ask questions even if some don't need thermometers. I have never used a moisture meter myself and do not plan on ever needing one but I can see where it can help some new guys. Let's not belittle them; let's help them.

 

[LLigetfa]

Let's not belittle them; let's help them.

The intent was not to belittle. To help, one must first understand. Stoves are cyclical beasts. They were never intended to cruise at a specific temperature so one need not watch the thermometer reading constantly and attempt to drive by it. It's all about several factors, temp being only one of them.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

I understand where you are coming from but just did not want some newcomers to take it all wrong.

 

[pen]

I think a thermometer should be viewed as a gauge in the car. In particular, the tachometer. You can certainly drive the car w/out one. And when reading one, you should only be concerned when thing hit the extremes.

I run the thermometers because they help my wife avoid those extremes. She would not be able to tell otherwise despite her good intentions.

Additionally, the thermometers help to satisfy the curiosity that comes from my repressed inner nerd.

Back to the original post. The guy has an old Fisher stove w/ no baffle plate. The temps can vary like crazy on them things. That's why I built the baffle for mine. Night and day difference in the ease of operation once installed. I had more than a few times where things quickly and nearly went out of control before when you could like in the stove and peek right up the 8in flue pipe.

I jumped up off the couch if it was 500 degrees on the chimney pipe too. Because if i weren't careful, it would have been 700 in a few minutes.

pen

 

[hareball]

I really like the looks of the 2 types of baffles. By trade I was a mason and something like that wuld be a bit tricky for me...especially being legally blind. I do love this old stove and in my last 12 years back in this house I've had one chimney fire. Luckily the Fisher is airtight and by shutting the dampers down the fire was out and everything was under control before the fire dept came. My neighbor didn't realize I was home as she saw no car in the driveway but yeah I stopped driving when I became legally blind! I did thank her for calling though.

A few reasons...as you did hit a few nails right on the head!
I am part control freak, if I had the money i'd have probes all over the stove and throughout the house. I like to see how things work. Right now I have one thermometer on the pipe about 2' above the stove.

I dont know if the stove is oo small but I am trying to heat a ranch with 4 bedrooms, 2 living rooms a full kitchen and laundry room and pantry. Originally my Father had the Fisher and a small cigar smoker stove but I scrapped the small stove a few years ago because it was no longer safe so I am running the fisher hard howerver it is getting the job done.

OCD...yeah I have it! My female roomie and her friend were helping me stack a half cord on friday and they noticed me making seperate piles and asked me what was wrong with this wood and that wood. I had to explain this wood here is for overnight burns, this wood here is for a reload and so on...

 

[Stevebass4]

750 on the top of my QF insert is about as high as i like to go

and i know my insert is too small but i have a small ranch (1300 sq feet) and a small fireplace so for now i am stuck with what i have until i figure out a better way to get a HUGE stove in my living room

 

[LLigetfa]

Good analogy Pen, about the tach. As for my comments about OCD and control freak, I am both so that entitles me to call the kettle black. Part of the reason I won't use a temp gauge.

As for those old stoves, if anyone here is old enough to remember the Ashey airtight, an oval tin can with no cast iron and no firebrick, well... I remember waking up in a sweat, in the middle of the night, in a small cabin with parts of the Ashley and the flue glowing cherry, orange, and yellow, and having to throw some water in the stove. Not sure where I was going with this...

To have a stove that isn't a runaway waiting to happen, it helps not to run it at its upper limit, to have good dry wood, and to understand the cyclic nature of the fire.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Hey, go easy there. Before we bought the Fireview, we had one of those old Ashley stoves. It served us for many years, even if it did eat lots of wood. I do have to say we never had a run-a-way situation with it but did have times when it didn't put out the heat we wanted.

 

[pen]

A few reasons...as you did hit a few nails right on the head!
I am part control freak, if I had the money i'd have probes all over the stove and throughout the house. I like to see how things work. Right now I have one thermometer on the pipe about 2' above the stove.

Do as you wish of course, but the standard for using a chimney pipe thermometer is to have it 18 inches up the chimney pipe. I think being 2 inches up you may be reading a lot hotter than you really ought to be.

Also, are you using a chimney pipe damper? If not, you really should.

Keep that chimney clean, burn good dry wood, and burn it good and warm and you won't have any problems.

pen

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Hey Pen, I think you should read that as 24" up and not 2".

 

[quads]

...between "Now that's some good fire there!" and "Holy crap! I better bring this down"?

500 degrees gets me up off the couch pretty quick. I just don't really like that there is nothing between the fire and heat and the pipe on a Grandma Bear.

Close the pipe damper a little more.

 

[pen]

Hey Pen, I think you should read that as 24" up and not 2".

Opps! Strike that prior advice and reverse it.

Thanks for noting that

pen

 

[hareball]

Thanks for the advice guys! Currently the pipe does not have a damper but my Father and I did just replace the pipe from the stove to the cap on top of the pipe. We never had a damper in the 33 years it's been here but I sure wish we added one a month ago when we replaced the pipe. The damper sounds like a great spring project but I like the baffle even more.
For those that used a baffle did it change the way you loaded your stove? How close to the baffle woul you stack a load?

I noticed the insulated pipe section in the attic is doing it's job quite well. I notice all the houses around me have a lot less snow on their roof and mine still looks like it did when the snow stopped yesterday.

 

[quads]

Especially in the old Fisher stoves without a smoke shelf/baffle, the pipe damper is what separates the "the fire and heat and the pipe" and also helps to prevent a runaway fire by providing more control. A pipe damper is easy to install. Try it, you might like it.

 

[woodconvert]

...between "Now that's some good fire there!" and "Holy crap! I better bring this down"?

500 degrees gets me up off the couch pretty quick. I just don't really like that there is nothing between the fire and heat and the pipe on a Grandma Bear.

Heh, I have a cast iron stove so when heating up and cooling down there are some "pings", "pops" and "doinks". Those sounds are like a clock up until I get to a new high temp. Then you get into the "ca-pings", "kerpops" and "gadoinks". Those i'll roll off the couch for but it usually only happens when the wind is just right.

If 500 is a new high or a rarity on your setup, it's worth rolling off the couch but that temp is nothing to worry about. Just re-adjust your comfort level and let er' eat!.

 

[hareball]

Thanks guys! How far up the pipe would a damper be installed?

 

[quads]

Thanks guys! How far up the pipe would a damper be installed?

A foot, give or take. Probably doesn't make a lot of difference, somewhere within easy reach to open when filling the stove.

 

[WES999]

I have a Fisher Grandma Bear also. 500* is nothing to get exited about, I don't start worrying until it's get over 800*- 850*.

Here is a story:this was before I installed the baffle and sec air tubes. I have the temp monitor/alarm set to 800*. I loaded up the stove ( must have been some very dry wood) and went up stairs ( stove is in the basement), I heard the alarm go off, in the minute or two two it took me to go down stairs the temp increased to 1100* :ahhh: , I quickly closed the air which brought the temp back down.

This is why I am a firm believer in knowing what temps the flue and stove top are running at.
I have a monitor/alarms for both flue and stove top on each of my stoves.

Now with the baffle and sec air the stove is much more controllable.

Hareball, does your stove have any baffle at all? My stove looks like it originally had a 6" wide baffle just above the rear exit, someone apparently torched it off so it only extended about 2".
My new baffle is supported by being wedged between the rear flue collar ant whats left of the original baffle.

If your stove has a rear exit you could easily add some 1/4 plate to reduce the heat going straight up the chimney.

 

[pen]

800-850 on a probe thermometer right? Or on a magnetic type? 500 on a magnetic type is a lot different than 500 on a probe type thermometer.

pen

 

[hareball]

I guess mine was one of the early models that only came with firebrick. My father thinks it was 1975-76 when he bought the stove. The pipe comes off the top. I am very interested in making the stove more efficient because as she sits now I can only imagine all the heat i'm losing. I can say on a 40 degree day I cant get the stove over 300 degrees and sit in my living room though!!
I had 2 stoves up until a few years ago but now the g-ma is doing all the work.

I took delivery of what was supposed to be a half cord and sitting in my garage is about 3 days worth left. The only positive from that deal was that it was very well seasoned but I wont be calling them nack!

Does anyone know where the ID tag might be located? I'd love o figure out the year it was born.