The earth stove model 706-806-m/r please help!

[1longshot]

Today my father in law gave me a nearly new stove made by the The Earth Stove company. It has an adjustment for high medium and low on the lower right hand front side of the stove below the lip where the door is. I believe it is a damper or oxegen adding device? Don't know the proper name. I hauled the stove outside to test it out. First I added about 7 feet of stove pipe 6". Then I began buring wood and paper.

I am thinking about using this stove for my cabin but I need it to burn hotter than it is and it seems that the damper or what ever it is doesn't work as effectively as my other wood stoves. The adjustment knob has a coiled spring attached to it and I don't know what it is for. If anyone could offer a suggestion on what I can do to increase air flow to the stove please let me know. I am going to take the device apart tommorrow and try to figure something out. Thanks

Robert

 

[daleeper]

The number you list does not match anything listed on the Lennox Hearth site. I'm not sure what model stove you have, but I do own an older Earth stove with the adjustment at the right hand upper back side of the stove, and would say that the coiled spring on the adjustment is a bimetal thermostatic control for the damper. It will open/close the damper as the stove cools/heats. When the stove is cold, it should have the damper wide open when the adjustment is in the High position, and should be closed off, or close to it at the low position. Previous models allowed adjustment of that mechanism. You really should try to locate a manual for that stove, it would go over controls of the stove. Make sure that the air passage through the damper is clear.

Hopefully you should be able to see if the damper is moving, and in the proper position without taking it apart.

Someone else will hopefully come along shortly that is familiar with this particular stove and give you information specific to this stove.

 

[1longshot]

I too looked at the Lennox Hearth site and found nothing. Not sure if "Earth Stove", and "The Earth Stove" are of the same manufacture. I did go out and shovel the ashes out of the stove this morning and noticed that the fire box was much deeper than I had thought it was when I started a fire in it yesterday. There is no ash box to drop the ashes out so hand removal by shovel is required. When I started the fire yesterday there were ashes already in the box and they were much deeper than I had anticipated. I think if I clear the ash box more frequently the stove will burn better and possibly hotter. Clearing out the ashes uncovered that the thermostatic damper intake to the fire box was much larger than I had percieved. Not only does it let air in for the whole length of the bottom lip of the door but also at each side of the door going all the way down to the bottom of the fire box.

 

[daleeper]

I believe "The Earth Stove" is the proper name. Most shorten it to Earth Stove. Same stove as far as I know.

Cleaning the stove out should improve the performance greatly. Making sure that air can get in there and you can control the amount of air entering is most important. Most on this forum will say that you need some ashes in the bottom of the stove, which you do, but I have found that having too many will "insulate" my stove, and lowers the heat I get out of it, YMMV. In cold weather, with my "classic" stove (non EPA) and certain woods, I carry out ashes 1-3 days.

If you could post a photo of that stove, we may be able to help identify it. Sometimes there is more than one set of numbers on that back plate, maybe there are some that would look more like a model number than the ones in the title. There is also a manufacture date on there, that might be useful. I suspect that many are seeing that model number in the title of the thread, not recognize it, and pass on by.

 

[crazy_dan]

yep they are the same.
Is there a cover on your air in take like the one in the picture? the air in take is in the back of my old stove and it is the square rectangle looking thing the flap I am talking about is the bent piece of metal with the wire attached to it and it had to open on mine all the time.
Hopes this helps feel free to pm me I will try to help you as much as I can.

 

[n9viw]

Hi! I just googled "earth stove 706-806 m/r", and this was the first result to pop up. I was so happy, I registered just to post! :D

I have THE EXACT SAME MODEL. My thermostatic control is on the bottom right FRONT, the nameplate is on the right rear side, riveted to the vent shroud. Got it from a friend-of-a-friend for $50 and just installed it today.

It's obvious the previous owner had no clue how to operate the thing- he complained of heavy creosote buildup, but had been using 8" single-wall chimney pipe (it's designed for 6" double wall, from what I can tell). He also had the damper vent covered with duct-tape, so he was either choking it out, or left the door cracked to run it- either way, bad idea.

I can't get mine to draft with the door closed, even with the therm in "High" and the damper (visually) wide open. I leave it 'shut to', just open enough to allow a draft thru the door. I'm guessing there's eons of ash and/or creosote in the damper, so I'll have to blow/poke that out. When I got the fire started, creosote flakes started popping off the interior of the unit like popcorn! Yech.

In any case, that is definitely the model number, I saw it clearly... mine is serial number 498. Longshot, sorry I can't be of more help, we're kinda in the same boat, but if I discover anything more helpful, I'll let you know.

 

[BrotherBart]

Seven feet of pipe out in the open will never develop enough draft to heat that puppy up. Once you get 15 or more feet of pipe on top of it and some of it inside the living space the draft will increase dramatically.

BB - Who has burned stoves outdoors.

 

[n9viw]

Well, I looked at www.earthstove.com and the Lennox website, neither of which had any information about the 706-806. I discovered "M/R" just stands for "Mobile/Residential", but upon closer inspection of the placard on the stove, found that "706-806 M/R" is DEFINITELY the model number- it cannot be construed to be anything other than what it is, at least not on my label. I tried to take a decent picture of it, but couldn't get one to come out. I wrote to Lennox and asked for any information about the model, and will post any information I get here.

I made sure the "Flame Tamer" thermostatic controlled damper was set to "H" (I could see it open up), and blew as hard as I could into the intake. I then blew into the holes in the firebox side of the damper, and then back up the intake. I also rattled a screwdriver about in the holes, but didn't touch much of anything. It did not draw well even after doing that, but later on when my wife came in and I got ready to close up shop (the stove is in my garage), I closed the door, and the fire kept going! The damper must have cleared out some. I closed the flue, and the fire died back. Great!

I think this may have been a short-lived model, as it's the only one I've seen in their lineup that has the damper in the bottom front. Perhaps they had a problem with people trying to clean out the firebox by scooping ashes up and out the front, rather than shoveling them up, and causing the damper to become occluded.

 

[BrotherBart]

Don't ya just hate it when your stove gets occluded? :lol:

 

[n9viw]

Don't ya just hate it when your stove gets occluded!

Oy, you know it! Seems like it needs something like Ex-Logs, or Pineamint gum. Clears yer orifices but good! :lol:
In a completely shameless thread hijack , where can you find the fiberglass insulation similar to that used for door gasketing, but is flat, to insulate on either side of the tempered glass window in the front door of my Earth Stove? A 6" section of it poked out and has been damaged, and now I don't know if it's introducing additional draft (guessing by the way the smoke moves when I close the door). The gap looks much too thin to use standard round gasketing, and I don't want to pack it with fire cement in case I ever need to replace the glass. Any suggestions?

 

[BrotherBart]

Don't ya just hate it when your stove gets occluded!

Oy, you know it! Seems like it needs something like Ex-Logs, or Pineamint gum. Clears yer orifices but good! :lol:
In a completely shameless thread hijack , where can you find the fiberglass insulation similar to that used for door gasketing, but is flat, to insulate on either side of the tempered glass window in the front door of my Earth Stove? A 6" section of it poked out and has been damaged, and now I don't know if it's introducing additional draft (guessing by the way the smoke moves when I close the door). The gap looks much too thin to use standard round gasketing, and I don't want to pack it with fire cement in case I ever need to replace the glass. Any suggestions?

ACE Hardware carries the the ribbon gasket for stove window glass.

 

[n9viw]

Okay, thanks. I'll check with them.

In a follow-up, I've had maybe a half-dozen fires in mine since I got it. It seems to run hit-or-miss- last time I fired it, it ran like crazy, and actually heated the garage to the point where I was sweating in my hat! That says a lot for a garage that has more in common with the average 150-y-o barn than an actual garage.

Tonight, though, it was all I could do to keep the stupid thing running. It would make coals to beat the band, but except for one brief burst, it wouldn't run at all. I had to use tiny pieces of wood just to keep an open flame, and any largish splits just wouldn't catch. I spent more time splitting wood into tiny bits than I did working on my projects!

The only difference I can think of is the ash- the wood's the same, the chimney's the same, the garage is the same, the weather... well, it was similar. But, ash from the previous fire was still in there tonight, whereas the time before, I cleaned every bit of ash out I could get. Seems to me a bit fussy to have to clean it out every single time, and heaven forbid if you try to bank a fire overnight! Sheesh.

My Atlanta 2-burner box stove could run with three fires-worth of ash in it before I needed to clean it out, but went thru wood like nobody's business. If this thing is going to be this finicky, and this fussy to clean (I needed to cut down a dustpan to fit the door, sweep all the ash to the BACK, then sweep FORWARD into the pan, being sure to NOT get any in the damper!), I'll go back to feeding the monster (the Atlanta) rather than fussing with this goofy thing!

That said, I did get a reply back from Lennox- they sent me a PDF of the owner's manual for the 706-806. If anyone's interested, let me know, and I can email it to you.

Thanks,
Nick

 

[n9viw]

Well, had another fire. This stove is so goofy!

On a suggestion from a member over at Homesteading Today (http://www.homesteadingtoday.com/), I leveled all the ash, and built a fire right on top of it. In the absence of any real directions for building a fire in a stove with a bottom-front vent, I placed two splits as bumpers, one in back, one in front, running left-right. I filled the space between them with crumples of paper, laid kindling over those like rungs in a ladder, and laid a third, smaller split on the kindling. (My splits are typically 18" long, and 6-8" across- quarters or thirds of a trunk typically 8-10" in diameter, or similarly-sized splits off larger pieces. I have not tried whole branches 3-5" yet, as I've had bad luck getting those to go, this thing NEEDS split wood!)

It was slow to start, and I had to relight it a couple times. I think that had more to do with the orientation of the bumpers than anything, and next time I will orient them left and right, running front-back. Once it got started, it really seemed to take off, and I got a grand old fire out of it! The garage was WARM, enough to take off both hat AND coat, and snow started melting off the snowthrowers! Made for a really enjoyable time in there, but for having to stoke the fire and add wood every half hour or so.

On a couple occasions, I let the fire die back, and came back to a happy bed of coals but no burning. I laid a split in the coals and left the door 'shut to', and within a couple minutes it self-started. I left the door cracked until the temps got up to 300* or so (gauging by the Chimstat on the body of the stove), then closed the door. The fire evened out, and would run between 3-400*F.

I'm still not quite 'on' in terms of running this thing, though. It seems to eat just as much as the old Atlanta, and while the more compact body and shroud fan really make this one a winner, I somehow expected better. I think this has more to do with my dampers than anything else. I have the front damper on "H" all the time, and run the flue vent wide open. When I put the front damper to "M", the fire seems to die back very quickly, and I have to open the door to re-establish a burn.
If I leave the front damper on "H" and close the flue damper to 1/2-2/3 closed once a fire is established, it mellows the fire, and kills it just as well as closing the front damper, only more slowly. My only indication this has happened is the gradual cooling of the garage, and often the first visible note of my breath clues me in that something's wrong. When I open the stove door, a gout of smoke comes out unless I remember to open the flue damper first. If I note the dampers' positions and open the flue damper, the coals sit and smolder until I open the stove to give the logs a poke, at which point they usually spring back into flame after a short bit.

Does this sound like normal running? Am I remiss in thinking that I should be able to get an active burn, with good heat, without having to feed the stove every half hour?