Vermont Castings Resolute Smoking Problem

[jbilliel]

Guys - I am having an issue with my vermont castings resolute stove. It fires up fine and will pre-heat with little to no smoke. I typically wait until the stove gets very hot and then choke it down with the secondard burn flue in the stove. I also have the air temperature flap all the way open and the secondary little circle air hole all the way open as well. So it should be getting the maximum amount of air with it choked down in the secondary burn position. However, after a while my wife who has allergies notices that the house then gets a little smoky. I can not see any smoke though and prior to starting the fire I cleaned out the ashes and the stove should be fine.

Any ideas on what to check? Feels like its loosing the draw up the chimney and perhaps a little smoke is coming into the house.

Thoughts?

 

[jharkin]

Smoke inside the house? Do you think its backdrafting or is there a lot of smoke outside lingering in the yard getting drawn in through a draft iwndow or such.

First things to check always are:
- Is you chimney clear and sized right to give proper draft
- Is your wood good and dry
- Do you maybe have a negative pressure situation in the house? Try cracking a window to see if it changes.


More specifically to your stove... From your description it sounds like you have the old pre-EPA Resolute. Correct? I'm guessing its got the "1979" cast into the fireback. If yes that was a very early kind of secondary burn stove. To work right you need a VERY good bed of coals before shutting down the damper. In dampened down mode it draws the exhaust out those ducts low down on the sidewalls - the idea is that the exhaust passes over the coals getting superheated and then mixes in the back chamber with extra air let in by that circular flapper on the side. Ive read the proper way to burn one of these is to get the first small load burned to coals, reload, get it up to 500, then damper closed, secondary air wide open, and adjust the primary air for desired heat output.

 

[jbilliel]

Good things to check. I am using a 6" pip which is what they wanted and yes this stove is the prior to the cat models on the secondary burn. I did not think about the wood and while its dry it was not perfectly dry (surface wet but seasoned dry)... Perhaps that is the culpret... I will also try opening the window although when my wife complains I can never see any visual smoke.

 

[jbilliel]

Its a second or third generation so it's not 1979, but it's early 80's... I put all new seals on it last year but that's really it