howdy
So I've now been burning with my new Quad for about 3 weeks. I have some observations and some questions.
1) After starting the original fire, I've only had to restart once from scratch. There are ALWAYS coals in this thing. As some people have indicated on this board, this is probably an indication that my wood is not properly seasoned (it's not). What I mean is not just that there are coals at the end of a burn but that the logs seem to turn to charcoal pretty quickly (they are dark and still have lots of heat value left in them). (To be fair, though, this mostly happens when burning low at night to extend the heat output over the course of the night). However, perhaps because I don't have experience burning in a stove like this with dry wood, having lots of coals doesn't seem like the worst thing in the world. I can have a 4-5" layer of them which will burn at 300F for a couple of hours.
2) I'm not sure what kind of burn times I'm getting but they are certainly not, say, 10-12 hours. Counting time with coals putting out good heat and having stocked it well, I'm probably getting 5-8 hours. I'm sure that I could do better with good wood.
3) Despite the wet(ish) wood, I appear to be using quite a bit less wood than last year. Of course, it's not gotten real cold yet. It's supposed to get to 10F tonight; has been in the teens some days; lots of days in the 20s. But, eventually we'll be <0F for, probably extended periods.
4) My glass stays mostly clean. Only one time did it get dirty and then it cleaned itself later.
5) I try to keep my burn temperature at about 300-350F. This is measured from a magnetic thermometer stuck on the pipe about 2.5' above the top of the stove. It says that 300F is the low end of what it calls "efficient burn." When I look at the chimney outside I rarely see smoke when at anything above 300F. I think the coal burning period is also smoke free.
I know that many other people talk about burning at temperatures substantially above 300-350F. Is there a downside (given no smoke, etc...) to my burning lower? I haven't checked my chimney yet but I suspect that it's going to be dirtier than with my old smoke dragon (since so much of the heat went up the chimney with it, burning off any build up).
6) 2nd stage burn: It definitely starts happening after the newly loaded wood gets going above 300-350, but it doesn't seem to last too long (probably no more than an hour per load). Is this normal? Wet wood again?
Anyway, all in all, I'm pretty happy with the QF 5700. It, compared to my Wonderwood, is night and day ;-)
JR
So I've now been burning with my new Quad for about 3 weeks. I have some observations and some questions.
1) After starting the original fire, I've only had to restart once from scratch. There are ALWAYS coals in this thing. As some people have indicated on this board, this is probably an indication that my wood is not properly seasoned (it's not). What I mean is not just that there are coals at the end of a burn but that the logs seem to turn to charcoal pretty quickly (they are dark and still have lots of heat value left in them). (To be fair, though, this mostly happens when burning low at night to extend the heat output over the course of the night). However, perhaps because I don't have experience burning in a stove like this with dry wood, having lots of coals doesn't seem like the worst thing in the world. I can have a 4-5" layer of them which will burn at 300F for a couple of hours.
2) I'm not sure what kind of burn times I'm getting but they are certainly not, say, 10-12 hours. Counting time with coals putting out good heat and having stocked it well, I'm probably getting 5-8 hours. I'm sure that I could do better with good wood.
3) Despite the wet(ish) wood, I appear to be using quite a bit less wood than last year. Of course, it's not gotten real cold yet. It's supposed to get to 10F tonight; has been in the teens some days; lots of days in the 20s. But, eventually we'll be <0F for, probably extended periods.
4) My glass stays mostly clean. Only one time did it get dirty and then it cleaned itself later.
5) I try to keep my burn temperature at about 300-350F. This is measured from a magnetic thermometer stuck on the pipe about 2.5' above the top of the stove. It says that 300F is the low end of what it calls "efficient burn." When I look at the chimney outside I rarely see smoke when at anything above 300F. I think the coal burning period is also smoke free.
I know that many other people talk about burning at temperatures substantially above 300-350F. Is there a downside (given no smoke, etc...) to my burning lower? I haven't checked my chimney yet but I suspect that it's going to be dirtier than with my old smoke dragon (since so much of the heat went up the chimney with it, burning off any build up).
6) 2nd stage burn: It definitely starts happening after the newly loaded wood gets going above 300-350, but it doesn't seem to last too long (probably no more than an hour per load). Is this normal? Wet wood again?
Anyway, all in all, I'm pretty happy with the QF 5700. It, compared to my Wonderwood, is night and day ;-)
JR