Burner tubes

[realstihl]

About a month ago I bought a new Lexinton Forge wood stove and have a question about burner tubes. If I really fire it hard the tubes turn cherry red. Will this shorten their life span? I really like like this stove and am surprised not more is mentioned about them. The glass does stay clean. Bought it at end of season close out for about half price.

 

[edthedawg]

Not sure what your primary/secondary intake controls are exactly like, but on mine the primary is operator-variable, but the secondary is effectively unalterable (open all the time). Closing the primary, I notice the tubes make cooling "noises" (characteristic tick-tick-tick) as the draft pulls more air thru the tubes vs. the primary ports.

Where is your primary setting when you are both "burning it really hard" and the tubes are "cherry red"? If your setup is anything like I've described above, and primary is wide open, you might similarly benefit more from backing it down and driving more air thru the tubes...

 

[realstihl]

No it does it when draft control is shut down. Mine does make that noise you speak of. Puts on a good light show too. Just wondered about the tubes. Thanks!

 

[burntime]

Mine glow, several people say that it is normal. I think thats near complete combustion and what its supposed to do. I know on my insert there are people that run it 100 degrees hotter then I ever have so I am not worrying. Keep it within specs of your manual. It has been thoroughly tested to do it...

 

[karri0n]

The burn tubes are indeed made to glow red. It's this heat that ensures the secondary combustion.

 

[BrotherBart]

The glowing tubes are normal in a tube style re-burn non-cat stove. The flames from the tubes heat the tubes in front of them and cause them to glow.

 

[WidowMaker]

I use to burn out a set of tubes about every 3 years in my Lopi Endeavor, until I went to the stainless steel tubes from the next size larger Lopi, same dia., only longer. Cut them down to correct lenght an drilled new keeper pin holes and all is good...oh yea my tubes are red a good deal of the time when it's really cold outside and I'm burning hot and hard, not a sign of damage to the stainless tubes after 3 years...

 

[realstihl]

I fairly sure the ones I have now are SS but not heavy guage. Looks like around 14 ga. or 1/16 thick. I'm already thinking about that mod. when tubes burn out. Have a 5 year warranty on tubes. Time will tell!

 

[jtp10181]

I have only seen one customer warp them on a Quad unit. They are solid stainless. This customer had removed half of their baffle board and the insulation blanket was smashed up into a ball almost blocking the flue outlet. I have no idea how they even used it like that. Actually now that I think about it they had the tubes in the closet when I got there because they kept falling out (because they lost the screws and pins for them, which they denied). They must have warped them before that though. I bet they had those things white hot, totally clueless people. There was a frayed out lamp cord with half the shielding missing in a few spots going across the opposite wall, my tech almost got electrocuted by it when we were doing the repairs.

 

[YZF1R]

This past Saturday evening I had my tubes glowing red. I could notice a bit of a hot smell for about 5 minutes, then a few tick noises as it cooled down a little to where the tubes were almost glowing red. I had loaded the stove about full, to 2 inch's or a little less from the tubes. After it got going I shut the primary air off as I have always done. It was a half hour or so after that when the tubes got that hot. I guess all the wood on the surface got hot enough to do its' initial burn all at once. I thought maybe I was overfiring but perhaps not acording to the manual. The manual states in bold:

Do not over-fire this heater.
Overfiring may cause a house fire, or can result in
permanent damage to the stove. If an exterior part
of the Montpelier Medium Insert glows, you are
overfiring.

Well, no exterior part was glowing, or any cast part. Just the tubes inside. I guess it was OK, but I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that yet. The little bit of hot smell I had just didn't smell like new hot paint, it just smelled more HOT. That's the best I can explain it.

Steve