Burning on warmer days

[velocity1]

HI All,
Next 2 days are going to be high 40's to low 50's but then the weekend will turn colder. Currently stove has a bed of coals and middle of the house is sitting around 79/80 degrees (stove is on one end of the house). How do you all burn differently in between when there is a block of warmer days? Or do you just let it burn out and the restart? I have a Cat stove so seems to make more sense to keep it going versus restarting in the next few days. Is it better to just put a log or two in to let keep burning or do you still continue to load it up and keep a window open if needed? thanks

 

[begreen]

It depends on whether the days will be sunny or cloudy. If sunny, I know the house will be solar heated from about 10am to 3pm. In that case, I make a 50% load fire and let it burn out. If it's going to be cloudy and in the low 40s then I will burn a full load and bank it down pretty aggressively. This is how we are burning now. The cycle is a full load at 7:30am and a reload around 5-6pm. Reload timing depends on the wood, how well packed the stove was, etc. so it's hard to be precise. Then at say 6pm I will load in about 4-5 large splits. The goal is to keep the house warm until about 1am, then let it gradually cool down. This is because we prefer cooler sleeping temps.

Last night got to 29º so I put an additional split on the fire at 11pm. This morning I restarted from the remaining coals at 6:50am. The fire has been burning for almost 3 hrs now, stove temp is 550º. When the temp range on a cloudy day is in the mid 40s we just run smaller loads, typically starting with about 5-6 splits and reloading with 2-3 splits about 6 hrs later. That keeps things from overheating. Run this way we keep the house temp right around 72º with little swing in room temp except in the living room where the stove is. There it can go up to 74 or 75º. The mass of the castiron jacket on the stove helps a lot with this. I didn't have this degree of control with the more radiant F400.

 

[velocity1]

Very insightful thank you! I was kind of leaning towards a few splits so Ill give that a try and see how that goes for the house temps.

 

[stoveliker]

I have a cat stove too. It turns down a lot.
I also have a minisplit. Both are good at higher outside temps.
Given that I hear my minisplit defrost when it's 35 F or lower outside, and that makes me cringe (seeing the BTUs evaporate outside...), I made myself a deal last year to use the stove below 35 F.
This year I have more dry wood, so if it's below 40 F I use the stove.

BUT, my stove likes continuous burning, like yours I think. So I only stop burning if it's above 40 F for 24 hours or more.

I.e. if it's 30 at night and 44 during the day (as in today), I'll load the stove full at night, keep the home the way I want it. The burn time of my firebox is long enough that I have quite a bit of fuel left in the morning. So what I do then is I dial it down by a lot and keep the stove simmering during the day. Keep the cat firmly but only just in the active range. Then, when it cools down again around 5-ish, I dial up and add a split or two depending on how much fuel is left. Then the stove is nice and warm for the night reload at 10-11. pm.

My load from last night (which was not even a full load) is still going. Burned normally keeping the home around 68 F overnight (bedrooms cooler), and simmering during the day. (In the end I didn't even need the minisplit due to the simmering...) Though I need to add some wood in the next hour I think to reach 10 pm.

Rinse and repeat.

So, I don't only look at outside temps, I look at how long they are warm or cold.
Given the long burns my stove can do (of course only at these outside temps when I don't need that much heat), it only makes sense to shut the stove down if it's more than 24 hrs above my minisplit temperature. Anything shorter and it's just easier to keep the stove simmering. THat doesn't even cost more wood as starting from a cold stove one has to heat up the stove, the flue, etc, going through some (not negligible) amount of wood too.

My two cents. Good that you are thinking about it.
It all depends on stove characteristics and home (energy loss) characteristics.

 

[kennyp2339]

I have the ability to turn way down, but I like when it gets 74 or so, I then open up the storm door, drop the screen some and get that nice fresh air flowing inside.

 

[velocity1]

I have a cat stove too. It turns down a lot.
I also have a minisplit. Both are good at higher outside temps.
Given that I hear my minisplit defrost when it's 35 F or lower outside, and that makes me cringe (seeing the BTUs evaporate outside...), I made myself a deal last year to use the stove below 35 F.
This year I have more dry wood, so if it's below 40 F I use the stove.

BUT, my stove likes continuous burning, like yours I think. So I only stop burning if it's above 40 F for 24 hours or more.

I.e. if it's 30 at night and 44 during the day (as in today), I'll load the stove full at night, keep the home the way I want it. The burn time of my firebox is long enough that I have quite a bit of fuel left in the morning. So what I do then is I dial it down by a lot and keep the stove simmering during the day. Keep the cat firmly but only just in the active range. Then, when it cools down again around 5-ish, I dial up and add a split or two depending on how much fuel is left. Then the stove is nice and warm for the night reload at 10-11. pm.

My load from last night (which was not even a full load) is still going. Burned normally keeping the home around 68 F overnight (bedrooms cooler), and simmering during the day. (In the end I didn't even need the minisplit due to the simmering...) Though I need to add some wood in the next hour I think to reach 10 pm.

Rinse and repeat.

So, I don't only look at outside temps, I look at how long they are warm or cold.
Given the long burns my stove can do (of course only at these outside temps when I don't need that much heat), it only makes sense to shut the stove down if it's more than 24 hrs above my minisplit temperature. Anything shorter and it's just easier to keep the stove simmering. THat doesn't even cost more wood as starting from a cold stove one has to heat up the stove, the flue, etc, going through some (not negligible) amount of wood too.

My two cents. Good that you are thinking about it.
It all depends on stove characteristics and home (energy loss) characteristics.

Yeah, the Manchester definitely prefers the continuous burns. Really takes some time to get that even heat through the house but once it does it cruises.
It still amazes me hearing the burn times some of you get, granted Im still doing the best with the crap wood i got but just hearing loading it up at night and still having that much fuel the next day seems wild lol. Right now I usually load around 9 at night and still have enough coals by 6am to start another load. One thing for certain I learned with this stove is I need to find someone who delivers longer splints. Not knowing really a whole lot when I first started the stove adventure I didn't realize just how big this firebox is compared to what standard split sizes firewood providers deliver. I think getting those longer splits plus better wood will make a big difference.

 

[xman23]

When you get it right the house is within a few degrees of what you want. Actually not that hard. One trick I use is set the thermostat to 66. Then run the stove keeping the house at 70. Nobody notices the house getting cold.

 

[stoveliker]

Yeah, the Manchester definitely prefers the continuous burns. Really takes some time to get that even heat through the house but once it does it cruises.
It still amazes me hearing the burn times some of you get, granted Im still doing the best with the crap wood i got but just hearing loading it up at night and still having that much fuel the next day seems wild lol. Right now I usually load around 9 at night and still have enough coals by 6am to start another load. One thing for certain I learned with this stove is I need to find someone who delivers longer splints. Not knowing really a whole lot when I first started the stove adventure I didn't realize just how big this firebox is compared to what standard split sizes firewood providers deliver. I think getting those longer splits plus better wood will make a big difference.

Meaning you're doing it right: load at night, reload w/o matches in the morning. The grass is always greener someplace else, but seriously, I think that 40 years ago folks were only able to do this with a humongous box that guzzled wood. Being able to do this is a testament to the development that wood stoves have seen (not in small part due to EPA requirements).

Yes, our stoves like to just keep chugging away slowly - it's not a quick rocket blast of heat. And therefore that requires some planning to keep the home comfortable. (Or a few gallons of oil - it's not a sin to use what's convenient...)

 

[DuaeGuttae]

I live in South Central Texas and burn much of our mild winter. There are definitely times that I will let the stove go out (when it’s in the 70’s and sunny, for instance, as it was yesterday afternoon.) When I have coals left in the stove and know that I won‘t want to stoke the fire for a day, I do sometimes “bank” the coals. Basically I just push the coals to the back of the stove with my ash rake. Instead of then raking them forward as I would do for a reload, I use my shovel to scoop a little ash from underneath and then bury them with that. I keep the air control fully closed. That can keep coals going for a day or more and make relights easier.

I have heard that in some setups that are prone to backdrafting, banking coals could lead to a carbon monoxide danger. We have a strong draft even in mild temperatures, and our carbon monoxide detector has never registered anything over 0 from the stove, but I can’t say whether it would work well in your setup.

 

[firefighterjake]

No cat stove, but I find it pretty easy to heat the house according to the needs of the day.

It took me a couple years to learn how though . . .

If temps are on the milder side (say in the 40s or 50s) . . . too cool to go without heat . . . or if it's cool in the morning, but forecast to warm up nicely later on (think early fall, late spring). I'll do a single fire, utilize my punks/chunks/uglies and lower BTU wood (this is where my pine shines) AND (most important lesson I've learned here) resist the urge to keep the fire going by adding more wood after it has burned down to small coals even if the outside temp is still on the cooler side. I let the heated metal of the stove radiate its heat, long after the coals are no longer visible. The end result is a perfectly warm house (not too cold and not too hot).

In the same way I regulate the temp in the winter without a huge swing in temps (generally I only see about a 10 degree swing either way) as the house is nearly always running at its low of 62 and a high of 72 degrees by using the better BTU wood, filling the firebox with the good wood and reloading sooner or later depending on the heating need, comfort level and present activities (i.e. am I going to bed?)

 

[savageactor7]

Looks like shoulder season is here.

 

[zmender]

I realize the masonry around my stove carries a lot of thermal energy... on milder nights it is enough to keep the living room steady in low-to-mid 60s. I don't have a minisplit so for me it's either wood or oil.

Got called out for a business trip last minute, but I was planning this strategy (L of 40s, H of mid 50s) this week:

1) Use top down fires.. With dry wood and biobricks I can get secondary within 5min or so, and stove will blow hot air within 15min. If I light this fire 7:30am, stove heat will chase the morning chill, get living room to 70F, and keep putting out heat until late afternoon (enough to heat and maintain 68~70F). Decision point to reload (cloudy / windy day / L in the 30s) or let it burn out.

2) No need for full reload - just enough to carry 66F to bedtime. If I can carry 66F in living room by bedtime, masonry will maintain living room to around 62F by next morning.

3) Build another blaze hot fire in morning. Chase the morning chill and heat the house and masonry

 

[Poindexter]

Spring shoulder season here. I do a cold start in the evening, let it rip, let it burn out. With good solar gain during the day I am burning almost nothing for oil, but warm the house back up before my wife gets home.

Depending on your local climate, you can, year over year, adjust your stack height so you can run low and slow at some temperature, but not melt your stove in the depths of winter. I have mine dialed in where I can run low and slow with 20-24 hours burns at maybe +40dF, but not turn my stove into a molten glob at -50dF.

I guess if you wanted to you could pop up on your roof to modify your stack height taller in the spring and shorter every fall, maybe keep a two foot section of chimney in your garage. Sounds like a pain in the neck to me.

 

[Todd]

With high temps in the 30’s to lower 40’s I can get away with 12 hour reloads and not over heat the cabin. 40- 50’s I find it better to just burn a single load in the evening and if needed during the next day I’ll keep the chill off with a little propane. If the suns out this time of year the cabin will hold the heat til the following evening fire.