check my draft?

[colophoto]

Hi folks,
so I'm now a month an a half into my wood burning career. at roughly the same time I got a VC Montpieler insert at home and a quadrafire 2100 at our little 600sf cabin. We decided to do some winter cabin-ing this last weekend and after a frustrating month at home with the insert I've got more questions.
In both locations I've got wood that measures dry on the moisture meter, but I have to pick carefully because some in the stack isn't ready. in both cases it's pine.
The quadrafire stove goes straight up to a 10' ceiling and then another 6 or 7 feet of chimney on top. because it's in a windy location we have a damper in the chimney and it's got the dual air controls. I found that by following what I have been told it was super easy to get to a 450-500 temperature on the flue pipe (measured 1-4" above the stove top) and the center of the stove top got to 600-700. All of this generally happened in the first load or with one reload. Temps were single digit outside and the stove is the only heat in the place.
At home it is harder to measure since it's an insert, but my overall impression is that we're just not getting the same kind of heat. When I look outside I rarely see smoke, mostly just heat waves. it takes many loads to get the temp at the door (just above to either side) to get to 400.
The big difference I noticed is that at the cabin I had to actively use the damper to keep from getting the fire going too much. at home with everything wide open I just don't seem to be getting the heat output (it's really the furnace that keeps us warm) and have never even come close to thinking "wow that's really going"

I'm not sure if we have inadequate draft at home or what since there's no smoke in the house or visible smoke outside maybe that's not an issue? I'm just not sure what to do, but I don't feel like I'm getting the heat I should at home. any ideas?

thanks!
Mark

 

[brenndatomu]

Try closing the air control in several steps over a 10-15 minute time span, these stoves make the real heat when they are closed down some, heat just goes up the chimney otherwise. If you can't maintain a good fire when closing the air control slowly, then you wood is not dry enough. Are you splitting the wood and testing MC on the freshly exposed side?

 

[colophoto]

I am bringing the wood inside for anywhere from a few hours to a day to get it warm, then I haul it back out and split. Run right back inside and hit it with the moisture meter (prongs in line with grain on newly exposed surface). As a test I did this with some recently cut walnut, got 32%. My pine measures 10-12% pretty regularly.

Can you check this logic.....
I've been burning top down fires (no real problems getting them to light). I start things wide open and burn 15-30 min depending on how anything looks. Then I turn on my blower medium or low, sometimes I have to wait for it to think its warm enough to come on. Then I close about halfway down. After 1-2 hours I have to reload so I open up, reload and let it go 15 ,I'm before closing down....I mostly don't close down if it doesn't seem like anything is really going.

Maybe I just need to close down anyway as long as the flames stay? Even though its pine it seems like a short time before I need to reload.

 

[Ram 1500 with an axe...]

I have the montpelier as well, I feel it requires high btu, dry wood and you need to load it pretty full to achieve very nice heat output. Do you have under 20% red oak or black locust? How many approximate pounds of wood do you load at a time? How long are you burning each time? I find after 10 hours of burning, I can overheat my room......there are lots of variables with this unit, but you need to find out what works for you best, keep burning, keep learning and keep asking questions.....

 

[brenndatomu]

10-12% sounds really low. It's really hard to get much below 15% in a lot of USA climates. FYI, kiln dried lumber checks in around 8%. The freshly cut walnut at 32% is possible, but that sounds low too.
Try turning air down (slooowly) 'til the fire dies, then bump it up a notch 'til fire comes back.
When you are reloading on hot coals, you should be able to turn the air down almost immediately if your wood is dry...

 

[Ram 1500 with an axe...]

If your running lower btu wood at a high MC through the montpelier you will not achieve a great amount of heat. This unit requires high btu, dry wood for a few hours, fan on medium and controlling the air to create awesome heat.... How many sqft are you trying to heat?

 

[colophoto]

The 10-12% seems consistent, the thing I don't get is that the wood that I bang together and get the crack sound that feels lighter seems to measure the same as the wood that goes thunk and is heavier at the same relative size. The walnut was standing dead to my untrained eye it looks like its on the way to dry. If I put the moisture meter on my hand and press I get mid 30's

I unfortunately don't have any good dry hardwoods. I'm scavenging city hardwoods now for next year and the year after. When I load up it seems to fit nicely with two 4-5" splits on the bottom, some 2" kindling and then the little stuff. After initial fire I add 1-2 5-6" splits. Tonight I started 3 hours ago and just about 20 min ago my blower finally kicked on. Dog thinks its great on the floor. I'm on the couch 6' away and don't really feel it.

I closed down about 3/4 of the way in increments and for a few min had some slow lazy secondaries then lost flame. Now opening back up slowly I've gone pretty much to open and have lots of red glowing coals but no flames back.

 

[colophoto]

Our open plan kitchen/dining/living room comes in at 900sf or so. The insert is on the garage wall of that space otherwise centered. It doesn't even make it into the kitchen which is 12-15 feet away (only an island in the way)

 

[colophoto]

Grabbed a 7" half round from beside the fire, split it open just now, inside is cool not cold digital food thermometer says 58.5 on the fresh split surface. Mm says 10%. Placed on my palm mm says 41.4%.

I'm absolutely ready to believe the wood isn't dry enough but the meter doesn't seem to back that up.

 

[Hogwildz]

The more open the air is, the more heat going up the stack. Once you have a good established fire going, try closing the air back as far as you can.
Make sure you have a block off plate installed in the damper are of the fireplace firebox.
And make sure the wood is really ready.

 

[colophoto]

Have a block off plate, learned to want one and how to do one here from all of the awesome smart people on this forum who I wish could come over and show me how to do the rest (heck, I even have beer and friendly dogs)

 

[colophoto]

Does it matter much/ at all that my insert is on the wall to the garage with just cement block behind it? The garage is easily 0 now while outside is -7. It is not a zero clearance unti as far as I know.