Cutting down the air to stretch out coals?

[mar13]

Mild rains (night and day in low to mid 50s) have reduced my fire needs today. With these temps and not a full stove, I burn with stove cut back to about half or a bit more to get a clean cruise. The house gets warm enough and I want to conserve my wood, so I'd prefer stretch the time out before adding more wood. Once the wood is all (from what I can see) coals, is it perfectly fine to cut the air all the way back to save the coals for later in the day? I'm thinking yes as word on the forum is that coals are not a culprit for creosote. This is a non- cat stove (T5). I'd typically just run the furnace for the rest of the day, but our furnace has been out for a few weeks as we wait for a new part to arrive.

This is a bit opposite of a recent post where someone was trying to run their coals at full air at the end of the night. And yes, probably a perfect scenario for a cat stove

 

[SpaceBus]

I do it all the time in my cookstove and our Morso on mild days. Sometimes I will pour ashes over the coals to insulate them and keep them hot for many hours. As long as the wood has completed off gassing then you should be fine to do whatever you want with the air control.

 

[xman23]

For my stove it doesn't mater what you do when a hot stove is only a bed of coals. But if closing off the air is causing smoldering, I would then open it up so they burn out. When you don't need much heat, it's a pain but burn hot fire's and let it go out. I do a morning and evening fires.

 

[St. Coemgen]

As for most things... it depends.

If the fire was hot, and the coals are hot, I have no problems tamping down the air.

But if the fire went out a while ago, and the coals are cooling off, tamping down the air is a bad idea, and will cause smoldering. Then I either try to relight the fire, or let the fire go out completely with the secondary air full open.