Damper On A Old Stove

[Plowboy]

I'm burning an old "Country Flame" wood stove in our basement. The last two years I burned one of those up-to date "EPA" stoves and I didn't like anything about it so I went back to the good old stoves that I used for the last 30 years.
My question is that over the years I never had a damper in the stove pipe, I always got the stove going till it got real hot then shut it down and let er go.
But this stove has a damper in the neck of the stove where the pipe fits on the stove. I played around with it, burned it with the damper open and then sometimes shut it. I don't see any different in the way it operates open or close. Are there any old timers out there that can explain the use of a damper and the proper way to use it for a better burn? I did find out that on a real windy day it helps to keep it closed to help slow down the up-draft.

Thanks,

Bill

 

[Duetech]

If you have a good draft in your chimney the damper will help slow down the smoke leaving the chimney and extend your burn times once the stove is hot. The trouble with dampers is they slow the smoke down and actually allow the chimney to cool sometimes to the point where creosote can become a problem. Wood moisture and type of wood and length of chimney and chimney clearance over the roof peak are all factors in the efficiency of the stove.

 

[savageactor7]

Our last 3 stoves had dampers so I kind of feel naked without one even though the stove burns OK.

An inline flue damper is opened to start or load wood into the firebox or whenever the door is opened when a fire burning. Once the stove is burning we never closed ours more than 45* and that was that. Occasionally when a chimney fire happened you could close it all the way and the fire would go out.

If your stove has a manufactured attached flue it probably has holes in it to prevent a total lock down of escaping flue gases. Plowboy With all your experience using flue dampers why not put a conventional one in the flue pipe and find a sweet spot for the stove damper and just leave it alone?

 

[LLigetfa]

If you have single wall smoke pipe between the stove and the chimney, the damper will cause the flow to be closer to the pipe, extracting more heat that would otherwise go up the stack. In the old days, I would use one size smaller and plug the hole in the centre. There's nothing like the warm feeling seeing a cherry pipe at the damper.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

The damper with those old stoves is great and I always considered them necessary. I learned how to use them when I was a little boy (back when we had dinosaurs for pets instead of dogs). Before opening the stove to add wood, open the damper full. Leave it open after putting wood in until the fire gets going good (usually when the wood gets charred). Then close the damper....but not fully closed. Usually about 1/2 way closed is about right at least until you get down to almost all coals. If you want to burn the coals down, then open it full again.