It‘s not a big deal with cold starts in the morning if you use a good fire starter like Super Cedars or make your own with sawdust and wax. Just load your splits like you would on top coals and place the starter in front and light.
Did I buy the wrong stove?
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What kind of wood are you burning? [edit - I see now you mention ash and oak] How tall is it from floor to the chimney cap? If I have packed my firebox full at 10pm, I will always have enough coals (hiding under a layer of ash) even until 9-10am the next morning to relight with at worst a couple of strips of kindling directly on the coals and larger splits on top. I usually even have enough coals 24 hours later to rake to the front, drop some kindling on, load the stove with splits/rounds, and shut the door and have a fire going 10-15 minutes later.
Make sure you're leaving at least an inch if not 2+ of ash on the floor. I also use very large rounds/splits on the bottom - a 6+" diameter round shoved down into the ash on the bottom, and the rest of your splits loaded on top and wedged carefully down around the sides gives me great results as far as having coals in the morning. Ideally you need 16" lengths on the wood, with some slightly shorter maybe 12" pieces to put up top where the secondary air box starts taking up space at the back and you can't fit 16" long pieces. I am burning very dry hardwoods - mostly mulberry so far this year.
I agree with most of the others that I would probably not be shelling out $4K+ for a different stove if it were me. I'd give it a year or two and also keep an eye on your electricity bills. As begreen was saying you may find that your heat pump, even if it is kicking on, is not having to do too much for the couple of hours. You will be hard pressed to find anything that uses as little wood as the Aspen C3, especially when you don't really need a biger stove with higher BTU output for your climate. Mine has been perfect for having one fire per day, late in the evening, when we're in the 20s-30s at night and sunny and 40-50 during the day since the house absorbs enough heat from the sun. However, when you get a colder spell, you can keep it going and feed it every 6 hours and get more heat. 1500 sq. ft. is pushing it for the stove's heat output but if only getting down to the 20s, I'd bet it should be adequate.
Make sure you're leaving at least an inch if not 2+ of ash on the floor. I also use very large rounds/splits on the bottom - a 6+" diameter round shoved down into the ash on the bottom, and the rest of your splits loaded on top and wedged carefully down around the sides gives me great results as far as having coals in the morning. Ideally you need 16" lengths on the wood, with some slightly shorter maybe 12" pieces to put up top where the secondary air box starts taking up space at the back and you can't fit 16" long pieces. I am burning very dry hardwoods - mostly mulberry so far this year.
I agree with most of the others that I would probably not be shelling out $4K+ for a different stove if it were me. I'd give it a year or two and also keep an eye on your electricity bills. As begreen was saying you may find that your heat pump, even if it is kicking on, is not having to do too much for the couple of hours. You will be hard pressed to find anything that uses as little wood as the Aspen C3, especially when you don't really need a biger stove with higher BTU output for your climate. Mine has been perfect for having one fire per day, late in the evening, when we're in the 20s-30s at night and sunny and 40-50 during the day since the house absorbs enough heat from the sun. However, when you get a colder spell, you can keep it going and feed it every 6 hours and get more heat. 1500 sq. ft. is pushing it for the stove's heat output but if only getting down to the 20s, I'd bet it should be adequate.
fvhowler
Feeling the Heat
I prefer to start new fires on the coal bed. It just seems more efficient to me. Easy, peasy just rake some coals to the front and reload some kindling and splits and wham, a new fire. In my somewhat small 1.7 stove I've gone 14 hours between loads and could restart without artificial means. I like that!
To the OP, just keep burning your stove and i guarantee, that with every burning season, you'll learn how to use it better and more efficiently. Heck, my heatpump stays turned off most of the winter and only on the coldest nights (mid-teens) do I use it as back up.
To the OP, just keep burning your stove and i guarantee, that with every burning season, you'll learn how to use it better and more efficiently. Heck, my heatpump stays turned off most of the winter and only on the coldest nights (mid-teens) do I use it as back up.
From the top of the stove to the chimney cap is about 18ft. I have Duravent DVL double wall chimney connector going into triple wall class A chimney pipe. I have had to be careful not to over fire it doing hot reloads. My first attempt for and all night burn was a complete fail. I stupidly loaded a really hot stove with way too many splits that were too small. When the temps kept rising and I noticed a faint glow between the cook plate and the flu outlet, I capped the air intake with aluminum foil, and luckily averted a meltdown! Lesson learned.
Your burn times sound really good. That gives me some hope I might could get a little more out of it. I really like the idea of using some rounds and having some shorter pieces on hand for the top. The rounds might be less likely to over fire and the small pieces might help me to be more gentle on that upper baffle too.
I have compared past electric bills and the reduction is very significant with the addition of the wood stove. Now if I could just get the kids not to take 1 hour showers. The biggest complaint with the heat pump, was when it was super cold you never really felt warm and it would run almost 24/7. The wood stove solves that problem. Even if the heat pump kicks on while the wood stove is going it still feels warmer inside. I have also realized that having it kick on occasionally when the when it is very cold probably helps get some more heat to the back bedrooms. The colder it is outside the bigger the temperature difference gets since the stove is on the far end of the house and bedrooms are down a hall on the other. The auxiliary resistance heater in the air handler has turned on zero times this year which is also good. I bought a dehumidifier which helped with perceived warmth. We get a fair amount of rain and high humidity in the winter and the heat pump doesn't dehumidify. Believe it or not, the wood stove doesn't dry the house out enough either. I figured this out with a hygrometer while fighting condensation issues...that could be a whole other thread though.
The good thing, as mentioned before, is we really like the stove, it functions well, and is really user friendly. It honestly does exactly what I bought it for. I somehow got a touch of the "wood heat only syndrome" which I hadn't anticipated. This thread has done a good job of helping me get through that.
Thanks again to all for the helpful advice. I am looking forward to trying several things that were mentioned. I feel like the kind members of hearth.com have saved me from spending some money I may not have needed to.
Easy fix - turn down your water heater, and make sure you get your shower first!
I tried this last night. Wow! What a big difference. Who knew all this by time I’d been building the fire wrong.
I only used two pieces of fatwood at the top with 1 piece of paper under a small split. Draft established quickly and since the stove was already full underneath I waited about 15 min, closed the door, and was good to go.
This may be the game changer we needed since one of my wife’s frustrations was AM restarts.
EbS-P
Minister of Fire
Light it close the door. I use 1 small 6”x1”x.5” of fat wood. It’s all it takes with a good load of dry kindling
Yup Took me a year with the new epa stove before i discovered the top down start. Total game changer. That's why i make all these Top Down youtube vids. My wife does it now when before her bottom up starts almost always smoked like crazy, then went out. Then "Honey will you do it". What a mess that was. Now she is 100% good starts with top down. She uses the fatwood like Ebs.
Okay, you're about 5.5' taller than my setup, and I have single wall instead of double wall stove pipe. That will likely reduce your burn times some due to higher draft. For sure, it's good to be able to shut things down. I have a couple feet of intake duct and a blast gate out on the end, away from the stove, so I can get to it to shut it down if needed.
Of course I'm not getting hardly any usable heat after 12 hours, but if I still have coals and you don't, that definitely means you can do better and get heat output longer. Even an hour or so longer sounds like it might make a huge difference in your situation. I hope it would be enough to make the difference for your overnight timing.
Here's how I typically load the stove. You can see the smoke starting from the pic of the reload onto coals I've raked to the front, and you can't quite see a couple more pieces hiding back in the dark at the top of the stove. The second photo is a typical top down cold start. I'd probably use a little more kindling around the paper now. Either will yield enough coals for a matchless relight 12 hours later.
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Very nice. Thanks for the pictures! I plan on incorporating some round pieces into my future firewood.
Lack of draft certainly is not an issue with my setup. The blast gate idea sounds interesting. I have a pretty close heat shield so I’m not sure I’d have room to attach anything to the intake.
I have considered a damper, but really don’t want to add another layer of complexity if I don’t have to. I think I will exhaust wood size/type/shape options first.
Too hot for a fire tonight, but tomorrow I will be testing some of the things I’m learning on here.
I started to write more about the blast gate but figured I was getting wordy enough with my last response. VC does not allow dampers to be installed per the manual. Several of us with Aspen C3s have used the blast gates to help control airflow at the intake side instead. I generally leave it cracked about an inch open and don't touch it at all now. You might consider messing around with this if your draft is a little high due to your chimney height. VC recommends 16' from floor to chimney cap (equates to roughly 14' from top of stove) so you are 4' taller.
After some trial and error I was able to find a position that I can leave the gate in and not touch it - basically open just enough that the secondary flames stay nice and active late in the fire. If I had it shut down a little too much it would reduce peak temps initially but then the flames would die out too quickly later on, from not getting quite enough air. I wouldn't mess with this yet if I were you though, other than maybe just to have a gate that you leave fully open and shut down if it's getting out of control. Experimenting with sizing of firewood and how you load first is the place to start.
And don't get hung up on the small rounds I have in there, necessarily - I use whatever I have. I love being able to heat the house for a night on one large round and a bunch of smaller branch wood because I have a ton from this one mulberry I cut up. You could probably pack similarly sized splits in better with less space between them and maybe increase the burn time further. Definitely have 1-2 big splits/rounds on the bottom, though. My record for active flames on the coals in the firebox is 9.5 hours after a cold start and it would've gone longer if I'd let it. The stove is certainly capable.
After some trial and error I was able to find a position that I can leave the gate in and not touch it - basically open just enough that the secondary flames stay nice and active late in the fire. If I had it shut down a little too much it would reduce peak temps initially but then the flames would die out too quickly later on, from not getting quite enough air. I wouldn't mess with this yet if I were you though, other than maybe just to have a gate that you leave fully open and shut down if it's getting out of control. Experimenting with sizing of firewood and how you load first is the place to start.
And don't get hung up on the small rounds I have in there, necessarily - I use whatever I have. I love being able to heat the house for a night on one large round and a bunch of smaller branch wood because I have a ton from this one mulberry I cut up. You could probably pack similarly sized splits in better with less space between them and maybe increase the burn time further. Definitely have 1-2 big splits/rounds on the bottom, though. My record for active flames on the coals in the firebox is 9.5 hours after a cold start and it would've gone longer if I'd let it. The stove is certainly capable.
I live about 200 miles north of you in deep southern Illinois, assuming you are in far north MS. We have a small stove, the dreaded Country Hearth 2000, which took me about 2 years to understand. It burns quickly, too; it basically runs hot or not. I hardly ever pack it, I find a fire temp of 350-390 to be just what I like. I agree with many other posters that a quick burn can be easier to deal with when you have a relatively warm climate. I process my own wood, too, and although I could probably be getting a little more efficiency with a larger stove, I don't mind. I live in the forest, however, so availability of deadfall and windfall to harvest for firewood is not an issue. My new-ish heat pump is only 14 seer, but much more efficient than the 22-year-old model it replaced. Heating bills are not so painful. I would stay with what you have, trading more heat for more control. But then again, I use a battery-powered chainsaw! 
@wjohn thanks so much for taking the time to share this detailed information.
Good info about the damper not being allowed. I’ll cross that idea off the list.
If I were to use a blast gate, is there one that fits on the intake?
Even if I don’t experiment with it yet for air control, I like the idea of an “emergency brake”(that isn’t Reynolds’s wrap).
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spudman99
Feeling the Heat
Burning wood is a lifestyle, not necessarily a requirement in your area. I find that we like the 71deg temp in the family room with the insert as opposed to the 68deg and constant (seemingly) cool air from the heat pump. Problem is the 2nd floor bedroom on cold days (sub 20deg) will be 61. Oh well...thats snuggle temps..hehe.
Decide what you like and test drive what you have for a bit. I would highly recommend considering upgrading your heat pump first. Typical life of a unit is 18 years so you are reaching its outer limits. A modern heat pump uses about 3k watts to run the condenser, that is the equivalent of 2 small space heaters or hair dryers. They are pretty efficient and its hard to save lots of cash with that low of a draw. Also a new unit will save you much more during the cooling season in efficiency. Cut, split and stack your woods now for next year. don't ever think you have enough or it is dry enough. Better wood = better fires = better experience.
Decide what you like and test drive what you have for a bit. I would highly recommend considering upgrading your heat pump first. Typical life of a unit is 18 years so you are reaching its outer limits. A modern heat pump uses about 3k watts to run the condenser, that is the equivalent of 2 small space heaters or hair dryers. They are pretty efficient and its hard to save lots of cash with that low of a draw. Also a new unit will save you much more during the cooling season in efficiency. Cut, split and stack your woods now for next year. don't ever think you have enough or it is dry enough. Better wood = better fires = better experience.
I picked up a plastic 4" blast gate at Menards because I already had a 4" outside air intake in the wall from the previous ZC fireplace and was going to reuse that. I then used an adapter to take it down to 3" and ran 3" flexible aluminum duct to the stove intake. The flexible duct doesn't really fit well with the stove intake. Then someone on here mentioned that pellet stove vent fits the intake about perfectly and I got a 90 degree elbow of that to make the connection and adapted to the flexible duct from that side. It's not the most aesthetically pleasing setup but you could probably do something nicer. I would run 3" duct/pipe to wherever you want to locate the blast gate, so you don't have to reach around behind the stove. You can get metal blast gates online, I believe, which would be a better choice for something located within the clearance requirements of the stove. If aesthetics are more of a concern than ergonomics of reaching back there then you can probably adapt one basically right to the intake and you'd never be able to see it from the front.
@spudman99 Thanks to your's, everyone's advice, I am planning on holding out for a new heat pump when needed. At 22 years I realize mine is on borrowed time, and new one would be even more efficient. I actually had my wood supply built up and seasoned before I installed the stove. I read enough here during the planning phases to avoid that mistake thankfully. I even have a strategic firewood reserve out of the weather in case for some reason I can't cut wood one year. I might need to join the firewood hoarders club.
@wjohn That sounds like a plan. I'm headed to town later to see what I can find. I'll report back with what I come up with and maybe include some pictures. I read your other thread about how hot things could/should be with the Aspen C3 and am pretty convinced now my draft could use a bit more control at times.
@wjohn That sounds like a plan. I'm headed to town later to see what I can find. I'll report back with what I come up with and maybe include some pictures. I read your other thread about how hot things could/should be with the Aspen C3 and am pretty convinced now my draft could use a bit more control at times.
@EbS-P I tried shutting the door right away after top down lighting and it worked great! Thanks for that tip.
@wjohn I could not find a blast gate in town. I did however buy some foil HVAC tape and covered the circular hole in the damper flap. I couldn't believe how dusty the intake was. I vacuumed it out and brushed it the best I could, but it is still kind of funky.
I lit a fire top down at 12noon and it was 41 F outside. At the 1 hour mark everything was burning nicely. I have a stovetop thermometer in between the cook plate and the flu outlet. It stabilized around 500F at the 1 hour mark and the flapper seemed to be about 95 percent closed. The secondary flames looked more blue/orange and slow as opposed to yellow and fast like I'm used to seeing. I think I am making progress here. I will report back later with any difference in burn times. Thanks again everybody.
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@wjohn I could not find a blast gate in town. I did however buy some foil HVAC tape and covered the circular hole in the damper flap. I couldn't believe how dusty the intake was. I vacuumed it out and brushed it the best I could, but it is still kind of funky.
I lit a fire top down at 12noon and it was 41 F outside. At the 1 hour mark everything was burning nicely. I have a stovetop thermometer in between the cook plate and the flu outlet. It stabilized around 500F at the 1 hour mark and the flapper seemed to be about 95 percent closed. The secondary flames looked more blue/orange and slow as opposed to yellow and fast like I'm used to seeing. I think I am making progress here. I will report back later with any difference in burn times. Thanks again everybody.
Hmm. At that temp my intake flap would've been fully closed well before an hour. It should sit right up against the main plate behind it, so that the only air getting in is coming through the primary and secondary hole, not underneath the flap. I can reach around, remove my intake ducting since I have it fairly loosely attached, and feel the intake flap. On my stove at least, there is no movement after that much time into the burn - I can't push it closed any further because it's flat against the plate behind it, if that makes sense. If you can push on it and feel it move in a little more before stopping against that plate, I'd suspect the chain isn't quite long enough which would prevent it from fully closing. There was another member on here who seemed to be encountering that issue. If so that would reduce your burn time because it's not shutting the air down as much as it's designed to.
My secondaries turn mostly blue after probably an hour or so. I hope you were able to read through all of my install thread and the thread dedicated to the stove top temps... If not, in summary, I was concerned at first, and then later on not so much. Some of my issue was a buildup of creosote flakes that had come loose from the stovepipe and piled up onto the probe, insulating it and causing it to not heat up as quickly and delaying the closing of the intake flap. The other is that temps at the cooktop up to close to 900 don't seem to be uncommon for these little cast stoves like the Aspen C3 and Jotul 602.
My secondaries turn mostly blue after probably an hour or so. I hope you were able to read through all of my install thread and the thread dedicated to the stove top temps... If not, in summary, I was concerned at first, and then later on not so much. Some of my issue was a buildup of creosote flakes that had come loose from the stovepipe and piled up onto the probe, insulating it and causing it to not heat up as quickly and delaying the closing of the intake flap. The other is that temps at the cooktop up to close to 900 don't seem to be uncommon for these little cast stoves like the Aspen C3 and Jotul 602.
I did read that thread and saw the pictures of the creosote flakes. I hope mine doesn’t look that way but I feel like I need to find out. I have access to a bore scope that I plan to use as a quick way to check for creosote flakes covering the probe.
I was able to push the damper flap down a bit further like you described at the one hour burn mark with the 500 F stove temp. I had to leave for work at that time so I’m not sure how things went after that. More observations to come tomorrow I hope.
That really sounds like the chain isn't adjusted long enough. Even with the buildup I had around my probe, it just delayed the closing of the flap by maybe 15-20 minutes as it took a little longer to get the probe up to temp. The flap was still fully closing once it warmed up enough. Keep us posted.
That makes a lot of sense. I think you are correct on the chain. Late this morning the stove was around 300F with and the back 1/3 of the firebox had a good layer of coals. The flap seemed about 60%closed. I added 3 small/medium splits after raking the coals to the front. Within about 30-40 minutes the stove peaked at about 525F. The damper seemed to be about 85%-95% closed. The fire looked like it could have used a bit less air based on flame color/speed of burn. Tomorrow it is going to be warmer and I am off work. I plan on removing the back cover and adding a link to the chain. It appears to be the same type of chain as a ceiling fan pull. I think I can just clip it in half and add a connector link. I will assess carefully though. I don't need an inoperable stove right now. I will report back with some pictures. Hopefully I can get the bore scope soon too. It belongs to a friend I just need the time to go get it.
Once I get the chain sorted out I plan to start focusing on burn times again.
EbS-P
Minister of Fire
I will point out that 550 stove top really isn’t that hot. It’s possible that the it goes full closed at hotter temps. 550 at the hottest part of my stove is a medium low burn rate for me. If I wanted more heat than that I would be opening my air control. Just a thought. I do think buildup into the probe could be an issue, but one that leads to higher temps the more buildup.
If you wanted to could you get the stove top temps to say 700?
If you wanted to could you get the stove top temps to say 700?
I could get the stove up to 700F easily. Maybe too easily. I have seen 900F before, which was too hot in my opinion. To me 700F-800F for a high burn would be a desired "sweet spot" for my setup. I have a stovetop thermometer placed in between the cook plate and the flue outlet. I know they aren't the most accurate devices but it has helped with learning the stove's behavior. The temps I have seen correlate fairly closely to what @wjohn has posted in his other threads.
My main concern about modifying the chain length is that I don't want to do anything to it that isn't quickly and easily reversible. I'll know more when I remove the back cover to assess tomorrow. I don't have a good feel yet for when the damper is fully closed. I think fully closed at around 500F would be good though, and I know it needs bit of chain length added for that. I do know it was fully closed the time it got to 900F. That was the time I mentioned earlier in the thread about it running away. I got nervous because it kept rising so I shut it down with some foil over the intake. That episode was complete user error though.
I think I'm getting pretty close to things being dialed in. A bit of length to the chain to get the damper closed just a bit sooner, plus the foil tape I already installed, may be all I need. I think I have a really strong draft given that I have about 18ft of pipe from stove top to chimney cap. Two of my four 3ft sections of triple wall chimney are in the attic, the other two sections are above the roofline, and I have about 6ft of double wall connector in the room. It is a completely straight shot too.
Pics and update to come tomorrow.
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Although I just skim read most of the comments to your situation.. I'm sure it was some good advice. However in my experience if your not happy with your stove and it's not doing the job and your not 100% happy with it.... Quite fighting the one you have and send it down the road... im telling ya straight up.. been there done that.. I'm completely satisfied I sent our stove to the next guy (he loves it and is happy) and we are happy we went with what we have now.
While I don't disagree, I do think 100% satisfaction is achievable. This is my first season with my first wood stove, so I still have plenty to learn.
This forum has helped me to get over my unanticipated bout with "wood heat only syndrome" and realize my stove is doing exactly what I bought it to do, supplement my heat pump. I would estimate it has provided around 80%-85% of our heating this winter, so in truth, it is doing much more than supplementing. I guess after realizing how much we enjoyed wood heat, I got a little carried away with not using the heat pump at all as some kind of irrational goal.
The other thing the forum has done is help me realize my technique needed improvement, and that my stove may possibly benefit from some minor adjustments. Fortunately I am not frustrated with it yet, and am enjoying the learning process. I certainly wouldn't rule out another stove in the future though. That Pacific Energy Alderlea T5 that @begreen mentioned comes to mind!
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