Dutchwest 2181 Burn Times - Tips and Tricks?

[MaverickH1]

I did a search for about 30 minutes and couldn't find anything specific to these stoves.

We were one of the places located by power outages this week. Out of power for 4 days, and the temp dropped into the negatives which is VERY rare for us. The stove did GREAT and I'd guess the house never got below 65 degrees. I was having to wake up every 3-4 hours to reload the stove. I just want to make sure I'm not missing anything here.

I'm still running on the old catalytic combustor from when I rebuilt it. I was burning green wood last year so didn't want to destroy a new Condar steel cat yet. This year I'm burning better seasoned wood, but I still let it burn for 5 minutes with the bypass open to let it cook off excess moisture before closing the bypass for cat mode.

I'm running the main air valve completely closed once it gets into the high temperatures during the cat burn, and running the cat air intake at about 1.25 turns or 1.5 turns, but that's only lasting 3-4 hours before it drops out of the catalytic temperature and the stove is ready to be reloaded. I fully load it. It doesn't seem to matter whether I use oak, ash, or pine. Long term, I'd like to get away from using ANY pine, but right now it's in the mix because of all of the trash trees slowly falling and making way for better hardwoods.

I installed this stove last year expecting more inflation, and we have LOVED it. The dog has decided it's the best place to be, of course. During the power outage it didn't only heat the house completely on its own, but it also served as a place to cook food and I used a turkey fryer pot to heat up water for a bath. We were so happy to be ready. Many of our neighbors had to drain pipes and abandon their homes.

Merry Christmas everyone!

 

[fbelec]

hi maverickh1. i agree with you. you should be getting more than 3 to 4 hours out of a burn. there 's got to be a air leak in the stove. (leaking air in). do you have a stove thermometer on the stove? if so what is the temperature running at?

 

[MaverickH1]

hi maverickh1. i agree with you. you should be getting more than 3 to 4 hours out of a burn. there 's got to be a air leak in the stove. (leaking air in). do you have a stove thermometer on the stove? if so what is the temperature running at?

I have the cat temperature probe that typically jumps to 1100-1200 degrees F when it's burning in that mode, then it slowly drops down to 500 or 600 after 3-4 hours.

The stove top right now using an IR thermometer is about 400 degrees on the sides of the top, and about 450 degrees in the center of the top just above the cat.

I went over all joints of the stove just now looking for any drafts, and I'm not seeing any using that method. This stove does have the open port on the back right side that is about a 3/4" hole or so that lets a fixed amount of air come in.

Should I plug that up and see what happens?

Thank you!

 

[Eman85]

If you have wood in the stove burning without the cat can you close the air down and smolder the fire? Can you see the difference in the fire when you move the primary air control without the cat activated? You say you close the primary air and adjust a cat air intake separately?, I'm not familiar with that as my stove has an automatic secondary (cat) air intake that is thermostatically controlled and it closes pretty quickly.
I can burn my stove not using the cat and easily get 8+ hour burns. last night I had the cat activated and it burned 11+ hours. Now with the cat activated my STT will drop to 300 degree range with the air shut.

 

[MaverickH1]

If you have wood in the stove burning without the cat can you close the air down and smolder the fire? Can you see the difference in the fire when you move the primary air control without the cat activated? You say you close the primary air and adjust a cat air intake separately?, I'm not familiar with that as my stove has an automatic secondary (cat) air intake that is thermostatically controlled and it closes pretty quickly.
I can burn my stove not using the cat and easily get 8+ hour burns. last night I had the cat activated and it burned 11+ hours. Now with the cat activated my STT will drop to 300 degree range with the air shut.

Yes, I can smolder the fire with primary air controls. Once the cat is engaged and working, I close them all to make the fire smolder and it produces great heat until all the wood is turned to nearly ash.

This stove has a ~3/4" fixed intake port that feeds the primary air, can't close that.

 

[Eman85]

Not familiar with a 3/4" primary port that you can't control, if that's directly to the firebox I wouldn't think the fire would smolder.
How does the cat air intake work? Is there a separate control for it? What changes does it make?

 

[MaverickH1]

I haven't played around enough with the CAT air intake.

Here is a video I just did of generic operation:

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[fbelec]

looking at your video i think i would try blocking the ash tray with a bunch of ash in it's place. let the ash build up above all that bottom and see what that does. maybe you are getting air in that way. usually stoves that have air come in from the bottom of the grate have fast burns. my H2 is one of them