Dutchwest 2462 Frustrating - Low Burn Temperature

[MarylandBob]

I recently bought a used (but in near mint condition) Dutchwest 2462 catalytic stove. I am at the point where I am going to give up on this stove and buy another. I have yet to be able to get it to really put out a lot of heat without the cleanout door cracked so that air flows under the wood. According to the new magnetic thermometer on the side door - I can get the main chamber to about 400 degrees, and the cat probe (also new) temperature to about 600 degrees - but only with the main front air vents open, the main damper open, and the cleanout door cracked. Without the cleanout door cracked - the chamber drops to 250-300 and the cat drops to 400. If I follow the manual's instructions - and once the fire gets going - close the main damper and turn the air vent to the cat out about 1 turn with the two front air vents open - the unit will burn a load of seasoned red oak wood over 8 hours, but at a main chamber temp of 250-300 - and I end up with creosote buildup. The cat will go to about 1000 when I inititally close the main damper - but soons drops in temperature anywhere between 400-600.

Also - if I attempt to open either the front or side door to re-load the unit - I open the main damper and crack the door per the manual. I can wait 1 to 5 minutes to allow it to flu - but no matter what it always billows smoke out of the door.

I have inspected and cleaned the catalyst, and ensured that the front air vents are not clogged. The unit is in the basement - so the chimney run is about 40 ft. This particular flu has not been used since I bought the house 5 years ago - but I had them all inspected and cleaned then. It just doesn't seem to be getting enough air under the wood. I was debating installing an air vent into the cleanout door.

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

 

[PunKid8888]

40ft is pretty serious height. is the chimney on an outside wall or inside the building? do you have any windows you can crack near the stove? the smoke pouring out the door smells of poor draft. I am not familiar with the stove so I will let someone else chime in on that aspect.

 

[Shari]

Do you have a SS liner in that chimney? If yes, is it insulated? Did you check the max chimney length specs in your owners manual? Is your chimney 2' - 3' above the highest point of your roof? What is the moisture content on your wood? Try some of that expensive wood sold at your local grocery store or gas station. If you get good results with that then it is your wood. Are there rear air vents inside your stove that are blocked?

(Listen to me, talking like I really know something and here I don't even have a stove yet............. but these questions are things I have learned already from reading on this list.)

Shari

 

[begreen]

If there are devices in the basement that are competing for air supply, the stove may be starving for air. Some examples would be a gas/oil furnace, hw heater, dryer, bath fan. You could try temporarily opening a nearby door or window to see if that improves behavior.

Is the chimney interior or exterior?

 

[gzecc]

I too question your wood although your draft seems very bad. With the stove cool try holding a burning piece of tightly rolled up newpaper into the flue area. Can you then feel and see a draft blowing up the flue? If not I would have the chimney inspected again and not use the stove without a carbon monoxide monitor.
What size is the ID of the chimney?

 

[webbie]

Basement chimneys can be tall and cold...and therefore suffer from a lack of draft. Your problem seems related to lack of proper draft.

You should read the articles and QA on chimneys to get a sense of what you are up against, but my first temp. solutions would be this:

1. Does the chimney continue down after your stove enters it (in other words, have a sump)?
If so, this can interfere with draft. Close it up temp with some balled up fiberglass insulation.
2. If chimney has a cleanout door, close that off with silicone caulk.
3. Make certain ALL stove pipe joints are sealed with black furnace cement and screwed together. Also make certain where the pipe goes into the chimney is very tight.
4. If possible, eliminate some 90 degree turns from the stove pipe - that means perhaps use 2 45's or two adj elbos instead of coming straight up from the stove and then turning 90 toward the wall.

In my experience, these steps will help somewhat. Another trick is to burn through the first load of wood quite quickly - use a lot of kindling and dry wood - in order to warm up the chimney as much as possible.

Try all that stuff - and if your draft does not improve your next step is probably a stainless liner for the chimney.

 

[Todd]

Either wet wood or you engaging the cat too soon. Let the coal bed build up with some small splits, then reload with medium splits and let it catch and burn for 15-20 minutes, then try engaging the cat and see what happens. Try reloading while maintaining a good hot coal bed. Big tall cold chimney may take a little longer to warm up like Craig said.

 

[wellbuilt home]

I used a VC DW extra large stove and loved it .I burned it at over 600o for 15 years . My DW is a convection heater . The out side of the stove dose not get hot .You need to have out side air . I kept mine at 1/4 turn open for years and never messed with it . Get some dry wood . John

 

[hoosier hardwood]

OK - don't blame the stove - I just bought a 2462 catalytic 3 weeks ago and I was posting here complaining about having trouble getting up to temp. I have a 16 ft inside wall masonry fireplace chimney / placed the stove on the hearth and ran isulated ss pipe with one 90 deg angle at the stove. I was having trouble getting much over 800deg cat temp. Now I run consistently at 1000deg - I open the cat after the cat probe reads 500. What I learned was that I was not feeding the box enough wood. I was hung up on the cat saving me wood so I wasn't getting the initial coal base large enough. Once you get that coal bed built up to 3 or 4 inches the thing runs it's self. I am heating a 1200 sq ft room under cathedral ceiling and blowing air down the hall to keep from sweating up my lazyboy[..Burns 8 - 10 hrs and fires back up without kindling. The flue is critical...with my short flue I operate in maintenance mode with the primary air vent just barely cracked and the secondary open about 1/2 turn. Initially heating things up I will open the cat 1 turn at 500 and dial it back to 1/2 turn at 800. From then it will climb to 1000 or more. Always seems to run between 800 and 1100. That insulated flue pipe is really salty on price but the frustration relief may be worth it.

The experts above have given you good advice. I just wanted you to keep the faith with the stove. Everyone has opinions on which stoves are best but the 2462 is working well for me. Remember it is a large box so feed it.

 

[MarylandBob]

Wow - I guess I picked the optimal place to seek advice - thank you all for the input.

Answers to some questions: It is an inside chimney - one of 5 flus in the app. 12 foot cinderblock pack for the house. Two of the chimneys are used for the oil furnaces, the other two are for stnd fireplaces - which operate normally. It is stnd clay lined 8 in square. The opening is about 5 ft off of the floor, with a cleanout about 3 ft below that. There are two oil fired furnaces in the basement on the other side of the cinderblock pack. I re-read the manual and the height of the chimney is OK - this is also what the local fireplace store said. The top of the chimney is about 15 ft above the roof of the house. No rear air vents in the unit. I have the cleanout door sealed with some duct tape. Al pipe joints are sealed with caulk and screwed. The unit sits on the concrete floor with a riser of about two feet to a 90 elbow directly into the clay receiver(I believe that this was specifically built for a woodstove). The elbow is adjustable - so it is not quite at 90. I have a window in the wall about 8 ft from the unit.

A couple of points of note:
1. I came across this stove when I went to look at another steel stove listed in the paper - it was sitting behind the one that I went to look at. The previous owner said that he had bought it new, had it professionally installed, and could not get it to throw much heat. He had Dutchwest to his house who said that it was operating just fine. He finally gave up and bought the steel one that I had come to look at. He was only getting rid of the steel one because he installed a whole house wood burning furnace. He also said that the steel one (coal/wood unit) installed the same way that the Dutchwest had been installed - would throw so much heat that they could barely stay in the bsmt. I bought the Dutchwest because it wa a nicer looking unit, had a catalyst, and the exterior walls would not get as hot as steel - I have three kids.

Some things I will try:
1. Buying some of that expensive wood - I have 7 acres of hardwoods and have been using various pieces of wood of all ages, moslty wood that was from a red oak tree that had died and I had felled about 1.5 years ago, after laying on ground for 1.5 years I split it a few months ago.
2. Without trying to light a full blown fire - do the flu test with the burning paper. I will say that this morning when I re-loaded it (it burned all of the load from last night with little coal bed left maybe 1 inch - nver seems to build up a good coal bed) I put kindling in with paper and some newspaper on the top of the pile in the back to make sure that a flu started - I lit the paper at the back top back and left the door cracked. When I opened the door to light the bottom of the pile - smoke billowed out. Appears to be a flu issue - either chimney not hot enough, or not enough air flow to unit.
3. I never seem to build up a coal bed - I start a fire and get it going with the cleanout door cracked - the temperature gets up to 400 in the chamber and 600 on the cat, then load it with a couple of bigger pieces, wait a few minutes and engage the cat and close the main damper with the cat air on 1 turn - it will burn all of the load, but at a chamber temp of 200-300. Creosote territory. Little coal bed

As the manual says - it is an art more than a science - which is tough for me to handle since I am an engineer.

Thanks

 

[gzecc]

One guarantee, your wood it not dry enough. It needs to season(in a split) for at least 9mos off the ground.
I suspect your fire is never getting hot enough.

 

[begreen]

Some things I will try:
1. Buying some of that expensive wood - I have 7 acres of hardwoods and have been using various pieces of wood of all ages, moslty wood that was from a red oak tree that had died and I had felled about 1.5 years ago, after laying on ground for 1.5 years I split it a few months ago.

That's the easiest test. Try the stove with known dry wood. If the wood has been laying on the ground, it will suck up moisture like a sponge. I would give it a minimum of 6-9 months drying time. Last summer was damp back east so that probably made things even worse. A moisture meter is helpful here. Try on a freshly split surface.

2. Without trying to light a full blown fire - do the flu test with the burning paper. I will say that this morning when I re-loaded it (it burned all of the load from last night with little coal bed left maybe 1 inch - nver seems to build up a good coal bed) I put kindling in with paper and some newspaper on the top of the pile in the back to make sure that a flu started - I lit the paper at the back top back and left the door cracked. When I opened the door to light the bottom of the pile - smoke billowed out. Appears to be a flu issue - either chimney not hot enough, or not enough air flow to unit.

Could be a combo of the two problems. Do you know the interior dimension of the flue tile on this chimney? Make sure that there is a nice uphill slope on the horz. section of pipe. Maybe try Craig's suggestion of replacing the 90 with a pair of 45s with a short connector in between them.

 

[PunKid8888]

I recently burned some dry old dead wood in my stove. The wood appeared to be dead for a couple years and seamed very dry but maybe a little punk. when I put a big piece in along with some normal wood it would last the longest but never really burn well, and always seamed to reduce the heat output from the stove. It would also use up all the coals around it trying burn it. If its at all punk looking don't bother burning it, I would save it for a big bon fire. Buy some wood for testing, or maybe someone on the site near you will trade you some well seasoned wood to let you run some tests

 

[Pine Knot]

As the owner of a Dutchwest Large 2461 I find it works the best, heat output, cat operation, length of burn etc. when the firebox is loaded full of dry wood, all you can get in. Then let it get HOT 500 degrees on a mag. thermo. about ten inches up on the pipe, close the bypass and then ten minutes later then close main air supply to near cuttoff. It should burn for 5 or 6 hours, and provide enough coal for a relite for about 10 hours. Cat inlet air [screw control above side loading door] set at 3/4 turn open. This is what it takes to get mine to work right.

 

[MarylandBob]

Thank you all for the input - here is what I tried.

Starting with a cold unit I did the paper flu test - it drew the smoke in the back of the unit - but with not much pull. I cracked the window near the unit resulting sin somewhat better results. I took the tactic of the guy that mentioned firing up the unit with a lot of small wood for a while to really get the temperature up prior to loading with larger pieces. I did this for about 45 minutes with the damper open and the front air vents open and the cleanout door cracked and the box went to 500 and the cat to about 700. I actually had to close the cleanout drawer because it appeared it may overfire. I cracked the door and waited a few minutes to allow it to flu - which resulted in very little smoke billowing out when I opened the door to load it ( a first). I had created a nice coal bed a few inches deep. I loaded with very dry split red oak (cracked throughout) wood and packed it as much as I could. Waited a few minutes for it to re-establish itself and then closed the main damper, waited ten minutes and then partially closed the front vents and opened the cat to 1 turn. This resulted in the temperature of the firebox dropping to 300 and the cat went to about 1100. To avoid creosote below 300 I opened the front air vents back to full and left over night.

This morning, After 9 hours, the box was at about 250 and the cat at 550, and it had burned most of the wood but I had a good coal base and some wood left. I opened the damper and waited a few minutes to flew - went to reload and had the same smoke billowing out problem. I reloaded and reset the unit to the same overnight settings.

So it appears that unless there is a really hot 500 temperature and fire in the box - it will billow smoke when loading. My main concern is that the temperature of the box drops into creosote territory when you close the main damper to engage the cat. Since buying this unit I have had several instances where creosote built up in the box to the point that the side door gasket was stuck to the box. Not sure how to deal with this - If I leave the main damper open I negate the use of the cat and burn all wood quickly.

Thanks for the input

 

[gzecc]

In my humble opinion its not your stove. Its your draft. Something is causing it to be border line at low temperatures. If you find out what that is you can solve your problem. Flue size ratios, bends turns, clogs, wye's etc.

 

[Pine Knot]

I think you have missed the point that when the cat is lite and working there is nothing left in the exhaust to creat creosote, so it doesn't mater what the exhaust tempeture is. With the cat working adjust main inlet air to provide enough smoke and gases to keep it working. Run the unit hot, 400 to 5oo degrees on the door thermometer with bypass closed until you get used to it then reduce inlet air to get longer burns. When working right these stoves provide clean, even tempetured, long burns. Good luck with it.

 

[MarylandBob]

To "Dutchwest" Large Cat

My issue is that I can get the main chamber to 400-500 with the bypass damper open and the front air vents fully open - but when the bypass damper is engaged to flow gasses through the cat - even if I leave both front air vents fully open - then the main chamber temperature drops to 250-300 - which builds creosote in the main chamber.

 

[begreen]

It does sound like weak draft and a somewhat air starved fire. Change out the 90 for a short stub up, then a 45, then a connector, then the second 45 into the chimney. Add an outside air kit to the stove. And get a flue thermometer.

FWIW, I don't think creosote is going to be a major issue if your wood is dry and you are burning through the cat. Most of the volatiles are burned off before it enters the flue. I'd be more concerned about overfiring the stove once it is running right.

 

[pen]

I see where you mentioned the height of your chimney, but not other characteristics. If you did and I missed it, my apologies.

By chance, what are the dimensions of your chimney?

For example, if your stove is a 6 in exhaust and your chimney is an 8x8 clay lined chimney, then your surface area expands greatly, reducing your heat and also your draft.

Many people have draft issues that go from a smaller into a bigger system.

pen

 

[Pine Knot]

I reloaded my stove at 3 pm and this is its condition now at 6 pm With main air inlet NEARLY CLOSED pipe temp 300, fire box 375 cat 800. those are about usual temps. If I read right you were getting similar temps with the main air control WIDE OPEN. As others have said that sounds like a draft problem. If so changeing stoves may not fix it. A stainless steel liner might fix it. If you want to use the clay flue burning hot and keeping the flue warm may help. I assume you have checked to see that you have a wide open passage from firebox to chimney cap and the cleanout door firmly closed. Let us know when you find the problem.

 

[Pine Knot]

Addition to my last post. Don't worry about creosote build up in fire box. The next hot fire will burn it out. Even off the glass.

 

[MarylandBob]

With main front air vents wide open and cat engaged - the cat will usually go to about 1000 when you first engage it after getting the box to about 350-400 on fire buil-up - then the cat decreases in temp to about 600 and the fire box settles to 250-300.

As far as chimney blockage - I had it inspected when bought house in 2004 and then screened over a year later. Possible something might be in it - but I cannot check as it is on rear of house, 10-15ft above highly slanted roofline - so approximately 50 ft above ground. The chimney collar in the basement is 8 in round feeding to a 8x8 clay chimney that goes dead straight up - which matches stove specs. Cleanout door is closed and sealed with duct tape.

Where can I get an outside air kit to the stove as mentioned in one of the posts?

Thanks again

 

[ozarkjeep]

Ill toss out a few ideas Maryland Bob,

burning news paper in the flu WILL clog the spark arrestor cap if you have one, and substantially hamper the flow. paper makes LARGE ashes that wont pass thru easily in my experience, can you get on the roof and get us pics of the cap and pics in side the flue?

also, red oak, takes more than 2 years after being cut, split and stacked to be dry enough to burn.

I too cut a downed red oak almost 2 years ago, split and stacked them then.

the last few days, ive come across that red oak in my wood pile, its spitting and hissing, it isnt dry yet.

Hope you get it figured out!

With main front air vents wide open and cat engaged - the cat will usually go to about 1000 when you first engage it after getting the box to about 350-400 on fire buil-up - then the cat decreases in temp to about 600 and the fire box settles to 250-300.

As far as chimney blockage - I had it inspected when bought house in 2004 and then screened over a year later. Possible something might be in it - but I cannot check as it is on rear of house, 10-15ft above highly slanted roofline - so approximately 50 ft above ground. The chimney collar in the basement is 8 in round feeding to a 8x8 clay chimney that goes dead straight up - which matches stove specs. Cleanout door is closed and sealed with duct tape.

Where can I get an outside air kit to the stove as mentioned in one of the posts?

Thanks again