Fine tuning.. problems finding the right mix of damper/combustion etc..

[Smitty090]

Hi!
Man, this stove is giving me grey hair.. although deep inside I know it is not the stove lol.
I have a Whitlfield Advantage II with 5 heat settings.
I tried factory settings by the book, I tried adjusting the damper 1/8 inch at a time in both directions and I have tried playing with the combustion air control. I even just replaced the seal all around the door and windows.. cant get a proper burn.

According to the manual this shouldnt be happening. I get a LOT of ash build up on the bottom. Manual suggests it would be not enough air so increase the damper. So I move the damper another 1/8 inch and it is just enough to make my 3/4 burned pellets lift off the gate and fly around.. so it must be too far..

On less damper settings I get a nice flame, great heat but when left for a couple hours I get too many pellets built up which suggests not enough air..

I am talking 1/4 inch or less between enough air to make the pellets pop out of the grate and not enough to burn them fast enough.
I have tried lower damper but increasing combustion air and I have tried higher damper and lower combusion air.

Few other notes, my chimney liner is very clean, I cleaned it while playing with settings to keep controlled tests..
Any thoughts to this mystery?

Thanks
Smitty

 

[Smitty090]

Oh and just to add.. sometimes I get the absolute perfect burn on say setting 2 of 5 for 4 hours.. feel great but then test it on 4/5 and way too much air.. or reverse...
Thanks!

 

[jtakeman]

Smitty you didn't mention what pellet brand? Also is there a way to reduce the pellet feed?

The pellets your using could be 2 dense and sounds like they need to be trimmed down or reduced somehow. Sometimes it can't be done with air adjustment alone it has to have the feed tweaked to cope.

 

[Smitty090]

Thanks! I am currently using Comfy Cozy which I am starting to read on odd posts here are not very good quality... I bought 2 bags of Eastern Embers yesterday to tes when this hopper runs out.. (later tonight or in the morning)...

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Perhaps starting at the beginning will help locate the problem.

How long have you had the stove?

Was it new or used when you got it?

Please describe the venting starting at the stove and going towards and including the termination cap.

Have you verified all of the gaskets on the stove as being good?

Describe how you clean the stove.

 

[Smitty090]

Here is a picture of it as of right now. My current setting the ash is in large pieces (air flow blew them up from the tray).. on lower air setting the ash is super fine and light.

Windows soot up MUCH less, but still some..

 

[Smitty090]

[quote author="SmokeyTheBear" date="1293780613"]Perhaps starting at the beginning will help locate the problem.
quote]

I have only had the stove for approx 3 weeks.
Brand new
Venting is 4 inch (increaser at stove from 3" to 4") as recommended by the manufacturer for anything over 15'). Tee at back of stove and another in chimney. 4" flexiliner in chimney up to top with cap (all came with pellet liner kit at Maritime Fireplace).
I clean the stove currently every 2nd day as I of course dont have proper ash control yet. I shop vac the interior of stove, the tray, I remove the tray and vacuum under it, I remove the ash pan and clean it and vacuum all inside the area as well (all after stove is cooled down of course)
The vent is all sealed with high heat silicone except at point of stove and one other spot so I can take it apart but those joints have a high heat silicone gasket in them and are taped as well with stove tape.

Stove has 5 heat settings, combustion air control setting, damper rod and a pellet feed adjustment.

I changed all the gaskets yesterday and I felt they were looking freyed at some points like they were poorly installed. I used the manufacturer set replacement sizes (around all 3 windows and the larger 1/2" around door. Used the cement and let sit overnight with door closed on 1 sheet thickness of newspaper to cement would set properly.

Cant think of anything else at the moment.
It seems on the lower settings (1,2 and 3) to only give about a 3-4" flame and sometime less. flame is higher with damper closed some but any lower and it gums up eventually from not enough air...

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Let me see if I have your venting correctly figured out.

You have 4" venting with three 90 degree bends in it? The bends are the Tee, the 90 degree elbow then inside the chimney there is a 90 degree bend in the flex in order to meet the small section of horizontal?

You might want to see if the stoves combustion blower can handle the 3 90 degree bends.

Now how long is that flexible vent?

 

[Smitty090]

Yes, there are essentially 3- 90 degree bends. I installed exactly what the manufacturer book recommends for this.
The tee on the back of the stove, a 4 foot vertical, 90 bend, 1 foot horizontal, 90 bend and approx 20 ft of chimney liner straight vertical to cap. (my chimney liner was clay for the old wood stove so I had to line it with a stainless steel flexliner (although it is not bent, just straight vertical) My chimney clears the peak of the house and I can quite often hear the draft pulling through the stove. According to the store and to the manufacturer (whitfield) the blower is not a worry at all, in fact there is often too much draft which is why I had to close the damper slightly more than the default shipped setting.

My comment about the 3-4 inch flame is a bit off.. it dips between that and 6-7 inches. I'll attach pics here as it goes up and down through a 2 minute period..

 

[Smitty090]

Pictures of setting 2 of 5.
Of course when pellets drop in, it dies for a bit and builds up but I guess my point is, is this type of flame looking somewhat normal for this setting/application.
Thanks for helping with this by the way!!

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

If there is a combustion blower trim adjustment on the control board I'd set the damper to the point that the pellets are just dancing around (wiggling) in the pot and fine tune using the trim control. If there is a feed trim control on the board I'd also adjust that to slightly lower the feed rate. The goal here is to match the fuel and air ratio for the best burn. Between the various controls you should be able to get the stove dialed in.

Remember each adjustment must be followed by enough time for the new state to stabilize. If you have a service manual that has the proper draft settings and a gage you can do this a lot faster.

Do not do any adjustments until the stove has been firing for at least a half hour.

The goal is an active yellow/orange tending towards yellow flame, with blue just above the burning pellets. At this point the pellets tend to wiggle in the burn pot and new pellets will eject ash when they hit the pot.

 

[imacman]

.....I have only had the stove for approx 3 weeks.
Brand new

OK, I'm confused....how can this be a "brand new" stove, when Whitfield hasn't made one, at the latest, since 2002?

 

[Smitty090]

That is kind of what I been aiming for.. slight wiggling but not really lifting. One of my problems has been when I find that perfect setting, it throws it off when I change the heat setting on the stove. For instance at 2/5 I fine tune it to seem to run quite well and usually on medium days this setting is fine for almost 24hrs.. but on colder days I move it up to 4/5 for a while to get the house back up to temp and they blow all over the place because as the heat setting increases, the stove auto adjusts combustion air to match. The manual says I should never have to adjust but so far, I cant find a setting on any of them that seems to work ok for the other 4.
Does that make any sense??

 

[Smitty090]

.....I have only had the stove for approx 3 weeks.
Brand new

OK, I'm confused....how can this be a "brand new" stove, when Whitfield hasn't made one, at the latest, since 2002?

It was a stove that Kent (a building supplies store here) had in their warehouse and lost the paperwork on. It sat for many years in the back/top shelf in the warehouse until a friend of mine told me about it (who has one himself). I approached the store and managed to get them to mark it down from $3979+txs to $1000 taxes in. It was never set up and new, but yes it is an older model. I hear it is one of the better ones ever produced.. if I can get it set right ha ha

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

You should do your adjustments at least midpoint (or wherever the manual suggests, some may say on high).

Use the damper as a rough tuning tool, then use the boards trim controls.

Pete ,

I wasn't going to go there.

 

[imacman]

If that truly is a Advantage II, according to the Wood Heat Stoves website, that stove was last made in 1990. $1000 for a stove that may be 20 yrs old???

No offense, but....I wouldn't care how "new" it is, after sitting around rusting/corroding all those years.

(broken link removed to http://woodheatstoves.com/advantage-ii-c-292_90_99_95_254.html)

 

[Smitty090]

Yeah, I understand your point. So brand new wasnt the best choice of words but I wanted to eliminate people asking if someone else wore it out or changed settings, or broke something etc. I thoroughly inspected it for rust, corrosion etc. It is overall mechanically in mint condition with exception to the way the gasket was initially installed, I replaced it as the rope had come unbound at one of the ends..

Didnt mean to try to be misleading, but all in all the stove itself is perfect.. just trying to tune it to my particular setup/venting pellets etc.

 

[imacman]

Also, I don't care what the owners manual says about it being OK to have (3) 90 degree bends in the pipe.....your EVL right now is at least 28.....not good even with 4" pipe. I think that old combustion blower is struggling to exhaust the stove.

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Now that we have established that the stove is not new, I'll ask one of the questions that old stoves need asked of them.

Did you torture it to within an inch of its life using compressed air, shop vacuums, various brushes, and after finding all of its ash traps?

 

[Smitty090]

Not sure what I said wrong but I can appreciate your position I suppose and of course the feedback.

imacman - I used a hand held CFM measurement (we have one at my hotel to test bathroom vent air flow in rooms) and there was barely a measurable loss in feet per minute at end (before I put final end cap on) and back of stove with no vent pipe so to answer your question the exhaust is functioning as it should. Again, I installed it exactly as illustrated from the manufacturer.

smokey, yes. I am a weekend computer junky (build, play, overclock, watercooling etc with computers) and although not really relevant, I cleaned it when I got it home to the point I could have eaten off of it, similar to how I would clean out my computers. I took it all apart (with exception to actually removing the motors, electrical components etc) but I took the panels off etc and cleaned any dust or anything. It was covered in plastic and was surprisingly quite clean.

Anyway, long of the short of it.. I can vouch that the stove functions as new.. it is the owner who needs the help, not the stove

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

Ok, I'll continue this tomorrow.

 

[Smitty090]

Well it has been running seemingly well on 2nd setting for an hour now. Not sure how it will react to 4th setting but I am done for the night. One factor I'll test tomorrow is the pellets. Maybe I have been stressing on the ash content and changing settings that didnt need changed from a crappy pellet all along too. I will test and report. I am burning out the remainder of the hoper overnight with comfy cozy pellets and the next 2 bags I'll run the Shaw Easter Ember ones to see what the difference is.
Thanks for all the input and guidance!

 

[Smitty090]

When I woke up in the morning the fire was similar to before, changing the brand of pellets to Eastern Embers did not have any effect.
I further inspected the stove today and I can see my door gasket is not making an air tight seal in many places. I had some challenges getting it on and I believe after a little research it is because I stretched the gasket slightly while installing which I understand is improper.
Everything I read says to just lay the gasket in the groove without pull or stretching in any way. I can see light through several locations.
I will replace the gasket tomorrow doing it properly. Then with a proper seal, will resume testing and tweaking.

I dont know (about to read up on it more) but I dont know how much effect a non airtight gasket has on the performance but I have seen enough posts to assume it can definitely be a factor.

Although blurry from low light, you can see the corner is obviously open and another several spots along that one side. The bottom has an opening as well in it.

Cheers and Happy New Year to ALL!
Smitty

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

When I woke up in the morning the fire was similar to before, changing the brand of pellets to Eastern Embers did not have any effect.
I further inspected the stove today and I can see my door gasket is not making an air tight seal in many places. I had some challenges getting it on and I believe after a little research it is because I stretched the gasket slightly while installing which I understand is improper.
Everything I read says to just lay the gasket in the groove without pull or stretching in any way. I can see light through several locations.
I will replace the gasket tomorrow doing it properly. Then with a proper seal, will resume testing and tweaking.

I dont know (about to read up on it more) but I dont know how much effect a non airtight gasket has on the performance but I have seen enough posts to assume it can definitely be a factor.

Although blurry from low light, you can see the corner is obviously open and another several spots along that one side. The bottom has an opening as well in it.

Cheers and Happy New Year to ALL!
Smitty

I can make adjusting a stove impossible.

 

[littlesmokey]

Now here is a challenge. All you high techers have a plain old analog stove, not compromised (never fired, right out of the box) no need to blow it's unused parts apart to clean (see above, paren) that will need for it's life more than one set and forget adjustment. There are more than three ways to adjust. The factory setting are recommendations, not rules. You can get it close by the pre-sets, but tweak you must. It is likely that there are "pots" on the control panel that will allow you some up and down adjustment. Don't use them until you are close. My stove have a center spot that took months to find, but now I can use the manual controls to get the stove to do my bidding. The feed rate went down a bit and the combustion setting went up a little. You are going to have to find those spots.

Now, Dance Of The Pellets, I seriously doubt that half the readers of this thread or forum have their stoves dialed in as close as you. What the factory says to them is good enough. The movement is intended as an indicator of sufficient movement of air through the burn-pot. Based on pot design and feed rate, some never dance and are only wall flowers, others only work in the mash-pit (sp?). Your stove is a little fuddy-duddy for the scrum, so doing the waltz or fox trot is very fine. The idea is enough air to keep the pellets burning and kit the ash out. A little hotter burn and the ash will be "lighter" too much junk in the pellets and not enough air will teach you the meaning of Clinker, the misfit of the pellet world. Make peace with your fox trot and carry on.

Build up of ash is a problem, it sounds like. Remember the pellets of your fathers day are not the pellets of today. However, your stove is like a '52 duce and a half. If it can be ignited it will burn. The tolerance of an older stove are lost on the new stoves with the pentium chips installed. Work on consistence in burn for starters and move to consistence in fuel later. Your ash build may well be a slightly low burn rate and the pellets you are using. I have burned the super premiums and find the ash as much as the generics, but I tend to tweak my stove every time I walk past it. Pick a "setting" pellet that is high quality, consistent in size and low/average in ash. Stick with it until you are satisfied with the working of the stove. Then tinker with the fuel. I burn a local softwood pellet from a commercial lumber mill. Same basic product, same process, same good old boys smashing wood fiber. My setting was done with "top of the line" pellets, that I won't touch for price now.

My last bad comparison is to the carburated vs fuel injected auto engines. You can infinitely adjust the carb, but the manufacturer limits the injectors. You have a nice Buick full size family car that will do you well. New to you and to the road, but it's still a very nice car. Personally, I'd take an out of the box, new old stock, classic over most of the new ones. What you paid for what you got is a bargain. Those who gripe about shelf wear and damage from rust and corrosion would likely complain that the zero mileage '66 Mustang tucked in the dealers warehouse was not worth anything except scrap. I have a "crated" duel port 1600cc Volks engine I won't sell for less than twice a rebuild, even though the engine was done in 2001, get the same hack about it you are getting about the stove.