Glacier Bay stove questions

[goldwinger]

I have a couple of questions about a glacier bay wood stove that is in the house that we just moved into.

#1 - How can I tell if the stove is made for wood only or wood / coal? I will attempt to post a picture of the stove if that helps.

#2 - Inside the stove there is a metal plate that runs at an angle from the bottom rear toward the top front that covers the outlet. Is this plate necessary for burning wood?

There is an issue with smoke coming out of the doors whenever we open them to add wood and when the fire really gets going good, we get smoke "puffing" out of the air regulators in the doors. This does not happen constantly but is a concern.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!

 

[begreen]

It's a wood burning stove. The interior metal plate is a baffle designed to help burn the smoke a bit more efficiently. If you can post a picture of the interior baffle, we can see how it looks. If it's warped, that could be an issue.

The smoke coming out of the stove indicates that you are getting backpuffing. It often happens when there is low draft and/or the air supply to the fire is being closed off too quickly. If the wood is somewhat damp, the problem could be worse.

Can you describe the entire flue system that the stove is connected to? How tall is it, what diameter pipe? are there any elbows or is it straight up?

And last, check the flue cap to see if it is starting to plug up with creosote and soot.

 

[goldwinger]

Thanks BeGreen for the assistance. I let the fire die down and looked at the baffle inside and it is in really good shape with no warpage.

I went up on the roof and checked the flue cap and it had quite a bit of creosote built up in side it so I cleaned it all out. I also ran the chimney brush down the pipe while i was up there but there wasn't too much that came down. I cleaned it about 6 weeks ago so i didn't expect to get much.

I took a couple of pictures of the set up that we have so you can see how it is. The pipe is 8" coming out of the stove for 48" and then it reduces down to a 6" inside diameter tripple wall pipe that goes through the ceiling and roof. That pipe extends above the roof 33" on the low side and 29" on the high side because of the roof pitch. Could it be that the chimney is not tall enough with the roof like it is??

Thanks again.

 

[begreen]

Glad you asked, the stove seems to be in good condition if the firebrick is all intact, but the flue is not. What you've described and shown in the picture sounds like the root of the problem. The flue should not be reduced in size. Flue choked down from 8" to 6" and a too short flue are making for a very cranky stove. The stove will need at least 10-12' of pipe to draft well.

The low pipe is just plain dangerous. It's too close to the roof. It should be a minimum of 3 ft over the roof and should be 2 ft higher than the nearest building surface measured horizontally for 10 ft. The pipe needs to be extended at least 4-5 ft and solidly braced. It won't be perfect, but I'll bet the stove starts behaving much better.