Help with Blaze King Princess Insert

[tgs30]

I come on hear and read about the long burn times and overheating concerns and I'm afraid im not getting the most of my stove. The burn times are 8 hours and longer than the previous stove but its not putting out as much heat.

Im in northern VA and the stove was installed last year in a exterior corner fireplace in a large 900 sq ft room but have trouble getting the room above 70. The one question with the install is that It's adapting to an existing 8" insulated liner. I dont know if this is causing the issue though. Another concern is the fan, it doesn't get real hot and only blows out of part of the opening. Circled below.

 

[tgs30]

Also think the cat could be going inactive early. Below are pictures from one load. Using white oak between 12 - 20%. Thanks in advance for the help and suggestions.



Loaded up with sticks at 11am house room was down to 64*.



Added two logs 15 minutes later



Completed loaded up 10 minutes later Thermostat still open and fan on. I engage the cat after 5 minutes later.


I slowly turn the thermostat down to 4 -5 o'clock. Below is at 4pm cat still active and room has been at 68 since 12ish.



At 6pm the stove starts to cool down and drops out of active for a 7 hour burn.

 

[tarzan]

Folks more familiar with inserts will be along but I can tell you the BK's usually require the right length and size flue to function properly.

 

[tgs30]

Thanks. That's what I'm thinking also.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

 

[Blazing]

Might wanna add more splits. This is a load in my bk insert.

 

[Blazing]

Mine also blows out that side.

 

[Blazing]

First off if you are starting from cold it eats a lot of wood to come up to temp. I'll start a small fire get my cat active and lay down some coals for the main event. I have my stove top thermometer set left of center off of the cat itself and shoot for a warm up around 300 degrees. Once there open the air up wide open as well as the bypass. Load that sucker full I mean ever little space has wood split a piece down if it's to large this is important. Shut the door and "I" cut the air to half so t-stat is horizontal. Bypass is closed and then I let her eat till I'm in the 500 degree range. Once I hit 500 I back the air down basically either three or four times depending on outside temp. If it's warm like now I take it down quarter turn every 15 mins. If it's cold back it down three times. End up when warm the t-stat is straight up and down when it's cold looks kinda like / if that helps any lol. My stove top runs 300 325 in warm temp mode in cold somewhere around 425 450. Now on those really cold nights I might have to bring it up some but hey that's why I have the knob. I do find the blower kills my burn times and if I keep everything in the house warm not letting the temp drop to much I just don't need them. 12 hour reloads when it's cold 24 hour +/- when it's warm. I've gotten 30 hours but at this point it's just saying yeah I reloaded off coals not kicking much heat. My insert does have block off plate with roxul above as well as roxul faced by micore 300 surrounding it. I have 15 or so feet of flex king HD insulated with an exterior brick chimney with roxul stuffed around the upper part of the chimney. One thing I will say when you go for low mode give it time to adjust before you give up. If I go low to fast it will go black and the stack won't be just steam. Once the temp of the stove comes down though it opens the t-stat and clears right up. Side note I burn mostly oak red/white with a moisture content around oh no that's an argument on here lmao. It's real good and dry put it that way.[/QUOTE]

 

[Blazing]

Just reposting this from the bk performance thread. This is my start up/run procedure hope it helps. I have no experience with running this stove with the incorrect size liner I'm sure others will have answers on that.

 

[black smoke signals]

Well said my friend! Blazing sure helped me out with my insert still working on the burn time.My insert runs just fine when its -12 outside wife says its easy to run and puts out heat.

 

[Blazing]

I was glad to talk with you sir! Don't hesitate to pick that phone up or shoot me a message. One thing I have heard from more than one member is this insert seems to lack the punch of some other/older stoves. I'd like to know if other BK owners feel the same?

 

[black smoke signals]

TGS30 This also helped me with my insert good info with cats http://www.woodstove.com/pages/pdffiles/Catalytic Combustor Tips.pdf

 

[black smoke signals]

Me for one is this insert puts out good heat (apox 1800 sq ft) to heat my home this stove is in a walk in basement with main floors upstairs.

 

[davenorthshorema]

Also think the cat could be going inactive early. Below are pictures from one load. Using white oak between 12 - 20%. Thanks in advance for the help and suggestions.



Loaded up with sticks at 11am house room was down to 64*.

View attachment 190603

Added two logs 15 minutes later

View attachment 190604

Completed loaded up 10 minutes later Thermostat still open and fan on. I engage the cat after 5 minutes later.
View attachment 190605

I slowly turn the thermostat down to 4 -5 o'clock. Below is at 4pm cat still active and room has been at 68 since 12ish.

View attachment 190606

At 6pm the stove starts to cool down and drops out of active for a 7 hour burn.

You mention fan is on but at what speed when the thermostat is at 4/5 oclock. If the fan is on high you will see the thermostat drop low and most times too low in the inactive state. Usually i run my thermostat and fan speed at the same level during the whole burn. I believe this is what the manufacture recommends.

Alteast this is how ive successfully run my princess the last three years.

I hope this helps. Good luck.

 

[black smoke signals]

the fan speed adjustment should match the thermostat control setting, i.e. if your stove is set at medium then your fan should also be set at medium, low—low, high—high etc.
This is in the B/K manual

 

[jetsam]

I think of the thermostat's MAX label as 100%, and each dot below as 10% less, which makes the MIN label 10%.

On my Princess Insert with a load of oak, 40% thermostat and the blower on about 25% is about as high as I can set it and still get 12 hours of heat- so that's about where I put it when I go to work on cold days. When I am home and warming up the house, it's more like 60% thermostat and 75% or 100% fan.

If you need more heat, more fan is usually more efficient than more thermostat, since the stove will adjust the air somewhat to meet the target temperature anyway. If you are chilling the cat out of its active zone, you're way out of range for the magic thermostat, and you should increase the thermostat setting.

Turning up either one decreases burn time and increases heat output.

I'm a little concerned about your statement that the blower air isn't real hot- that fan blows through the convection top, and hmm... Right now for example, the stove is running medium hot with blowers on high and about a 410° stovetop. If I put my hand 12" in front of the blowers, it takes about 7 seconds for my hand to pass through 'warm-hot-unpleasantly hot-mild pain'.

It looks like you have a pretty good fire going- even if your cat was dead, I'd expect very warm output from the blower, unless all the heat is going up that oversized flue.

My blower output is also skewed over to the left side, where the blower is- I think that's probably normal.




(That's Stove Tea brewing in the pickle jars on either side of the stove!)

 

[tgs30]

Thanks everyone. Your posts really help. When trying to get the most heat out of the stove, I always have the fan on high. I think that is definitely decreasing the burn times and is taking the cat out of active early.

It also sounds like its normal for the fan to only blow out of the one side.

How do you guys run your stove when your are trying to get the most heat? Fan on high with thermostat at 50% or above?

I'm also still not sure if the 8" liner is hurting.

 

[jetsam]

My settings for max heat would be smaller pine splits, max fan, highish thermostat, and reload every few hours.

If I needed lots of heat while I was asleep for 8 hours, that would be a load of oak, maybe 40% thermostat, 30% fan. If I was going to work and needed 12 hours, maybe 35% thermostat and 25% fan. 24 hours, 25% thermostat and no fan. (I shoot for a bed of hot hot coals and an active cat at the end, not a cold stove!)

All these settings won't work that way for you or anyone else though- you have a differently calibrated thermostat, a very different flue with different draw, different wood with different moisture content, different altitude, and different loading and burning practices.

I don't have enough technical knowledge or experience to answer the 8" liner question.

 

[weatherguy]

To get maximum performance from the BK insert the liner has to be in the just right zone, too small and you won't get enough draft, too long and you get too much draft. Having an 8 inch is not going to give you maximum performance, that's probably your biggest problem
I always ran my blower on low to get max burn time, it threw plenty of heat. The insert won't match the non insert for burn times for a couple of reasons, it's slightly smaller and the blower running cuts down burn times.

 

[Woody Stover]

It's adapting to an existing 8" insulated liner.

How tall, from the top of the stove to the top of the cap?

 

[ksks]

[jetsam,
(That's Stove Tea brewing in the pickle jars on either side of the stove!)[/QUOTE]


Here I've been cursing the winter months that I cant make my sun tea.
Thats's genius!

 

[jetsam]

Here I've been cursing the winter months that I cant make my sun tea.
Thats's genius!

That Stove Tea IS Sun Tea all summer, I use the same pickle jars.

 

[Rickb]

[jetsam,
(That's Stove Tea brewing in the pickle jars on either side of the stove!)

Here I've been cursing the winter months that I cant make my sun tea.
Thats's genius![/QUOTE]



I agree. Gunna try it next week. How long to you leave it brewing?