I MADE THINGS A LOT WORSE!!!!!!!!!!!!

[oldspark]

My cap does not have a screen, just a grill looking affair.

 

[Waulie]

8.) Put new gaskets in made the draft worse.

Just echoing most of the comments here. But again, it can only be two things. Either you chimney has insufficient draft or your stove is not allowing enough air in. Since the stove is clean, that would mean you have a poorly designed stove. I wouldn't worry much about your wood since you tried lumber and eco bricks.

I didn't read all the comments, but this is important: Does the wood burn with the door cracked?

 

[AppalachianStan]

When you can't get a roaring fire with kiln dried pine (2X4) and the door cracked.

I can get a roaring fire with the door cracked, but close the door and it go out.

 

[Waulie]

I can get a roaring fire with the door cracked, but close the door and it go out.

That's what I figured since it got worse when you replaced the gaskets. Obviously your chimney draft isn't enough to pull enough air through your stove intake. The questions remains which is the problem. It probably isn't one or the other. It is probably a combination of somewhat low chimney draft and a poorly designed air intake. If the fire gets rolling easily with the door cracked and since this stove is a little suspect, I'm guessing a different stove might work fine for you. Being down south, and having an 8" flue is not helping but I have a feeling this is the wrong stove for this set up. Some stoves breath easier than others.

 

[Stephen in SoKY]

It's down to 52 degrees in Clover now, have you tried waiting til night to start your fire?

 

[AppalachianStan]

I can get a roaring fire with the door cracked, but close the door and it go out.

That's what I figured since it got worse when you replaced the gaskets. Obviously your chimney draft isn't enough to pull enough air through your stove intake. The questions remains which is the problem. It probably isn't one or the other. It is probably a combination of somewhat low chimney draft and a poorly designed air intake. If the fire gets rolling easily with the door cracked and since this stove is a little suspect, I'm guessing a different stove might work fine for you. Being down south, and having an 8" flue is not helping but I have a feeling this is the wrong stove for this set up. Some stoves breath easier than others.

That is kinda sad the Stove manufacture is from NC you would think that they would have figured that out. the stove can run on an 8" or 6" flue. I was going to go with a 6" chimney system, but the chimney pro said to run 8" because my stove is 8". I have 14' chimney system.

 

[AppalachianStan]

It's down to 52 degrees in Clover now, have you tried waiting til night to start your fire?

No not tonight I thought I would wait after I add the pipe to the chimney. Sat it was 42°F and I fire the stove up with some 2x4s, had a roaring fire with the door cracked, shut the door the fire dies out. But I guess if I started a fire it would let us know that it is not the stove's draft, but maybe the chimney is not high enough.
Then maybe the stove has a bad draft design.

 

[maple1]

Seems to me a roaring fire with the door open would mean a decent draft. Sounds to me like there is a problem with your air intake since it snuffs the fire when the door is closed - are your sure ALL the passages are absolutely clean & clear?

It is kind of hard to check it out over the internet though, can't poke around it thru the vid screen.

 

[AppalachianStan]

Seems to me a roaring fire with the door open would mean a decent draft. Sounds to me like there is a problem with your air intake since it snuffs the fire when the door is closed - are your sure ALL the passages are absolutely clean & clear?

It is kind of hard to check it out over the internet though, can't poke around it thru the vid screen.

The only air intake I have find and double check with Appalachian to make sure. Here is drawing of it.

 

[maple1]

If I'm seeing things right, that looks like an intake tract that would be very difficult to get properly clean if it got plugged up - if drawn anywhere close to scale. Unless it can be partly dissassembled. I see lots of places for stuff to get stuck in and create partial buildups. Can you fish some haywire or something thru all the passages to double check they are clear?

There is one sure way to determine if you have adequate draft - find a friend with a manometer. Adequate ones are not that expensive - if you couldn't find someone with one that would do you a favour & measure your draft out of the good of his heart (it should only take a few minutes to do), surely they wouldn't charge you much. Did the guy you had out use one? If he called all clear without actually measuring your draft, I'd look for someone else. It is a very easy thing to verify with the proper tool, and that tool is not that expensive. Without soundly verifying or ruling things out, we're kind of hoping to grasp the right straw here - as can be seen by the varying feedback.

 

[nelraq]

Hi Stan,
Here's my 2 cents worth:

I had a 14' straight run of pipe on my first stove -worked very well.

Changed stoves (now have an Oslo). I 'fought' with it for most of the first winter. Just like yours, the Oslo would run great with the door cracked open, but would die down to almost nothing when I closed the door. Very frustrating indeed! I know what you are going through!!

With the help of this forum, I was encouraged to lengthen the chimney by adding sections of single wall stove pipe. Added 2' - no difference, added 2 more feet - a noticeable difference - but still not great. Added another 1 foot section and voila I now have very good draft and the stove works great.

Of course, I took the single wall pipe off and ended up adding 5.5 feet of Class A.

My main point here is don't give up after adding only 2 feet. It may take 4 or 5' to solve the problem

Good Luck!!

 

[AppalachianStan]

If I'm seeing things right, that looks like an intake tract that would be very difficult to get properly clean if it got plugged up - if drawn anywhere close to scale. Unless it can be partly dissassembled. I see lots of places for stuff to get stuck in and create partial buildups. Can you fish some haywire or something thru all the passages to double check they are clear?

There is one sure way to determine if you have adequate draft - find a friend with a manometer. Adequate ones are not that expensive - if you couldn't find someone with one that would do you a favour & measure your draft out of the good of his heart (it should only take a few minutes to do), surely they wouldn't charge you much. Did the guy you had out use one? If he called all clear without actually measuring your draft, I'd look for someone else. It is a very easy thing to verify with the proper tool, and that tool is not that expensive. Without soundly verifying or ruling things out, we're kind of hoping to grasp the right straw here - as can be seen by the varying feedback.

No the chimney pro did not use anything like that, He just looked up and down the chimney. I blew it at with a air compressor and this thing I put together.

 

[AppalachianStan]

Hi Stan,
Here's my 2 cents worth:

I had a 14' straight run of pipe on my first stove -worked very well.

Changed stoves (now have an Oslo). I 'fought' with it for most of the first winter. Just like yours, the Oslo would run great with the door cracked open, but would die down to almost nothing when I closed the door. Very frustrating indeed! I know what you are going through!!

With the help of this forum, I was encouraged to lengthen the chimney by adding sections of single wall stove pipe. Added 2' - no difference, added 2 more feet - a noticeable difference - but still not great. Added another 1 foot section and voila I now have very good draft and the stove works great.

Of course, I took the single wall pipe off and ended up adding 5.5 feet of Class A.

My main point here is don't give up after adding only 2 feet. It may take 4 or 5' to solve the problem

Good Luck!!

How does it look. If I add 5.5' to my chimney it would look like a smoke stack. (really tall) But looks does not matter as long as it works.

 

[AppalachianStan]

I did a search on Google for manometer. I have no clue how to use one so I guess that I would have to call a pro who has one. Does anyone know how much that would cost?

 

[Stephen in SoKY]

It involves tapping into your flue pipe, installing heat proof tubing (Usually brake line), setting the manometer to zero, hooking up the plastic tubing to the brake line and reading the manometer. Not worth it unless you're setting up to burn coal. How many of your attempts at starting a fire have been during the day?

 

[AppalachianStan]

One I think since I installed the gaskets. But I have tried different time of the day. I have tried a 9:00 Sunday night it was in the 40s used 2x4 it took like 2 hours to burn it up. I have tried @ 6 in the morning was in the 30s. But the worst was this past Sat was around 55 °F @ 11 in the morning it took like 5 hours to burn up the kindling and two ECO bricks had to keep the door crack open and feed it kindling to get it to burn up.

 

[maple1]

Not worth it unless you're setting up to burn coal.

Why is that?

Even after all the chasing in circles going on here, nothing has been confirmed or ruled out yet. If you can find someone with a manometer, all you would have to do is drill a little hole in your pipe, get him to do his thing with the manometer (which would only take all of 10 minutes), and you would know for sure if your draft was or was not the problem without spending money on pipe or climbing your roof.

Time to get methodical, I'd say.

 

[AppalachianStan]

I think that all most everyone here believes I have a draft issue. But is it poorly designed stove issue or mere of a short chimney and warm climate issue, or Need a new stove and add to the chimney issue.

nelraq said he keep adding 2' until it had a good draft. Most people here has at last 20' chimney system.

I now know and understand what all the issue are. I need to make a check list and just need to do it and post back after I have gone though all the issue and have them fixed. Then need to gave everyone the update when it is working right. I guess to I just like here from all of you. Thanks you all for you time. Stan

 

[mayhem]

If you're going to just be replacing the stove eventually anyway, how about just notching the gasket in a couple places and make the thing leak again so you can run it with the door latched shut? Mayb cut out that same section that you said was not present before you replaced the gaskets. I know the mfr told you they were right the way you did it, but you gotta do what you gotta do, right? It worked better before you put the new gaskets in, so try to return it to that state.

I would guess you've got a half dozen minor issues working together against you instead of a silver bullet.

1) You're in a warm climate (my stove has a 26 foot 6" chimney and when its 50 degrees out its damn hard to start a fire).
2) Your chimney is on the short side. But at least the cap is above the peak of your house.
3) Your chimney is 8" diameter. I know you were advised to go to 8" from 6", I beleive this is very bad advice though.
4) The stove may just be a lousy design.

 

[AppalachianStan]

If you're going to just be replacing the stove eventually anyway, how about just notching the gasket in a couple places and make the thing leak again so you can run it with the door latched shut? Mayb cut out that same section that you said was not present before you replaced the gaskets. I know the mfr told you they were right the way you did it, but you gotta do what you gotta do, right? It worked better before you put the new gaskets in, so try to return it to that state.

I would guess you've got a half dozen minor issues working together against you instead of a silver bullet.

1) You're in a warm climate (my stove has a 26 foot 6" chimney and when its 50 degrees out its damn hard to start a fire).
2) Your chimney is on the short side. But at least the cap is above the peak of your house.
3) Your chimney is 8" diameter. I know you were advised to go to 8" from 6", I beleive this is very bad advice though.
4) The stove may just be a lousy design.

Thank you for you advice. I might start buying up the 6" chimney system. The 6" chimney system is so easy to get around here. I was at Lowe's yesterday evening to get the black stove pipe and they had every thing you would need for it.

Just and up date. blowing the air intake out has help some. I have the door shot and and a lazy flame with kindling and it is 50°F outside. Maybe by add the chimney pipe it will get better.

 

[AppalachianStan]

It has 10 mins now I have the damper closed and the firebox still has flames very small flames with just kindling stove pipe temp is 200*

 

[oldspark]

So who can tell me if this is a rule of thumb in a warmer climate, a 6 inch is better than a 8 inch chimney, pretty sure he said the stove has a 8 inch opening, or are we guessing that the 6 inch will have more velocity that the 8 inch?

 

[buckdog]

It has 10 mins now I have the damper closed and the firebox still has flames very small flames with just kindling stove pipe temp is 200*

It sounds like your trying to conserve wood buy building small fires? If it was me, I would build a hot fire by pileing on the wood and burn it like I stole the wood. You need to make sure that fire box is pulling air, and the draft control is not plugged. Also why do you close your damper when your just burning kindling? That damper your referring to is that on your stove pipe above your stove? Any damper shold be wide open till your fire box is up to a sufficient operating temp. Get that fire ripping hot! What kind of spiecies of wood are you burning? Wood might be dry on outside, but wet in middle.
Just trying to help Bro

 

[Stephen in SoKY]

Not worth it unless you're setting up to burn coal.

Why is that?

The OP is trying to provide heat as cheaply as possible. A service call from an HVAC contractor will be quite expensive. 2 joints of 8" stove pipe (48" total) will be $25 assuming he's somewhere near York, SC: http://www.tractorsupply.com/stove-pipe-24-ga-8-in-dia-x-24-in-l-3196656

 

[AppalachianStan]

So who can tell me if this is a rule of thumb in a warmer climate, a 6 inch is better than a 8 inch chimney, pretty sure he said the stove has a 8 inch opening, or are we guessing that the 6 inch will have more velocity that the 8 inch?

I have no idea but that is a good question.
Now the manual says 7. Chimney Installation #5 The pipe is to be minimum of 6" inside diameter.