Hi! We installed a new Intrepid Flexburn in the fall of 2021, and I'm still trying to get a handle on how to operate it to best effect. So first, the background:
When we moved in, the house had an old gas furnace (six-digit phone number in the paperwork!) and a Fisher Baby Bear in the basement. We used the furnace for a month, looked at our gas bill, said, "Huh," and went exclusively to wood heat after that. There's a grate in the floor over where the wood stove sits, and we put a fan in it, open the doors upstairs, and use the stove to heat the basement and first floor. We live in Vancouver, WA, so it gives you an idea of what the climate is like, and we're heating just under 1350 square feet with it. Using the wood stove keeps the un-insulated old house pretty comfortable, and we go through an average of 2.5 cords of wood from October to April, and we used the Fisher for about ten years before getting the new stove. There is a second half-story, with baseboard heat, so it's only important 'cause it makes the chimney taller--close to 28' from basement floor to top.
I *know* chimney height matters, but I honestly did the human-brain thing and just said, "I have a wood stove here, so it'll be fine if I put a different one here!" and we bought the new stove and muscled it into place. The manual with the Intrepid says it's optimized for a 16' chimney, which is obviously not anywhere close to what we have. Still, it seems to draw fine; we have a window that we leave slightly cracked all through the heating season, and the only time we ever get smoke is when we forget to open the damper, open the top when fire's smouldering, or when there's a heavy wind (and even then, it doesn't seem to downdraft once the fire's going). Chimney sweep has never said there's an indication that soot is building up too fast or hard, so we must be doing *something* right. When we started out with the new stove, we had problems keeping the glass clear at first, but have that pretty well dialled-in now, and there's not much build-up to speak of.
Sooooo... what's the problem, then, right? Basically, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get the secondary burn to reliably work. Last year I didn't install the cat; it didn't arrive until December, and by then, I didn't want to bother with it, since the stove was in use. I did use the damper semi-regularly, and would hear the delightful whoosh of secondary combustion, which would last anywhere from a minute or two up to half or three-quarters of an hour. This year, I put the catalyst in, and I can't get the damn thing to roar almost at all. I'd use the temperature probe that came with the catalyst, except the instructions are utter trash and I have no idea where it's supposed to go. The catalyst also doesn't seem to quite fill its socket. No matter what I do, there's almost always visible smoke (with or without cat), and I'm not getting that secondary burn anymore.
What the heck am I doing wrong? Is the chimney too tall? Am I not getting the stove hot enough--and if not, how can I fix that? I load the firebox up and have it blazing nicely and am getting plenty warm, but is it still not enough? I'm mystified.
When we moved in, the house had an old gas furnace (six-digit phone number in the paperwork!) and a Fisher Baby Bear in the basement. We used the furnace for a month, looked at our gas bill, said, "Huh," and went exclusively to wood heat after that. There's a grate in the floor over where the wood stove sits, and we put a fan in it, open the doors upstairs, and use the stove to heat the basement and first floor. We live in Vancouver, WA, so it gives you an idea of what the climate is like, and we're heating just under 1350 square feet with it. Using the wood stove keeps the un-insulated old house pretty comfortable, and we go through an average of 2.5 cords of wood from October to April, and we used the Fisher for about ten years before getting the new stove. There is a second half-story, with baseboard heat, so it's only important 'cause it makes the chimney taller--close to 28' from basement floor to top.
I *know* chimney height matters, but I honestly did the human-brain thing and just said, "I have a wood stove here, so it'll be fine if I put a different one here!" and we bought the new stove and muscled it into place. The manual with the Intrepid says it's optimized for a 16' chimney, which is obviously not anywhere close to what we have. Still, it seems to draw fine; we have a window that we leave slightly cracked all through the heating season, and the only time we ever get smoke is when we forget to open the damper, open the top when fire's smouldering, or when there's a heavy wind (and even then, it doesn't seem to downdraft once the fire's going). Chimney sweep has never said there's an indication that soot is building up too fast or hard, so we must be doing *something* right. When we started out with the new stove, we had problems keeping the glass clear at first, but have that pretty well dialled-in now, and there's not much build-up to speak of.
Sooooo... what's the problem, then, right? Basically, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get the secondary burn to reliably work. Last year I didn't install the cat; it didn't arrive until December, and by then, I didn't want to bother with it, since the stove was in use. I did use the damper semi-regularly, and would hear the delightful whoosh of secondary combustion, which would last anywhere from a minute or two up to half or three-quarters of an hour. This year, I put the catalyst in, and I can't get the damn thing to roar almost at all. I'd use the temperature probe that came with the catalyst, except the instructions are utter trash and I have no idea where it's supposed to go. The catalyst also doesn't seem to quite fill its socket. No matter what I do, there's almost always visible smoke (with or without cat), and I'm not getting that secondary burn anymore.
What the heck am I doing wrong? Is the chimney too tall? Am I not getting the stove hot enough--and if not, how can I fix that? I load the firebox up and have it blazing nicely and am getting plenty warm, but is it still not enough? I'm mystified.
And it is definitely a picker beast than the Fisher was, but the stuff we're burning has, for the most part, been sitting split for at least a year. While it's not scientific, until I can figure out where the meter went, I've been bringing in wood that is "light for what it is," makes a good sound, and slivers snap rather than bend. Some of it is damper than I'd like, judging by how it burns, but most of the wood we've been using catches quickly and burns smoothly.
