Isle Royale - where did my secondaries go?

[deathandtaxes]

So I have had the Isle Royale for quite a few years (6 or so). Use it quite a bit, other than one year where I was a beta tester for the Ideal Steel stove (miss that beast). That year it was moved to the sun room about 10 feet away, repainted in the spring, and moved back to place. Since then I have had some struggles with it. It seemed harder to keep the burn clean and would smoke more from the chimney. To combat this, I have kept the primary air slide open a little more (slid to the left about 1" more than before). Last year I tried to help it and put in a new fiber board in the baffle as the old one was cracked quite a bit. Since that didn't help, I thought it might be a draft change because I had sealed up a older sliding glass door, but opening a window near by did not seem to change the situation. I also tried sealing up (air tight) the clean-out in the basement to increase the draft at the stove. Trying to think of what else I have tried....anyway. So I was working from home this morning, so the fire was up and running around 7 as usual, then I was wrapping up at home and headed to the office so I tossed a few logs in, opened up both airs and let it get nice and hot again, then shut the startup, waited a bit, as usual and started closing down the primary to it's new location. Did a few things before leaving the house and as I wondered by the stove, I noticed that there really wasn't much in the way of secondaries, so just for fun I put the primary way down (stove is nice and hot, 600ish, and has been hot for many hours) just so I could see those secondaries I used to enjoy...well...there weren't any and it looked like smoke was passing right on up passed the baffles not igniting....sure enough a quick look at the chimney proved that.

This got me thinking, it all my attempts to problem solve this...the poor performance is because the secondary burn is not happening (there is a little flame/air from the tubes, but not much, I used to light up the entire top of the stove if I wanted to). So why wouldn't the secondaries happen. Well, it has to be not enough air, duh. So what changed....and more importantly, how do I fix it.

My current thought is that something is blocking the air to the manifolds some where. So these manifolds get their air from both sides where this tilting manifold connects to the stove and pivots (just an open pipe/tube that it rotates on). Now this is where I am stuck, where does this air come from? Anyone out there who knows this stove better than me, where should I be looking for some sort of blockage? Also, not knowing the air route for the manifold air, could something have been bent while moving it that could be restricting the flow (a dolly with a fork was used so lots of pressure on the bottom ashpan area)? I have looked around the stove from the outside and not noticed anything bent. Can ash or something else get into the air path for the secondary tubes / manifold?

FYI, I don't think it is a draft issue as the primary and secondary air controls get plenty of air.

 

[jb6l6gc]

Are holes on secondary manifolds nice and clean?

 

[claydogg84]

Anything change with your wood supply? My Oslo will struggle to get secondaries if I have wet wood in the load.

 

[jatoxico]

Make sure all baffles and any insulation blankets are seated correctly. May have been jostled out of position during the move.

 

[deathandtaxes]

Wood supply is really good so that is not the cause...
The baffles seem to be in place and the fiberboard (between the baffle and tubes) is new, I took it apart and replaced it last year hoping that was the cause.

This is a frustrating one....

It just seems like there is not enough air from the tubes, but maybe it is something else. If I understand how that works, the air to the tubes is always open providing whatever air is needed for the secondaries, right? The primary air control only controls the main air coming in and does not affect the air to the tubes?

 

[deathandtaxes]

JB616, missed your response. Last I looked, they were all open and did not appear clogged. I will take a wire brush to them quickly in the morning to make sure.

 

[jatoxico]

@Jags has one I think, he's likely to have some good suggestions.

 

[begreen]

I would check and make sure the baffle assembly is correctly seating in the closed position and that no smoke is escaping from behind it and up the flue. @Jags may have some additional thoughts.

 

[deathandtaxes]

Thanks guys for tagging Jags!

begreen - yeah, I went through that last year, checking that nothing was going behind the baffle, etc. Today I was actually watching the smoke come forward, past the tubes, and up the chimney. It's like I am burning with an old school stove, have to keep the air open more than I should and still battling smoke way more than I should.

I am not even sure where the entrance is for the air for the secondary tubes. I would take a shop vac to it.

 

[deathandtaxes]

stupid question, but would the air to the secondary tubes be controlled by the primary air slide? Opening more air to the tubes as I close the primary air down? If that is the case, maybe a rod got knocked loose or bent. The diagram in the manual does seem to give me any insight.
if you care the parts breakdown is on page 32
http://downloads.hearthnhome.com/installManuals/250_5763.pdf

 

[begreen]

I don't know, but suspect not. Only a few stoves that I know of control the secondary air with the primary. Usually the secondary air intake is a separate open hole on the stove bottom or on the rear of the stove behind the heat shield.

 

[jb6l6gc]

Maybe blow back through tube holes with air compressor.

 

[Kobeman]

There's a round hole in back kinda under the blower where the air enters for the whole thing, sheet metal channels it forward and it then flows to primary slide and also feeds up thru the left and right channels to the top tubes. Is the small rear baffle slice seated?

 

[Jags]

The air to the tubes is unregulated (Not controlled by primary adjustments). Just to get a baseline so that we can try and get some things figured out - where are you taking your stove top temps from? The middle of the griddle will be different than the corner of the griddle even to the corner of the stove. I use top left corner of griddle as my guide.

Was the baffle material the same as original. Not all materials has the same reflective properties. The same reason that the IR uses the pumice style bricks vs the very dense style. Do you use the top loading feature?

The difference between a 500F stove top and 600F stove top is a night and day difference when looking at tube activity on my stove. This also changes between fuel types (I would venture a guess at different out gassing rates). What is the wood you are burning? Oak seems lazy compared to a soft maple at the lower range of "active" - like 500F.

Even if you cannot see the river of secondary flames, can you see where air is exiting the tube holes? It should almost appear to shoot a "hole" through the flame at the top of the box.

Note: If I am not getting proper secondary flames, or possibly notice a bit of smoke from my stack, my first objective is to bring up the temp a little bit. Often 50 or 100 deg. on the stove top temp makes a HUGE difference in performance.

 

[kennyp2339]

Hmm, you checked the baffle and its all in place, the primary air control does not control secondary's, wood supply is good, the only thing that I can think of is possibly the intake to the secondary's got clogged with paint?

Read the manual - what's your start up air control doing?

 

[Jags]

An afterthought... have you confirmed the accuracy of your thermo? The reason I ask is that as stated above, I can notice a HUGE difference in performance with as little as 50F change in stove top temps. An inaccurate thermo could waiver by that much pretty easily and if so, its possible that you simply are not getting to the temps required for active secondary burn. Keep in mind that the tubes need to be about 1100F or above to be fully active.

 

[deathandtaxes]

Well things are more confusing to me this morning.

So first I will answer the questions.

Kobe - yes, that smaller separate baffle piece is seated corrected.

Jags - Yes the baffle material was from Quadra Fire, so I would think would be the same. I do not use the top loading feature. For temp, I use the left side of the griddle closest to the front of the stove (learned to use the side from you years ago). Same place I always use. I have a pipe temp too (not probe) at the same location I have always used. I agree, this bad boy likes to run hot. Wood type- mix, from the typical supplier, seasoned over a year and half and burns great. And yes, I know what you are talking about with the air from the tubes shooting a hole through the flames, that was also missing yesterday (and prior).

Kenny, yes, I agree, there has to be something with the air supplied to the baffle only.

On to the confusing part. So I poked around with the stove this morning. Holes in the tubes are completely free of debris and open. Tubes in good shape. So I spent some time looking around in the stove trying to figure out the path of the air into the stove. Based on what others have said, I think I may have figured out some of the path, but that may be irrelevant based on what I am going to say next.

So I looked at the baffle closely, opening up the top load lid and poking around with a flashlight (again, I never top load). So I moved the baffle around with the handle a bunch of times. Not rough, but not gentle, thinking that maybe if there was some build up in the side tubes of the baffle it might help (long shot, but I wasn't going to take the stove apart this morning).

Started the fire, wondering what I was going to do with it this weekend, and wouldn't you know, after the regular heating up routine, shut down the start up air, then in a few minutes start shutting down the primary. Secondaries (or obvious air coming out of the holes) from all the tubes. And actually the secondaries fired right up as soon as the startup was shut. WTF. So I work the air down as usual and actually closed it a bit more than I have been lately (last year +). This location of the primary slide would have started producing some smoke from the chimney (just this last year). So today it decides to burn better than it has in over a year. I left with the primary slide pretty close to where I used to put it prior to my issues (when the stove moved), and as I drove away, not a sign of any smoke.

So obviously there is something with the baffle and/or the connection, but it baffles me (no pun intended) as to why just moving it around would make that kind of difference. I guess if it happens again, the next step would be to remove the baffle and poke around some more.

 

[Jags]

You scared it. I do the same thing to computers.

 

[jatoxico]

You may have seated something that was being held up by debris or who knows. Flame and smoke escaping past route of least resistance or secondary air now getting to where it needs to.

Hope you get a repeat performance next time you burn and happiness ensues.

 

[kennyp2339]

Right on - glad to see the stove is running good again!

 

[deathandtaxes]

Thank you guys. I am no closer to knowing what was/is wrong, but I guess on the bright side, it is working and working well.
I should have tried "The Fonz" fix before bugging you guys. At least I know what I am taking apart if/when this happens again. It has something to do with the baffle/manifold and/or where it connects or as Jatoxico points out, maybe some debris was preventing it from being seated properly (strange because I never use the top loading, but stranger things have happened).

Thanks again you guys.

 

[begreen]

Good news! Just for point of reference, I can't recall ever hearing a secondary passage or tubes getting blocked. Positive pressure keeps the tubes debris free.

 

[deathandtaxes]

Good news! Just for point of reference, I can't recall ever hearing a secondary passage or tubes getting blocked. Positive pressure keeps the tubes debris free.

I would agree. The only way would be for something to enter from the outside as that is the direction of the air (ash can't build up in there, wrong direction). But something getting in from the outside would be rather odd too.

Maybe I am just nuts. Can't rule that one out.

 

[baseroom]

Here are the Secondaries on my IR after about three hours. Air almost completely closed. 35 degrees outside.