Long burns 20+ hours, how is this possible?

[Fargo]

TLDR: I'm getting 24 hour burns and my mind is blown at how efficient this stove is running.

So I had my Ashford 30.2 installed at the end of Dec and I've gotten about 6 weeks of burning on it now and its been an interesting journey. Initially, my wood was a bit damp and I ran the fan on high with the thermostat a little more than half way open over night. This would give me around an 8 hour to 10 hour burn time. So I filled it 2-3 times a day. This worked great when it was -20* F+/-. But as outside temps got above 0* it started getting too hot in my house. Around that same time I also acquired a cord of drier wood to burn. So that my have contributed to the higher heat levels as well as the higher outside temps.

So in an effort to bring my house down to a more reasonable temp, I started only burning at night and let it cool off during the day. But I missed having the hot coals to start a fire. So I decided to try turning the thermostat down further to get longer burns. That didn't really change things a whole lot. But then at some point, I turned off the fan. Wow what a difference. The fan must pull off enough heat to keep the thermostat open further. Because the last couple days, since turning off the stove fan, I have had the thermostat down to just at the start of the white marking and I get really long slow burns. Yesterdays burn was close to 24 hours. As far as I could tell my cat never fell below the "Active Zone" that whole time. So for almost 24 hours I had a low slow fire going within the Active zone.

My current load was filled around 11pm last night and right now, after 12 hours of burning at about 11;20 AM, my stove pipe temps are around 215* and the needle on the cat probe is at about the 12 o'clock position. (Or right in line with the stove pipe. So about halfway around the dial.) With lots of unburned wood still sitting in the firebox. So it looks like I will get about another 24 hour burn.

I'm new to wood stoves, but this seems crazy good to me. From reading forum reviews, I was fully expecting to be able to achieve 12 hour burns, but never did I think I would be able to get by loading once a day. I keep looking to see if I'm missing something, but everything seems to be good. Granted our outside temps are in 20*-35* range, so not much heat is needed. But needless to say I am very pleased with how this stove is working.

For reference the stove is in the basement and using the house fan to circulate the air, it puts out sufficient heat to heat both basement and upstairs during these more mild temps. Additional note, I have an electric heating system that stores heat in ceramic bricks, so that does contribute to some of the heat as well. So I'm not fully heating with the stove. But the combination seems to be working really well right now.

 

[Tron]

Granted our outside temps are in 20*-35* range, so not much heat is needed. But needless to say I am very pleased with how this stove is working.

For reference the stove is in the basement and using the house fan to circulate the air, it puts out sufficient heat to heat both basement and upstairs during these more mild temps. Additional note, I have an electric heating system that stores heat in ceramic bricks, so that does contribute to some of the heat as well. So I'm not fully heating with the stove. But the combination seems to be working really well right now.

That's not what we call "mild temps" around here, but ok.
In general, yes, with energy-dense wood and turning the stove to low, you can get 24h burns. Whether that makes sense depends on the use case. When we have sub-freezing temperatures, I use the stove to heat the home almost exclusively, so it runs higher than low resulting in 8h or so burn times, but we only have pine.

Sounds like you could save a lot of money by utilizing more heating from the stove, since those electric/brick storage systems are the absolute worst when it comes to energy efficiency. IIRC they were popular in the 70's and 80's and designed to take advantage of low-load hours in electric demand like overnight and then use the energy throughout the day, but that never really came though. And as they are resistive heaters AND lose energy with the brick storage, their efficiency is not good.

You might be able to lower your electric bill by using more of the stove to heat your home.

I've tried using the AC/furnace fan to distribute heat throughout the house, but with little effect. For one, the return air intakes are at floor level, and secondly, the ducts run through the uninsulated attic. May be different in your case.