MANY QUESTIONS

[chrisman34]

I will admit I am a paranoid wreck, when it comes to wood stoves. I am a firefighter and an insurance guy.......so that accounts for me being scared to death of this thing. Any way on to my questions. I have a LOPI Endeavor.... 1)I am curious what cook top temp should be as well as stack.... I have had cook top to 700 with a stack temp of 300 my stack never really gets much above 300. 2) I have had this a couple times now...the stove will not back down...extinguish with a spray bottle or extinguisher and find that the wood load has turned to all very hot coals that can not be controlled! Is this due to coals or a problem with the stove? If it is the coals why is the stove producing them? 3) tonight I had it closed up for the night, and i heard this roaring....what it was is the secondary burn.....it would go out and then erupt so violently that it would blow smoke out of the stove.....I fiddled with the controlls and nothing help it but to spray with water and again remove the abundance of very hot coals! I find if the stove goes over 550 it WILL NOT COME BACK DOWN! it will climb untill the wood is used up, the highest I have got is 750 cook top, and the manual says 800 is over fire!

I guess in a nut shell my main problem is the wood cooking down to coals instead of burning up. Is this normal for epa stoves or am I doing something wrong? Should you still be able to back the stove off with these coals..... I close everything up and the temp continues to rise!!

I have read many posts on here and can't find these questions, sorry if they are duplicate!

 

[begreen]

Welcome Chrisman, don't feel bad. We've all been there.

It sounds like you're restoking the stove too soon and putting full loads of wood on a really full, hot coal bed then dampering it down too soon. That's not a good practice with an EPA stove. It's causing the wood to outgas rapidly, but extinguishing the flame. When you shut the air off too quickly, the flame temporarily dies out, but the gases keep building. Then when the flame comes back, it ignites the gases. Whoomph!

Instead, when you have a real deep, hot bed of coals, rake them towards the front (or towards the primary air source), and leave the air wide open, to burn the coals down a bit. Then, with a modest coal bed, load it up. Leave the air open until the wood is charring. Then close it down about 50-60%, but not enough to snuff the flame completely. FWIW, 700 on the stove top when the stove is in intense secondary burn is not all that unusual. That's why we're all such sticklers about safe installations.

Here's a neat video that will give you some pointers on burning in a modern stove:
http://www.ec.gc.ca/cleanair-airpur/default.asp?lang=En&n=8011CD70-1

 

[Hogwildz]

What kind of stove is it? Mine goes to 750 at height of burn, its fine. You sound new to the stove, and some paranoia & worry is normal.
At 750, I don;'t want mine to come down . Thats when you get some nice heat from her. The coals are a natural thing. Coals are both normal and wanted.
Once the initial burn is down, the coals are what gets you through the night and what you restart your next load on. If too many do as Begreen suggested. If you have more than 3 inches of coal or so, your loading too many times in too short a period of time. Don't get into the habit of continually feeding splits of wood in just cause there is no flames going on. Just cause there are no massive flames after the initial burn cycle, does not mean your not getting heat from her. The thermo will prove that.
If 800 it top temp, just keep it under there and you'll be fine, and have limited creosote build up.
When loading, try and put around 1/2 the firebox with large splits, then the rest with mediums. Less chance of over firing with larger splits.
Also check the door gasket when the stove is cool by doing the dollar bill test. If its leaking air in, that will make the stove hard to control & cause hi temp spikes.

 

[Kilted]

Use one of these to pull down the stove top temp and warm up the house.

http://cgi.ebay.com/WHISPER-FAN-COR...ryZ41987QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.com/free-breeze-woo...ryZ41987QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

(broken link removed to http://cgi.ebay.com/Free-Breeze-Stirling-Engine-Woodstove-Fan_W0QQitemZ230211914802QQihZ013QQcategoryZ2594QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem)

-- Brandy

 

[chrisman34]

Thanks for the info.... as I stated the stove is a LOPI Endeavor....... I noticed this morning a fairly significant leak where the stove pipe goes into the woodstove..... Could this be causing my low stack temps, or is it normal for these to run lower stack temps. If I have a stove top temp of 5-600 degrees my stack runs around 200 or so. Is this normal? Running the bypass doesn't effect the stack temp much but the bypass is right on top so i know it is opening and closeing correctly. I also read someplace that wood can be too dry... I know the stuff I am using was cut atleast 2 years ago and maybe more...could this be the cause of some of this too/

AGAIN THANKS A BUNCH, I dont want to get rid of this stove that I just spent $2000.00 on, but I also don't need a trip to the hospital for a nervouse break down LOL

 

[jqgs214]

Close up that leak with some stove cement. It is sucking in cooler air and could be the cause of some lower stack temps.

 

[Mandoo]

Thanks for the info.... as I stated the stove is a LOPI Endeavor....... I noticed this morning a fairly significant leak where the stove pipe goes into the woodstove..... Could this be causing my low stack temps, or is it normal for these to run lower stack temps. If I have a stove top temp of 5-600 degrees my stack runs around 200 or so. Is this normal? Running the bypass doesn't effect the stack temp much but the bypass is right on top so i know it is opening and closeing correctly. I also read someplace that wood can be too dry... I know the stuff I am using was cut atleast 2 years ago and maybe more...could this be the cause of some of this too/

AGAIN THANKS A BUNCH, I dont want to get rid of this stove that I just spent $2000.00 on, but I also don't need a trip to the hospital for a nervouse break down LOL

I had a leak in the same area causing low stack temps. After the repair I gained about 100* on the stack and my stove acts normal I have no more run aways but it may be do to multiple actions including the way I load wood. I do believe that this type of leak somehow changes the burn atmosphere in the stove causing strange behavior the stove was not engineered for.

Let me put it this way my stove is now easy to use and I sleep like a baby in a warm house. Now if you were to ask the same question a month ago!

I'm not an expert just giving my .02 from my experience.

 

[ecfinn]

I had similar problems last year when learning to use my Lopi insert, although I didn't have the leak. The one thing I learned that helped alot was learning to pack the wood as tightly as possible when loading it. The more air that can get around the wood, the hotter the fire can get and the harder it can be to control. Try to pick your straightest best fitting pieces to use on overnight burns. Pack them tightly and when you damper down the air (never all the way) you will have much better control of the burn temperature.

Also note that the damper bypass should really only be used when reloading. Its main purpose is to make it easier to re-load by forcing the smoke/etc out the back instead of up the front. If you open the bypass when the secondary burn is going you're theoretically sending unburned gasses up the chimney, but in practice the secondary burn tubes are still putting out air so the gasses will still get burned before going up the stack.

Hope that helps.

Eric

 

[chrisman34]

Thanks again for the help.....spoke to distributor today and they think the same as you guys, short of my paranoia, the leak may be cosing most of my "real" problems. I have purchased high temp silicone to seal the gap in between the stove and pipe, and the stove seems to be much more responsive....I am still a little gun shy to fire it up past 500 degrees but at the lower temps I am getting really good control now. Stack temp is up a little not a lot..... Give my nerves a few days to settle and I will run it up and see how she responds.

THANKS AGAIN FOR THE HELP! With any luck I will get comfortable with this thing and be able to sleep without alcohol!! LOL

This site should be made a part of every stove purchased!

 

[pulldownclaw]

I'm pretty sure you want to use furnace cement and not the high temp silicone in that area, it get too hot. Unless I am missing something. Anyone else?

 

[swestall]

NOPE, Cement is it....

 

[chrisman34]

Wow dist told me the silicone would work, even after asking about the lable stateing something like, flexible up to 450°.... but they said it would hold up to 1200° and i dont need it flexible..... WOW..... I didn't want the cement becouse i remove that pipe to clean from below and thought the silicone would be easier to take on and off.... I guess I go back and drop some more coin for the right stuff!