My Jotul is weak

[Angelo C]

Side note: Which also shows the wood is dry enough.

Boy I hope that’s true, if this thing needs three year old wood to keep a room warm in winter then I wasted 8k and should have bought something else.

Side note; I’ve emailed Jotul through their website “contact us” system 2x and have NOT heard a thing . And the rheostat / fan speed control button fell off in my hand. Stuck on one speed till my ‘dealer’ returns one of my three calls or Jotul does. Service? Not impressive so far.

 

[Angelo C]

Ok so then try it in 3 days.
Top down fires gets the secondary burners hotter faster. That means better faster hot burning.
And air flow is the other key to getting everything going faster as well.

In the jotul, a key is providing a path for the boost air (which comes from under the door) to flow under the load of wood and up the back of the stove so that it can flow from the top of the back of the stove and right under the secondary burners.

Not really having problems getting it to take off….so long as I give it enough air it gets up quick. Just doesn’t really heat up much and there is very very little heat once the flame is down to ashes. A 6 hour “burn time” means nothing to me if I only get heat for 2 of them.

 

[bigealta]

Well all modern stoves need good dry seasoned wood so really it does not matter. other stoves would have the same problems burning wood that needs more seasoning.

Let's just see if if a top down loose stacked load works better in your set up.
It has been a game changer for some folks here.

And really it is mostly only oak and a few others that need 3 years to be very good. Others can be 2 year seasoned and some even 1 year seasoned. They all have trade offs.

 

[Angelo C]

Well all modern stoves need good dry seasoned wood so really it does not matter. other stoves would have the same problems burning wood that needs more seasoning.

Let's just see if if a top down loose stacked load works better in your set up.
It has been a game changer for some folks here.

And really it is mostly only oak and a few others that need 3 years to be very good. Others can be 2 year seasoned and some even 1 year seasoned. They all have trade offs.

Open spacing definitely helps the airflow and heat flows. Just ends up being a shorter burn time.

 

[bigealta]

Not really having problems getting it to take off….so long as I give it enough air it gets up quick. Just doesn’t really heat up much and there is very very little heat once the flame is down to ashes. A 6 hour “burn time” means nothing to me if I only get heat for 2 of them.

Oh ok then that makes sense.
Yes 2 hours of nice hot burn is about right even with good dry seasoned oak in my jotul anyway.
The key is to dial the flames in to get a longer but slower burn by adjusting the air. It can be Very touchy where just a slight bit more closed can stall the flames. I do it all the time by trying to get a "perfect burn".
But also letting it rip super hot for to long uses up the fuel to quickly.
This just takes a while to figure out with your particular set up as everyone's is a bit different with all the variables.

With the stacking i showed you can adjust the air gap spacing on every level. That's where your control of the fire starts.
Tighter spacing gets longer burns, slower starting, not as clean burns initially
Looser spacing gets shorter burns, faster burns, cleaner burns faster and hotter usually.

 

[Angelo C]

Well all modern stoves need good dry seasoned wood so really it does not matter. other stoves would have the same problems burning wood that needs more seasoning.

Let's just see if if a top down loose stacked load works better in your set up.
It has been a game changer for some folks here.

And really it is mostly only oak and a few others that need 3 years to be very good. Others can be 2 year seasoned and some even 1 year seasoned. They all have trade offs.

The supply of burnable Ash is really depleting fast. In 4 years there won’t be any left. Oak’s and maples are pretty much what’s left. I split by “weight” not species, if it’s an oak I make “ drumsticks “. if it’s an ash or a swamp maple” silver” then it can be a little bit “ heavier”- length and thickness. So short and thin will season in a year if thin and short enough given my full south facing top of a ridge property. Very windy as well.

 

[bigealta]

A six hour burn is very misleading. It really means there are enough coals after 6 hours to start a new fire.
It is almost a useless rating, especially when people take it to mean a hot fully flamed burn for 6 hours.
There is no way the jotul will do that.

 

[Angelo C]

Oh ok then that makes sense.
Yes 2 hours of nice hot burn is about right even with good dry seasoned oak in my jotul anyway.
The key is to dial the flames in to get a longer but slower burn by adjusting the air. It can be Very touchy where just a slight bit more closed can stall the flames. I do it all the time by trying to get a "perfect burn".
But also letting it rip super hot for to long uses up the fuel to quickly.
This just takesva while to figure out with your particular set up as everyone's is a bit different with all the variables.

With the stacking i showed you can adjust the air gap spacing on every level. That's where your control of the fire starts.
Tighter spacing gets longer burns, slower starting, not as clean burns
Looser spacing gets shorter burns, faster burns, cleaner burns and hotter usually.

Agree on all points so far.

 

[bigealta]

I like to split fat with just some smaller splits. This is a trade off i'm willing to make with longer seasoning needed to get longer burn time with the fatter splits.

With your faster drying maple that can help you if you have marginal wood down the road. The faster drying maple mixed in with harder to burn splits will help boost the heat inside the stove and boil off the moisture.

 

[bigealta]

The best is to have very dry very fat splits. Once you get to burn those then you will see how this stove can kick a lot of heat out. But of course those splits are hard fought to get.

 

[bigealta]

Stovetop temps of 550f-650f are where the magic happens with the f400. I'm not sure what it is with the Rockland but it's got to be somewhere around that.

Medium Cruising for longer burns would be more around 450F-500F

If it helps i usually burn with the draft set somewhere between 1/2 open to 1/4 open. I close the draft in a couple small moves to get down to those settings.
My draft is ok, not to strong, not to weak so those setting usually work best for my f400 set up.
Different woods affect the settings by a good amount.

 

[Ctwoodtick]

I know the the OP said wood is dry, but have we seen what the actual moisture content is on fresh cut logs yet? I know there is use of sawdust brick, but curious what the wood used is like. Sorry if this has been answered but it’s a long thread.

 

[MRD1985]

Walk me through the theory with this? Is it heating up the Cat/tubes sooner because the flame is closer to the secondary ?

No, it does a much better job of getting the fire going evenly. This is on a cold start though. If there are enough coals it will light from the bottom on its own. But if not, top down fire gets things going quick.

 

[bigealta]

No, it does a much better job of getting the fire going evenly. This is on a cold start though. If there are enough coals it will light from the bottom on its own. But if not, top down fire gets things going quick.

Well i say on Cold starts, Yes it does heat the secondaries faster (certainly in the jotul f400), and also agree about getting the fire going more evenly and cleanly and quickly.
Also you set it up, light it, close the door, and no need to reload with more splits until the whole load is down to coals.

 

[bigealta]

The supply of burnable Ash is really depleting fast. In 4 years there won’t be any left. Oak’s and maples are pretty much what’s left. I split by “weight” not species, if it’s an oak I make “ drumsticks “. if it’s an ash or a swamp maple” silver” then it can be a little bit “ heavier”- length and thickness. So short and thin will season in a year if thin and short enough given my full south facing top of a ridge property. Very windy as well.

We have good other wood types that are common in NJ.

Sassafras, Dries fast and burns hot, similar to pine sort of.
Locust very hard "splits like butter burns like coal" takes a while to season.
Beech i don't get hardly any but it is very good if you can get it.
Cherry, Pretty good
Hickory, good if you can get it
Fruit tree wood, smaller usually but can be very good
Dogwood good dense hard wood but small
Black walnut, not bad
Pine, not my favorite but actually does burn great in the jotul, Full secondary flames are super easy with dry pine in the jotul. or even just 1 piece of pine added to a load of harder to burn splits.
Cedar, similar to pine
and others i'm forgetting right now.