Hi Rose Lane,
My stove is from 2007/2008, but it should burn essentially the same as yours. I would assume that it burns the same as yours because that is probably true. My chimney is ~12' height from the top of the stove - on the low side. East-West (E-W) means the wood is loaded with the long side going from left-right in the stove. North-South (N-S) means it is loaded with the long side going from back to front of the stove.In a day, I'll burn about 2 cubic feet of wood if I have three fires (early morning, afternoon, evening).
This is my cold-start process and full load start process. The first image shows the initial kindling load and start. I load a bunch of kindling and very small splits as shown, separating the wood to get good air flow during the start up burn. I use a wax fire started and newspaper on the bottom, and maybe a little kindling wood too, if I have it. I use a bottoms-up method for the start, but others use a top-down method (either works). The second image shows it after about 5 minutes and stove top is about 175 degrees. At this point, stove top is low temperature, but fire is raging and it is small kindling pieces, so I cut the air back to 75%. The third image about five minutes later and stove top is 350 degrees - I cut the air back to 50%. The fourth image is about 5 minutes later and stove top 500 degrees. I cut the air back to 25% and just let it go. After about an hour I have the fifth image - a nice pile of coals. It should burn this hot and lively and fast if the wood is dry and small and well-spaced apart in the stove.
Now, I am ready to load my stove for the full load - the full load will start better with the stove already at 350 degrees and the chimney flue warmed up and drawing well, which is why I do that kindling fire first. Push the air control all the way in (100% air again). I pre-stack my pile (6th image) to get a decent sense of what I will put where (this gets pretty intuitive after a while, and I like to have stacked it ahead of time to get the fullest load and not spend too much time with the door open). I rake the coals forward (7th image - those are the long welding gloves I wear when I am loading the stove) and the coals are shown at the front (8th image). I make sure the primary air is again at 100% (full air, handle all the way in). I load the wood into the back (9th image) and create a V groove in the coals (10th image). Then I load the front stack (11th image) and close the door but leave it open just a little (note the handle is not fully pointed down - depending on how tight the wood is, how many coals you had, the outside temperature, how dry the wood is, etc. you might have to leave the door open more or less and for shorter or longer time - but shouldn't be more than 5-10 minutes if you have good coals and your wood is dry). That's shown in the 12th image. Within 5 minutes, I've got decent flames (13th image) so I close the door tight (handle down) and about 5 minutes after that the flames are building nicely (14th image). Now, I'll go through the process of slowly shutting the air down. With dry wood, I'll go to 75% of full air with stove top at 350 and 50% of full air with stove top at 500. (When I first started burning, I would let the stove top get to 500 before I shut down primary air to 75% because my wood was not well dried). I'll shut down the air to 25% when the stove is between 550 and 575 (usually about five minutes after it gets to 500, if the wood is dry), and then I'll shut it down in 1/8th (12% increments) as it allows me to, depending on wood, how cold it is outside, etc.). The 15th image is what it looks as it is gasifying well, probably 500-550 stove top, and the 16th image is it settled into a nice burn at about 550-575 stovetop within about a half or three quarters of an hour of initial load. Note the purplish flames in the last image - that is indicative of a really hot, efficient burn and if you can get a burn like that, then your wood is really dry. If not, you have more moisture in your wood than you should. I don't even get this burn all the time with the purple flames, but the more purple they are the more efficient and hotter the burn. I think I had some nice dry hickory in that burn, mixed in with some maple and ash, so it was burning pretty nicely. Regardless, if you get the flames dancing off the top of the tubes, you are doing the right thing with the burn.
I recall you telling me that you just got a new delivery of wood from a supplier - I can tell you that new deliveries of wood from suppliers are never dry enough to burn well - get a bunch more of that now and stack it up in the open air and top cover it to keep the rain off (but leave the sides open - cover the top only , don't cover the sides or you will trap the moisture inside). Give it two years to dry covered and outside. Yeah - two years, no matter what the wood guy tells you.
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