New to burning wood

[W00die]

Hello everyone. I am new to burning wood to heat my house so let me give u all a run down of what i am dealing with.

I believe the stove is a napoleon 1400 free standing epa stove. Only a few years old bought it on craigslist. The wood i have is maple red oak and ash all below 20% moisture. (Yes it is seasoned wood. Resplit it, check moisture of split pieces still below 20%). Stove is in unfinished basement so only insulation is on the ceiling. I mainly rely on pellet stove in my livingroom on the main floor to heat the house. I live in new england.

I have no problem getting a fire going or keeping a fire going as my wood is seasoned and very rarely have any smoke out the chimney. My problem is getting the basement te heat up. 66 degrees is the hottest ive had it down there and would really like to be able to leave the door open to let heat into the main floor during the day

stove will get up to 600 degrees so ill shut the air down to about 1/3 open and fire stays going good but the temp drops to 300 before all the wood is being burnt and leaves A TON of coals. (Magnet thermostat is on flue 18 inches above stove top) maybe i just need a bigger stove? Fits about 4-5 pieces of wood Horizontally so i try to put a few small pieces inbetween to let air up.

sorry for all the info but i tried toput it all out there as to what im dealing with. How can i get my stove to stay hot 400 500 degrees and throw heat all day. Burn time is only about 3 hours then i have to go rake coals around open air all the way up wait another hr for coals to burn down to fit more wood in.

 

[Bad LP]

Your wasting your time without insulating the concrete walls. All that cement is a giant heat sink.
I had a old non airtight stove that swallowed 30” logs like nothing. Very little heat went up the cellar stairs until the walls were covered in 2” rigid. After that it turned into a 80 degree sauna.

 

[ChadMc]

When you get to 600 and cut the air back does it go down to 300 right away? Sounds like you need to pack the box tighter. My stove performs best when it’s packed North-south and totally filled. If there’s any air gaps or half full it burns them up quick and the temp doesn’t hold.

 

[W00die]

I lite the stove at 8 this morning and put a load on this picture is what it looked like an hour and a half in. Was loaded with 6 small splits. I moved the thermometer onto the top left face of stove. Reads a lot hotter than it did when it was on flue pipe above stove

 

[ChadMc]

Seem normal for smaller splits. Not sure what your weather is today. Sometimes a small hot fire will warm the house but I would loaded that baby to the top. And pack it tight like Tetris. What will happen is when it gets up to temperature it will cruise at that sweet spot for hours. Small fires get hot quick but then drop right back down in temp.

 

[begreen]

Small splits are going to burn faster. There is more exposed surface per pound of wood burned. Thicker splits, packed tighter will burn slower. Also, try closing down the air much sooner, but not to the point of killing the flame.

 

[john26]

I moved the thermometer onto the top left face of stove. Reads a lot hotter than it did when it was on flue pipe above stove

I see you have a meeco red devil thermometer I would not put much trust in that I bought 2 of them from menards before Christmas I put them side by side on the same stove top they read 100 degrees difference from each other and 200 and 300 degrees lower than my IR gun.

 

[Shrewboy]

The concrete walls and floor of the basement will absorb heat nearly endlessly, and transfer it out into the ground.

There is actually an interesting story about Subways in some cities FINALLY after 100 years of using them, have totally saturated the surrounding clay / dirt with heat from the brakes of the trains. That is why in certain subway tunnels it is always hot, the ground has heated up completely around the tunnels.

The reason I told that story is to outline how much heat energy it takes to heat up the ground, it is insanely high, so I think insulating as much as you can would help!