New to me wood furnace

[tstaude]

New to the forum, also new to having an indoor wood furnace.

I picked up a used P&E wood furnace, it was previously ducted into the guys house and heated a 2000sf house by filling it up twice a day. I put a new door seal on the upper door, will do the lower as well to prevent any leaks.
On the back side it looks like it had a draft inducer or some sort of throttle mechanism, right now it is just a 2.5" hole. Is this the place where I am going to control the flame intensity? I have heard that using the chimney damper makes the unit less efficient.
What is my best bet for having the best, longest burn with the least amount of smoke?

The unit is in a pole building, so it is not perfectly sealed up...but will be some day.

I appreciate any input!

Tom

 

[Highbeam]

Is there not a blower on this thing? That side door at the bottom should maybe have a big blower attached.

 

[tstaude]

yes, the blower does mount right in front of the large rectangular hole. It just is not there for the picture.

Once this thing get up to temp, it keeps up nicely but the wood only lasts a few hours.

 

[Highbeam]

yes, the blower does mount right in front of the large rectangular hole. It just is not there for the picture.

Once this thing get up to temp, it keeps up nicely but the wood only lasts a few hours.

I know your firebox is probably bigger but I have the biggest non-cat stove I could find and can burn right through a full firebox in only a few hours.

 

[brenndatomu]

On the back side it looks like it had a draft inducer or some sort of throttle mechanism, right now it is just a 2.5" hole.

Pix of this? Do you have the blower(s)?

 

[tstaude]

I'll get a picture of the air inlet posted.
I did get a good solid 4 hour burn from a half full load. Most of this is pallet boards, some hardwood chunks.

I made a makeshift draft inducer...a fan blowing in from 3 feet away, this seemed to keep everything going nicely.
another thing I did was slide a piece of sheetmetal half way over the inlet to throttle back the amount of air going in.
My conclusion is that the draftiness of the pole barn requires a small amount of forced draft to keep everything in balance.

Any suggestions for a good draft inducer that I can adjust?

 

[Highbeam]

Your terminology is really weird. A draft inducer is typically a fan in the exhaust system of the furnace, the chimney, that sucks air through the stove. Sometimes it is also a blower bolted to the front of the stove to force air into the fire and make it burn hot.

The draftiness of the pole barn means you would not need any type of forced combustion, there's plenty of make up air to balance with what is going up the stack. It's the airtight homes that can starve the furnace of combustion air.