I moved into a house a little over a year ago with a quadra-fire 4300 ACC stove. This past winter I was never able to get a satisfying burn time. I'd say 4 hours until there weren't enough coals to restart the fire. There are a few things that might be issues and it seems like many of them have been discussed on other threads on this forum. Perhaps the best summary would be post #17 by richg here https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/quadra-fire-why-the-bad-rep.121562/. Here are some things I have addressed. Just to get the obvious possible issue out of the way, I replaced the gasket on the door twice last year and I replaced the gasket on the glass in the door. I'm pretty sure those aren't the issue. I also think my wood is adequately dry. I am currently burning pine leftover from last season, and I had thought it seemed dry last year. But I also would have thought wetter wood would smolder and not burn as fast... so I don't know much.
(1) There is a burn rate assembly in the top left. Oddly, when I first took off the paneling to investigate possible issues, it had looked like somebody had taken a hammer to the burn rate assembly and it was completely deformed. So I ordered a new one and replaced it. But as noted in the picture, this wedge-shaped slider does not completely close the gap. In fact, there is a screw that prevents it from covering the last quarter inch, and the slider doesn't fit snug along the box so there is also an air gap along the whole. See richg's pictures with helpful annotation below.
(2) There are NO controls to the secondary air intake tubes. e.g. the stove is not designed so that air can be turned off for these. See richg's pictures with helpful annotation below.
(3) I believe the flue is too tall. I haven't measured the exact distance, but it goes up through two stories.
(4) When I swept the chimney before this burning season, I realized that the flue has a larger diameter than I am used to. Additionally, the diameter increases right above the chimney. My understanding is that an increase in diameter can increase pressure and contribute to an over draft (and I assume a wider diameter is creates a larger draft anyway).
So together it seems like there is a combination of overdrafting and that the design of the stove is such that you can't cut off very much of the air intake. Things I am considering are
(1) Putting in a damper
(2) Rigging up magnetic tape to make a better seal on the burn rate assembly
(3) Rigging up something that can slide across the secondary air intake in order to close that off as well.
Do those things seem reasonable? Would you suggest starting with just the damper and seeing how that goes? I feel a little uncertain messing with modifying the other intakes, since I'd hope the designers of the quadra-fire know what they were doing. Any suggestions would be welcome.
(1) There is a burn rate assembly in the top left. Oddly, when I first took off the paneling to investigate possible issues, it had looked like somebody had taken a hammer to the burn rate assembly and it was completely deformed. So I ordered a new one and replaced it. But as noted in the picture, this wedge-shaped slider does not completely close the gap. In fact, there is a screw that prevents it from covering the last quarter inch, and the slider doesn't fit snug along the box so there is also an air gap along the whole. See richg's pictures with helpful annotation below.
(2) There are NO controls to the secondary air intake tubes. e.g. the stove is not designed so that air can be turned off for these. See richg's pictures with helpful annotation below.
(3) I believe the flue is too tall. I haven't measured the exact distance, but it goes up through two stories.
(4) When I swept the chimney before this burning season, I realized that the flue has a larger diameter than I am used to. Additionally, the diameter increases right above the chimney. My understanding is that an increase in diameter can increase pressure and contribute to an over draft (and I assume a wider diameter is creates a larger draft anyway).
So together it seems like there is a combination of overdrafting and that the design of the stove is such that you can't cut off very much of the air intake. Things I am considering are
(1) Putting in a damper
(2) Rigging up magnetic tape to make a better seal on the burn rate assembly
(3) Rigging up something that can slide across the secondary air intake in order to close that off as well.
Do those things seem reasonable? Would you suggest starting with just the damper and seeing how that goes? I feel a little uncertain messing with modifying the other intakes, since I'd hope the designers of the quadra-fire know what they were doing. Any suggestions would be welcome.
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