Quadrafire Isle Royale - Review for ELK

[carpniels]

HI Guys,

Here a small review on the Isle Royale. It is the largest castiron stove Quadrafire makes, and the unique point is that it is top loading. The only stove built that way.

I bought it in April 2006 to replace a Jotul Castine. The wife wanted top loading, so the only option we had was the IR. It has been a really good stove. Startup takes a while (because it is so big and has firebricks). Once you hit 200 on the thermometer on the top, it goes off and keeps going until you ease up on the air.

I have been running it continuously since November. I feed it cherry, locust, some aspen. It takes 22" logs and the opening is huge, so it cuts down on splitting and cutting tremendously. 3 huge splits and it lasts forever.

The burncycle is interesting. I start with some leftover red coals, open the 2 front doors, rake the coals and get rid of the ash, rake the coals forward over the grates, add the wood (oriented left to right) and start stacking from the back until you get to the doors. Then close the doors. Open the air valve fully, wait 10 minutes until the fire really goes, lower it to 1/3 to 1/2 open and let it coast. Most flames are yellow, after you lower the air, they almost disappear. You sometimes have lazy flames, sometimes a lot of blue flames. I don't see the blue flames from the secondary burn tubes as much as with the Castine. Then the fire slows and flames disappear, so I open the air a little bit. The air is sometimes hard to regulate because the air might make the fire fill the entire firebox. So I lower the aire again. It is probably caused by my strong draft.

I run mine hot (600-800) because the house is so large and the insulation good but not great. It heats all 2500 ft (70 downstairs minus the far bedroom) and 65 upstairs in the far bedroom. That is on a 15 degree day. If the weather is 20 or higher, I lower the air and let it run at 500. The fire lasts a lot longer that way.

I need to empty the ash tray every day (early AM when the fire has died down). I have about one ash pail a week in ash. The door also works as a great blast furnace if you have little coals left; I clean the stove, move the coals over the grates, add the splits and open the door. The blast of air makes the coals light up and the entire stove is in flames in 30 seconds. Then I put the ash tray back and close the door. The fire dies down but it is really ignited. Easy and fast way to restart the stove in the AM. You cannot forget to close the door (which is how overfiring occurs), because it makes a deep air vibration sound. Unmistakeable and you would be an idiot not to close the door within seconds of hearing that.

One of the issues is that when I load it up for the overnight burn (load it, let it char, clamp the air down), the fire really dies. The heat output seems to be small (I don't know for sure because I am in bed) and does not really keep up with the heat loss at night and thus the house might cool down 5 degrees. If I keep the air open a bit more, I don't get the overnight burn (no coals left in the AM).

All it all, I like the stove. Easy to clean. Looks good. Excellent clearances. Great heat output at regular operation temps.

Thanks

Carpniels

 

[begreen]

Nice review Neil, it is a great stove. How well does the top-load feature work? Is there any smoke spillage? How well does the start up air control work?

Although the Quadrafire literature says it's the only top loader, it is in error. I think when they published it in the 90's it said something like it was the only top-loader, non-cat stove. This since has changed, though their literature has not. Now VC, Harman, Lopi also have top-loaders.

 

[carpniels]

Hi will,

Thanks for the reply. The top load works very well. You need to flip the secondary burn tubes, wait a minute or 2 to clear the firebox, then open the top. No smoke to speak of.

The start up air works great. I really helps the fire along. I normally close it within 5 minutes, because it works so well.

I know Q is not the only top loader, but from what I understand, it is (or was) the only cast iron top loader with secondary burn tubes. The Harman Oakwood is a plate steel stove. And the VCs are cast iron but they have cats (as my VC Intrepid II had).

Thanks

Niels

 

[BrotherBart]

That Harmon Oakwood is 480 pounds of honkin cast iron. Your are thinking of the Harman Exception which is a steel top loader.

 

[begreen]

VC Encore, Defiant Non-Cat, Lopi Leyden, have joined the gang since the 90's. All top loading cast iron, all with secondary combustion.

 

[Corie]

Yeah I have to admit that the pivoting secondary baffle is really slick. I sat at the store staring at this stove for quite some time because of all the neat little features it has. Glad to see its getting a positive review from a good member. Makes me think one of these may have a place in my house some day. Provided I just don't built my own instead.

 

[elkimmeg]

Carp Thanks. I can't believe only 4 hours at 600 degrees..

Corie count me in wishing you get to the show and make the contacts

 

[Greg Ray]

This stove is a very good stove I replaced My Waterford with this stove, Have not had any trouble with the stove and like the warranty! I know I live in Tx and it does not get as cold as some of the place's yall live. But I think it would work great in Alaska, my last electric bill was $125 for the month of Jan. Im total electric and my next door neighbor's was $350, so I think I made a good choice Plus my dealer is 25 miles from me

 

[begreen]

Carp Thanks. I can't believe only 4 hours at 600 degrees..

It would be great to graph out the real performance over time on these stove and many others under controlled circumstances. I would have to have ideal wood to acheive an over 600 burn for over 2 hrs. in the Castine. The stove would still be at 400 probably at 4 hrs. and if loaded right and dampered down correctly it would have meaningful coals and may be a 150 degree top temp at 8 hrs. But Neil is looking for sustained overnight heat. Can the Summit really accomplish this? I don't see how unless it has a flatter curve.

If one figured that a full load approached 2.5 cu ft. that would be about 382800 btus figuring 153125 btus per cu ft.. Even with a 3 cu ft box, one can never get it fully packed so I think 2.5 cu ft is a generous load. If one got 4 hrs at 60000 btus/hr. that would leave about 140,000 for the remaining ramp up and ramp down time. If so, maybe Neil's figure doesn't sound that unrealistic?

 

[carpniels]

Hi Guys,

After the comment that Gunner made in the PE Summit post, I started thinking. He shuts the air all the way and gets 600 degrees for 8 hours. I normally run my IR at 1/3 to 1/2 open. I thought:" Am I losing a lot of heat up the chimney because the air is too far open and therefore inefficient?

I tried it last night (10 degrees going to 0). I lowered the air intake to closed. That immediately shut the fire off. So I opened it a little bit. The fire came back slowly, I had lots of secondary blue flames, the stove stayed above 500 for many hours and it never seemed to end. I have to add that I loaded the stove up pretty good with ash, so it was a good wood. Also they were large long splits. I was surprised at the result. It appears that the less you force the stove to perform, the better it does.

A few days ago I also decided to let the stove do its thing and it did not stay as hot as I wanted (around 500 instead of 700), but it stayed there for many hours. Again, I did not expect that.

Also, ELK, I have to say that my hours are mere guesses. I do not use a watch or timer or anything. Just going by what I think the time is and how long it takes between reloads.

In conclusion, I think it all comes down to the operator (mostly) and wood size (a little). Gunner apparently has the right approach for his weather and install to make the Summit do what it needs to do and do it well. I might have to tinker some more to find the sweetspot. I also might need larger and longer splits.

carpniels

PS. Do you guys load your stove left to right or front to back?I mean, when the stove is loaded, do you see the side of the splits or the top? I saw Roo's filmloop and he showed the splits front to back. I always load left to right. I am wondering if I will be able to load more wood if I can slide them in on top of eachother instead of stacking from back to front.

 

[Roospike]

Hi Guys,

After the comment that Gunner made in the PE Summit post, I started thinking. He shuts the air all the way and gets 600 degrees for 8 hours. I normally run my IR at 1/3 to 1/2 open. I thought:" Am I losing a lot of heat up the chimney because the air is too far open and therefore inefficient? .

Gunner has the "Automatic EBT" on his stove as to how he can turn his stove down all the way and let the stove do its thing.

******************************************************************************

EBT Extended Burn Technology

(broken link removed to http://www.chimneysweeponline.com/hoebt.htm)

 

[begreen]

It still seems to defy math to get 600 degrees for 8 hrs. Though maybe the Summit is putting out less btus. Are you able to acheive this Roo?

 

[DriftWood]

[quote author="BeGreen" date="1171352079
It would be great to graph out the real performance over time on these stove and many others under controlled circumstances. I would have to have ideal wood to acheive an over 600 burn for over 2 hrs. in the Castine. The stove would still be at 400 probably at 4 hrs. and if loaded right and dampered down correctly it would have meaningful coals and may be a 150 degree top temp at 8 hrs. But Neil is looking for sustained overnight heat. Can the Summit really accomplish this? I don't see how unless it has a flatter curve.

If one figured that a full load approached 2.5 cu ft. that would be about 382800 btus figuring 153125 btus per cu ft.. Even with a 3 cu ft box, one can never get it fully packed so I think 2.5 cu ft is a generous load. If one got 4 hrs at 60000 btus/hr. that would leave about 140,000 for the remaining ramp up and ramp down time. If so, maybe Neil's figure doesn't sound that unrealistic?[/quote]

I would bet all the manufactures have what you want. If you could get them to the same test standards you could cross reference the curves. What would it take to make that happen?

 

[Roospike]

It still seems to defy math to get 600 degrees for 8 hrs. Though maybe the Summit is putting out less btus. Are you able to acheive this Roo?

Let me say this... the only time i fully load my stove is when I'm gone for the whole day and or at night when sleeping and it has to be real cold to fully load the stove. I dont get to read the thermometer when I'm sleeping or away so I cant really say how much heat for how long as per max temp and BTU's . It would have to be colder than 20° for me to fully load the stove.

Also when i run my stove when outside temps are above 20° i dont run my stove top over 450° ( stove front thermometer says 550° when the top says 450° )
I average 375°-425° @ above 20° outside.

Now i can say when the fire on the Summit goes out and goes to coal stage the stove temps hold steady for a long time .........a long time. on a lot of steel stoves you see the temps drop fast after the fire goes out but the Summit really holds the heat for longer times. I cant confirm 600° for 8 hours , I would never need this kind of heat . It also seems this i have the smaller house of the bunch of the Summit owners too and also when we bought this house we updated the home and totally re-insulated the roof / ceilings / walls / crawl space and updated all the windows and doors.

Now i can confirm 450° -375° top temp @ around 8 hours + or - . ( 525° @ 8 hours )

 

[BrotherBart]

It still seems to defy math to get 600 degrees for 8 hrs. Though maybe the Summit is putting out less btus. Are you able to acheive this Roo?

Yeah. And EBT has to have some pre-set target temp that it is trying to maintain. One wonders what that is. Shouldn't be hard to figure out. Fire up a Summit. Damp it down and look at the thermo a couple of times during the burn.

 

[Roospike]

It still seems to defy math to get 600 degrees for 8 hrs. Though maybe the Summit is putting out less btus. Are you able to acheive this Roo?

Yeah. And EBT has to have some pre-set target temp that it is trying to maintain. One wonders what that is. Shouldn't be hard to figure out. Fire up a Summit. Damp it down and look at the thermo a couple of times during the burn.

Might be harder then you think. I can have secondary burn going off inside the stove @ a stove top temp of 300° and the EBT is on the bottom of the stove.

The stove top take a little longer to come up to temp vs other parts of the stove. This is another reason when you can load the stove , fire it off and get secondary burn , turn it down and the stove top temps climb.
#1 as we know a stove temp will climb once turned down and secondary lights off.
#2 the thicker body takes longer to come up to temp.

 

[Roospike]

If you go to the chimneysweeponline link and look at the stages of the EBT its a little easier to understand when and how the EBT is working.

 

[BrotherBart]

If you go to the chimneysweeponline link and look at the stages of the EBT its a little easier to understand when and how the EBT is working.

Understand. Tom's write-up is excellent. But it only talks about a "certain temperature" and some overfire temp. Since EBT isn't connected to the primary air control then with the stove primary closed all the way the the Summit is going to try to maintain that certain temp no matter the fuel load or any other consideration. I just have always wondered what that "certain temperature" and that overfire temp is.

If it ain't 600 then nobody is burning very long at six hundred just depending on EBT. EBT would be closing the flap and bringing the stove down to its target temp.

 

[Roospike]

Well Damn ............. hh: Its kinda hard to explain unless one has used the PE stove. I cant explain it compared to say your stove BB because i'm not familiar with how your stove works from start to finish. Let me think about how to explain it for a minute.

 

[Andre B.]

It still seems to defy math to get 600 degrees for 8 hrs. Though maybe the Summit is putting out less btus. Are you able to acheive this Roo?

Yeah. And EBT has to have some pre-set target temp that it is trying to maintain. One wonders what that is. Shouldn't be hard to figure out. Fire up a Summit. Damp it down and look at the thermo a couple of times during the burn.

Might be harder then you think. I can have secondary burn going off inside the stove @ a stove top temp of 300° and the EBT is on the bottom of the stove.

The stove top take a little longer to come up to temp vs other parts of the stove. This is another reason when you can load the stove , fire it off and get secondary burn , turn it down and the stove top temps climb.
#1 as we know a stove temp will climb once turned down and secondary lights off.
#2 the thicker body takes longer to come up to temp.

If you look at the diagrams on this page.
(broken link removed to http://www.chimneysweeponline.com/hoebt.htm)

As you can see the EBT unit is a very basic servo feedback loop with a variable gain that starts out positive and drops as the temperature comes up.

When cold and first started the EBT is operating in a positive feedback mode ie. as temps increase the draft is opened more, if temps drop the EBT draft is closed. Then after the little arm goes over center it changes to a negative feedback mode it is in this mode where you can close the manual draft and the EBT will maintain a more or less constant temperature.

If the manual draft is closed before the EBT unit gets into the negative feedback mode it could well close the draft down and go into fire out slow smolder.

Since the temperature sensing unit is down low and some distance from the fire there will be a significant delay between the EBT opening the draft and the temperatures at the EBT unit. Long delays like this can make for unstable operation in a servo loop.
I would think they would be much better off if the temperature sensing unit was at the top of the stove.



Do these stoves have some kind of visual indicator of when the little arm goes over center?
If not they should.

 

[Roospike]

It still seems to defy math to get 600 degrees for 8 hrs. Though maybe the Summit is putting out less btus. Are you able to acheive this Roo?

Yeah. And EBT has to have some pre-set target temp that it is trying to maintain. One wonders what that is. Shouldn't be hard to figure out. Fire up a Summit. Damp it down and look at the thermo a couple of times during the burn.

Might be harder then you think. I can have secondary burn going off inside the stove @ a stove top temp of 300° and the EBT is on the bottom of the stove.

The stove top take a little longer to come up to temp vs other parts of the stove. This is another reason when you can load the stove , fire it off and get secondary burn , turn it down and the stove top temps climb.
#1 as we know a stove temp will climb once turned down and secondary lights off.
#2 the thicker body takes longer to come up to temp.

If you look at the diagrams on this page.
(broken link removed to http://www.chimneysweeponline.com/hoebt.htm)

As you can see the EBT unit is a very basic servo feedback loop with a variable gain that starts out positive and drops as the temperature comes up.

When cold and first started the EBT is operating in a positive feedback mode ie. as temps increase the draft is opened more, if temps drop the EBT draft is closed. Then after the little arm goes over center it changes to a negative feedback mode it is in this mode where you can close the manual draft and the EBT will maintain a more or less constant temperature.

If the manual draft is closed before the EBT unit gets into the negative feedback mode it could well close the draft down and go into fire out slow smolder.

Since the temperature sensing unit is down low and some distance from the fire there will be a significant delay between the EBT opening the draft and the temperatures at the EBT unit. Long delays like this can make for unstable operation in a servo loop.
I would think they would be much better off if the temperature sensing unit was at the top of the stove.



Do these stoves have some kind of visual indicator of when the little arm goes over center?
If not they should.

Your other points of the EBT looks good,
The EBT works great ! Why would they want to change it ?

 

[Roospike]

Well Damn ............. hh: Its kinda hard to explain unless one has used the PE stove. I cant explain it compared to say your stove BB because i'm not familiar with how your stove works from start to finish. Let me think about how to explain it for a minute.

Alright , I guess I'm back .......... I had to make a capachinno. ;-)

When loading the stove the heat out put is going to depend on how much wood is loaded , what kind of wood is loaded and how the wood is loaded.

Once you have the stove loaded with wood now its going to depend on how long you char the wood , you can char the ends of the load and before the secondary burn kicks in you can turn it down,
OR
you can load the wood and char the load until secondary burn kicks in and then tuen it down,
OR
You can char the load until the secondary kicks in and leave it longer and tuen it down in stages and then turn all the way down,

Now what your doing is getting bigger secondary , getting the load of wood more chared and getting the stove hotter , when doing different size loads , different way to load and how long the secondary runs before lowering the damper changes how hot the stove will run once shut down. As you load is running along is going to depend on how your EBT is going to effect it , and also once the load is going on the down stroke the EBT is going to kick in and out and then do its change over into coal stage.

********************** :gulp: ************************

 

[carpniels]

Hi Roo,

Wow, that is quite the explanation.

All I want to know is: which of the 3 options do you use? I always rake the coals, load the stove fully and leave the air alone. It takes a long time for the stove to char the wood and the fire goes throught different stages: smoulder, yellow flames, die down, secondary flames, coals. My gut tellsl me that by not charring the wood first, I get a longer lasting fire. Is that correct? Is my gut feeling wrong?

I have tried some of the other options too but I have no clear idea of what is best/lasts longer/gives more heat. The fuel is use changes so much I cannot replicate the same fire over and over and test the different burn strategies.

Thanks

carpniels

 

[Andre B.]

<< snip

Your other points of the EBT looks good,
The EBT works great ! Why would they want to change? it ?

Because based on the threads here lately EBT does not always work great and some of the modes of not working great apparently result in over burn conditions that cannot be immediately shut down, manual draft shut but the EBT draft still open.

 

[Roospike]

<< snip

Your other points of the EBT looks good,
The EBT works great ! Why would they want to change? it ?

Because based on the threads here lately EBT does not always work great and some of the modes of not working great apparently result in over burn conditions that cannot be immediately shut down, manual draft shut but the EBT draft still open.

I didnt know any issues reported of the EBT (

Because based on the threads here lately EBT does not always work great and some of the modes of not working great

What threads was this posted in ? The EBT dont "over burn" that i know if and for what is the need to turn the stove all the way off ? Where are you getting this information Andre? based on what threads here lately on the EBT ?