VC Aspen C3 (2023) Can’t Heat Small Room

[meagloth]

I have a VC Aspen C3 that I bought new in 2023. We installed it in February of 2024 and so didn’t use it much that year. It’s set back into an old brick fireplace as you can see in the picture.
Last winter we used it a good bit and found it struggles to put out any heat at all. Our house is VERY small and it could barely warm up the 12x12 living room. We put it up to our wood not being well seasoned. I build a lean to for the wood and it’s been sitting dry and covered for another year. It’s white oak, soft maple and sweetgum.
Well this year it’s been just as bad. It doesn’t seem to matter how small I split it or how well I stack it. As soon as I close the door the fire simmers down and the stove makes charcoal in the back and only has a lazy flame at the front, or just red coals. I can not boil a pot of water on the cook top. It will simmer but never breach a rolling boil. It does not come close to heating our 700sqft house. I believe the automatic air control is to blame. The chimney and cold air intake are clear. The wood is dry.

Is there anything I can do to fix this? Some adjustment for the air thermostat? I am not sure if the thermostat is supposed to go by room temp or combustion temp, maybe being in the brick alcove is making it sense warmer than it should?
I can not find any good repair of disassembly info online (the exploded view in the manual is only somewhat helpful) and the dealer I bought it from said they “don’t really do repair stuff”
I would rather have a manual damper than this BS, but I can’t find anyone has done that before.

 

[Todd]

How tall is your chimney? Is it lined?

 

[stovelark]

Something is not right- in your area, that stove should really keep you warm. Are you losing it up the chimney? You do have a 6 inch liner the whole way? Do you have a stove top thermometer? Not even boiling water sounds very suspicious, wet wood? Have you tried some store bundled wood to see if that burns different? And are you fully loading? Good luck...

 

[stoveliker]

Also, do you have a block-off plate where the pipe goes into the brick chimney?

 

[meagloth]

The chimney is a straight run, about 20 or 25’ through the roof. It is 6” double walled metal inside the chimney but the old chimney only goes to the attic. In the attic it’s triple wall insulated. The block off plate is where the chimney is ‘cut’ in the attic if that makes sense. I have also installed and electric fan that blows air backwards through the chimney and out into the room. It helps a little but the stove just doesn’t get that hot.

 

[begreen]

As a process of elimination, the wood moisture content should be checked.

When was the flue last cleaned? Is there a screen at the chimney cap? If so, check that for plugging.

 

[stoveliker]

The chimney is a straight run, about 20 or 25’ through the roof. It is 6” double walled metal inside the chimney but the old chimney only goes to the attic. In the attic it’s triple wall insulated. The block off plate is where the chimney is ‘cut’ in the attic if that makes sense. I have also installed and electric fan that blows air backwards through the chimney and out into the room. It helps a little but the stove just doesn’t get that hot.

even with an inside chimney, a lot of heat might go up from the alcove until it hits the plate at the attic.
Best is to seal the whole thing right where the pipe enters the brick chimney directly above the stove.

(And yes all of the others above can be an issue too. Including wet wood and a 25' chimney sucking way too much heat up the flue rather than allowing it to radiate out into the room.)