What are we doing wrong?

[enigmablaze]

Haha ok after trial and error I think we need some more advice .
We have a Morso 1440 with an Olympia Ventis stovepipe/chimney that extends somewhere around 14' tall altogether inside and outside I think, it seems to draw very well. It is double-wall pipe, attached to the stovetop and we have only a stovetop thermometer.

Ok, we have been having issues with...
1) the glass gets so dirty, I can't understand why we can't keep it clean!
2) we are making what strikes me as an excessive amount of ash.
3) we get very little actual heat from the stove, in a room of about 250 sq ft with outdoor temps being mild at full blast I don't think we've gotten that room up to 80*, the highest I remember is 78* and we ran it most of that day. The stove does not give a "sense" of being very hot (it is convection, but still).
4) We are having trouble keeping the stove in a "goldilocks" zone where it stays consistent, it's temps are usually either rising or falling they don't like much to stay steady.

Now if we were burning wet wood or burning too cool fires then these things would make more sense to me but we are using eco-bricks (only supplemented with kindling, paper or the occasional piece of dry or mostly dry wood (we have a moisture-meter)). The other thing is we definitely don't burn on the cool side, the eco bricks when they catch burn very hot and we have to watch to keep the stovetop temp under 750*! I thought perhaps our thermometer could be wrong but when it gets very hot you can tell from the nearly constant expansion "ping" noises.

How can such hot fires with such dry fuel be having these issues?

 

[begreen]

This might be weak draft, fuel or stove operation. It seems counterintuitive but with inadequate draft, secondary combustion can be weak. An indication of this problem can be high flue gas temps in the stove pipe. They should be equal or below the stove top temps. Or it may be the way the biobricks are being burned. Are they being burned in a teepee fashion or as layers with minimal air gaps between the bricks? Is the air control all the way closed once the bricks are burning well?

As far as heating goes, this could simply be a case of the heat loss being greater than the stove output. If I recall the sunspace is uninsulated with lots of single-pane glass. Is that correct or am I mixing it up with another installation?

 

[SuperJ]

You could be losing a lot of heat to those windows that are above each side of the stove. Is the concrete slab in the room cold soaked, is it insulated? There is a lot of thermal mass in a slab.
Looks like fairly small stove, how big are those eco bricks, maybe they are getting in the way of the primary air?
Can you break them up into smaller pieces, this will increase the surface area?
I've heard of some stoves heating better when turned down a bit. When run on high, a lot of the heat goes up the chimney with the flue gas because it doesn't have time to exchange heat with the metal stove and pipe.

 

[Squirrel]

Experience with my similar set-up (I actually ordered a 1440 but could not get one so have a 1410)

I have tried different kinds of manufactured logs but none seem to burn as well as regular firewood.

Here's what I do.

When lighting a cold stove, half fill the fireboox with kindling criss-crossed about 4-5 sticks in a layer, hardwood split to about 1/2" works best. Use a firelighter at the bottom. Leave the door open for about 30 seconds once the wood is burning. Close the door and leave the air inlet full open, let it blaze away untill you have just a few sticks showing flame and the firebox is covered with glowing coals.( This is why hardwood works best) Stove top should now be 500f or close. Without moving the coals, quickly put in three 3" splits and close the door. If the stove is hot enough the secondary burn will start immediately when the wood starts to smoke. You can now use the primary air to control the temperature of the rest of the burn, keeping it between 550f and 750f.

About half the heat from this stove seems to come from a good glowing coal bed and the other half from a double row of "gas fire" secondary burn. Flames on or in the wood may or may not show up depending on the type of wood.

I don't think you can overfire this stove unless you add more than 5lbs of wood at a time or leave the air open for too long when refuelling. To put out it's maximum heat the glowing coal bed is a must, it also keeps the glass clean.

 

[Rickb]

where are you at in Illinois?

 

[Squirrel]

Just for fun, stove at 650f

 

[prezes13]

Hey I just read your other post where you said that your stove is ina sunroom where the whole floor is a concete slab. That is where the whole het goes to. That slab is soaking all your heat and warming up bugs and worms.

 

[kennyp2339]

I'm leaning towards the room is soaking up the heat the stove is producing, do you run the stove constantly 24/7 or is it ambience usage? That could make a difference, my stove is located in my basement on a slab with concrete block walls, I typically light the stove up when temps dip into the 40's, it doesn't sound to terribly cold but I have to run the stove on high for almost a full day because so much heat gets absorbed into the walls and floor, after a day I can dial it back because there's a balance in the thermal mass.
Onto whether the stove is functioning correctly / efficiently ie: dirty glass; I'm not to familiar with your stove on whether it has a goof air wash system to keep the glass build up down some, but you state that your burning bio bricks (which are bone dry) and your getting stove top temps of 750 (which is kinda high) So my advice is to look at your chimney cap, if its glazed over and getting real dirty then something is up, either the fuel is burning to rich (off gassing fast) or its starving for air and smoldering.
As BG mentioned a short chimney system can also be contributing to the poor function of the stove, poor draft can make things very whacky, trying to make the stove compensate for a poor draft can be very frustrating because your constantly adjusting the air to get the stove hotter, then dialing it back because it takes off only to go low and burn to cool, you can try to add a 3ft length of cheap black chimney pipe to your chimney to see if it improves the burn, if it does then add a length of class A pipe and bracing if needed.

 

[Squirrel]

There should be a draft reducer installed in the top of the stove, just below the stove pipe, which makes the exhaust turn a 180 before it leaves the the stove (part# 11 in the manual). This reducer comes as a loose part with the stove and may or may not have been installed. If it is installed it can be removed by twisting a few degrees sideways and allowing it to drop down, this will increase your draft. If it is not installed and you have a good draft you may be loosing heat up the chimney.

 

[SuperJ]

I'm leaning towards the room is soaking up the heat the stove is producing, do you run the stove constantly 24/7 or is it ambience usage? That could make a difference, my stove is located in my basement on a slab with concrete block walls, I typically light the stove up when temps dip into the 40's, it doesn't sound to terribly cold but I have to run the stove on high for almost a full day because so much heat gets absorbed into the walls and floor, after a day I can dial it back because there's a balance in the thermal mass.

I notice that once my stove and house is up to temp I can't keep the stove on low fire. But if the stoves been off and the place is cold soaked, I have to run it on high for quite a while to bring it back up to temp.
Do you have the option of a fan on that stove? That might heat the place up a little faster without running scary high stovetop temps.

 

[begreen]

Hey I just read your other post where you said that your stove is ina sunroom where the whole floor is a concete slab. That is where the whole het goes to. That slab is soaking all your heat and warming up bugs and worms.

FWIW, this was discussed prior to the stove installation in that location.

 

[prezes13]

Oh I missed that. I guess I wouldn't make it as a detective.

 

[begreen]

Oh I missed that. I guess I wouldn't make it as a detective.

It was a long discussion in prior threads before the stove purchase.

 

[enigmablaze]

This might be weak draft, fuel or stove operation. It seems counterintuitive but with inadequate draft, secondary combustion can be weak. An indication of this problem can be high flue gas temps in the stove pipe. They should be equal or below the stove top temps. Or it may be the way the biobricks are being burned. Are they being burned in a teepee fashion or as layers with minimal air gaps between the bricks? Is the air control all the way closed once the bricks are burning well?

As far as heating goes, this could simply be a case of the heat loss being greater than the stove output. If I recall the sunspace is uninsulated with lots of single-pane glass. Is that correct or am I mixing it up with another installation?

The strange thing is our draft seems really good, maybe too good. The sweep mentioned how strong it was when it was installed and that was with a cold stove on a warm day!
We are burning the eco-bricks pretty much one at a time laid on their side...if we add a second too quickly before the first one is mostly burned down those are the times we get a little scary hot. They just weigh so much that one brick is pretty much the weight limit for fuel in that box. The air control almost never goes all the way down because the fire tends to die out.

My husband feels like he needs to keep a visible "flame" as much as possible, I'm not so sure about this...I wonder if that's why we might lose heat.

 

[ddddddden]

. . .Burning the ecobricks is a challenge when you can't use a bunch, but we're getting more comfortable with it slowly. . .Our dealer said to not burn more than one at a time, the weight of them is so great that one about maxes out the capacity. I think we've actually been doing 3/4 bricks (cut off a portion) with fat wood, a few kindling small splits and newspaper. . .I think we've been too conservative on the amount of fuel.

You're not going to know how well that lil' beauty can heat your space until you load her up. BTU's loaded in = BTU's put out over several hours (minus, say, 30% for inefficiency.) It's good that you're going conservative while you learn and break in the stove, but I wouldn't worry about cutting a single brick down to 3/4. Could you be a lil' more specific about the weight of one of those bricks and the rated capacity of the stove? Once you get a good feel for operating the stove, you'll probably be able to stack several bricks in there, as long as you can get them to burn slowly enough.

Also, you're probably losing a lot of heat out of the adjacent windows. You might want to try some of the 3M window film that BeGreen is so fond of.

 

[enigmablaze]

You could be losing a lot of heat to those windows that are above each side of the stove. Is the concrete slab in the room cold soaked, is it insulated? There is a lot of thermal mass in a slab.
Looks like fairly small stove, how big are those eco bricks, maybe they are getting in the way of the primary air?
Can you break them up into smaller pieces, this will increase the surface area?
I've heard of some stoves heating better when turned down a bit. When run on high, a lot of the heat goes up the chimney with the flue gas because it doesn't have time to exchange heat with the metal stove and pipe.

I think those windows are double paned (they are a modern window at least), but yeah the room is insulated but not well. The slab I'm almost positive is not insulated though we did seal it...that probably doesn't make a difference here.

We were wondering if we might be able to cut the ecobricks with a chainsaw or something to make them smaller, seems like that would GREATLY improve matters.

 

[enigmablaze]

Experience with my similar set-up (I actually ordered a 1440 but could not get one so have a 1410)

I have tried different kinds of manufactured logs but none seem to burn as well as regular firewood.

Here's what I do.

When lighting a cold stove, half fill the fireboox with kindling criss-crossed about 4-5 sticks in a layer, hardwood split to about 1/2" works best. Use a firelighter at the bottom. Leave the door open for about 30 seconds once the wood is burning. Close the door and leave the air inlet full open, let it blaze away untill you have just a few sticks showing flame and the firebox is covered with glowing coals.( This is why hardwood works best) Stove top should now be 500f or close. Without moving the coals, quickly put in three 3" splits and close the door. If the stove is hot enough the secondary burn will start immediately when the wood starts to smoke. You can now use the primary air to control the temperature of the rest of the burn, keeping it between 550f and 750f.

About half the heat from this stove seems to come from a good glowing coal bed and the other half from a double row of "gas fire" secondary burn. Flames on or in the wood may or may not show up depending on the type of wood.

I don't think you can overfire this stove unless you add more than 5lbs of wood at a time or leave the air open for too long when refuelling. To put out it's maximum heat the glowing coal bed is a must, it also keeps the glass clean.

Ok this sounds better than what we are doing, ours is in very "active burn" with flames off the eco brick I think most of the time. I want to try this way and see if I can get the brick to burn in place of the three splits.
ETA, I think our mistake might be something about the coal bed...I can't understand how our hot dry fires can keep the glass so murky

 

[enigmablaze]

where are you at in Illinois?

Basically right in the center of the state!

 

[enigmablaze]

Just for fun, stove at 650f
View attachment 217096

Yeah ok...your fire is definitely different than ours. Way more coals and secondary combustion. I wonder if my husband is running ours more like an open fireplace...that's what he's used to. But then it can be hard to identify secondary combustion in our stove because the eco brick is so "tall" on its own that its flames show up at the top of the box anyway.

 

[enigmablaze]

Hey I just read your other post where you said that your stove is ina sunroom where the whole floor is a concete slab. That is where the whole het goes to. That slab is soaking all your heat and warming up bugs and worms.

I hadn't considered this as being the main reason as the slab doesn't feel abnormally warm and the temperatures had been pretty mild outside but I have no doubt that is probably playing a pretty big part. Perhaps running it longer will help figure that out, once we get the thermal mass of the floor up to temp.

 

[enigmablaze]

I'm leaning towards the room is soaking up the heat the stove is producing, do you run the stove constantly 24/7 or is it ambience usage? That could make a difference, my stove is located in my basement on a slab with concrete block walls, I typically light the stove up when temps dip into the 40's, it doesn't sound to terribly cold but I have to run the stove on high for almost a full day because so much heat gets absorbed into the walls and floor, after a day I can dial it back because there's a balance in the thermal mass.
Onto whether the stove is functioning correctly / efficiently ie: dirty glass; I'm not to familiar with your stove on whether it has a goof air wash system to keep the glass build up down some, but you state that your burning bio bricks (which are bone dry) and your getting stove top temps of 750 (which is kinda high) So my advice is to look at your chimney cap, if its glazed over and getting real dirty then something is up, either the fuel is burning to rich (off gassing fast) or its starving for air and smoldering.
As BG mentioned a short chimney system can also be contributing to the poor function of the stove, poor draft can make things very whacky, trying to make the stove compensate for a poor draft can be very frustrating because your constantly adjusting the air to get the stove hotter, then dialing it back because it takes off only to go low and burn to cool, you can try to add a 3ft length of cheap black chimney pipe to your chimney to see if it improves the burn, if it does then add a length of class A pipe and bracing if needed.

Ambience usage for sure. Longest we've run it continuously was probably...12 hours? I think a longer burn might be helpful in figuring out if that's the problem.
My understanding is that this stove does have an air wash system, I'd never heard of a major issue keeping it clean. I just looked at our chimney cap, you know, it is getting "smudgy" on the inside bits with a little bit of black. I can NOT understand why but clearly it is user error, our temps are high and our fuel is dry!

So burning fuel too rich...how do I know if that's it? I doubt it's the smoldering, we try hard to make sure it doesn't smolder.

I believe the draft is quite good, it seems so strong I wonder if it's to much sometimes.

 

[enigmablaze]

There should be a draft reducer installed in the top of the stove, just below the stove pipe, which makes the exhaust turn a 180 before it leaves the the stove (part# 11 in the manual). This reducer comes as a loose part with the stove and may or may not have been installed. If it is installed it can be removed by twisting a few degrees sideways and allowing it to drop down, this will increase your draft. If it is not installed and you have a good draft you may be loosing heat up the chimney.

Is that a "half moon" type piece? If so then yes it was installed.

 

[enigmablaze]

I notice that once my stove and house is up to temp I can't keep the stove on low fire. But if the stoves been off and the place is cold soaked, I have to run it on high for quite a while to bring it back up to temp.
Do you have the option of a fan on that stove? That might heat the place up a little faster without running scary high stovetop temps.

There is no option for a fan, other than a stovetop fan I guess, it is a convection model, but of course that won't cool the actual stove like a fan would.

 

[begreen]

Yeah ok...your fire is definitely different than ours. Way more coals and secondary combustion. I wonder if my husband is running ours more like an open fireplace...that's what he's used to. But then it can be hard to identify secondary combustion in our stove because the eco brick is so "tall" on its own that its flames show up at the top of the box anyway.

Sounds like you are on to something. The stove will not burn like a fireplace. It's a very different burning process. Have you tried burning the ecobrick laying down flat? Will two fit in, lying down, with a gap between them?

Do you have any friends that burn wood regularly that would trade or give you a box of known, well seasoned firewood? You may need to resplit it or recut it to fit the Morso, but that would help with the learning curve.

 

[enigmablaze]

You're not going to know how well that lil' beauty can heat your space until you load her up. BTU's loaded in = BTU's put out over several hours (minus, say, 30% for inefficiency.) It's good that you're going conservative while you learn and break in the stove, but I wouldn't worry about cutting a single brick down to 3/4. Could you be a lil' more specific about the weight of one of those bricks and the rated capacity of the stove? Once you get a good feel for operating the stove, you'll probably be able to stack several bricks in there, as long as you can get them to burn slowly enough.

Also, you're probably losing a lot of heat out of the adjacent windows. You might want to try some of the 3M window film that BeGreen is so fond of.

The manual says aim for 2lbs of fuel, each ecobrick (I guess they are called enviro bricks now) is a little over 3lbs themselves...I think this is one reason we're having trouble with the temps getting hight. I doesn't explain the dirty glass or chimney cap though.