Wood Stove Project!

[Gas-man]

I don’t post online much at all but I’ve been working on a project over the last year that I think this community would appreciate. I did a lot of research on this forum before and during my build so it also seems fitting to give you all the first look!

My wife and I lived in Wisconsin for a couple years and absolutely loved the wood stove that we put in the house. I also really enjoyed splitting the plentiful oak and maple that we had on our six acres in the middle of nowhere. Unfortunately my wife didn’t want to deal with winter driving after those couple years so we ended up back in California where we both grew up (yuck). Anyway, I miss our wood heat and have been lugging around a 4x8 sheet of 1/4” plate from house to house over the years without having a use for it. I had been looking for a fun but useful project to use up most of this steel so I measured and figured I had enough for a small wood stove.

Basic details are as follows: Main body is all 1/4” plate and internal air ducting is mainly 11ga steel. The firebox is lined with 15 firebricks with a 1/4” steel baffle plate and measures to about 1.14 cuft. Primary air, secondary air, and air wash controls are all independent for testing and tuning. I decided on a rear flue exit but may consider a top flue exit at some point.

Total cost of the project is probably around $600-700 including all the steel, firebrick, door glass, insulation, stove pipe, etc. My fabrication tool collection is limited to an angle grinder, hand drill, and my trusty Lincoln MIG welder. A plasma cutter, drill press, press brake, etc would have made this project much faster as easier but I’m used to working with what I have so it wasn’t any different than other fab projects around here. Wood is free from ChipDrop around here and I ended up with a bit over a cord of Eucalyptus that I split in January and stacked out back to dry in the hot California summer sun. One more summer will dry it out more but it’s burning well as is.

I have over 500 pictures from the build process but here’s a sample throughout the year. I made the first cut on Jan 12th, 2023 and the first fire was Sept 30th but the first real test was October 8th. I’ve been modifying and adjusting since then and still have more work to do but the stove is functional and seems to do well for my 400 sqft garage. It’s still bare steel since it’s not 100% complete yet but I did pick up some high temp primer and an Almond colored stove paint for when it’s time to make it final. I’m hoping to paint it this coming Spring or Summer. If someone wants a detail picture of something I can probably dig one up.

Enjoy!

 

[Wisco Shepherd]

The fact that you did this with minimal tools is extremely impressive. Geeks like me would love to know what you see for burn times, stove top temps, and stuff like that. I'm sure it was a very enjoyable project.

 

[begreen]

Nice build progress. Looks like there is no glass in the initial pics but the andiron teeth are now gone and the glass is in, right?

 

[Gas-man]

The fact that you did this with minimal tools is extremely impressive. Geeks like me would love to know what you see for burn times, stove top temps, and stuff like that. I'm sure it was a very enjoyable project.

Thank you for the kind words. Testing and tuning is still ongoing so I don't yet have much for temperatures or burn times. I'm chasing an air wash issue at the moment that I think is causing some performance issues so more research on the way!

Nice build progress. Looks like there is no glass in the initial pics but the andiron teeth are now gone and the glass is in, right?

Yeah the first two completed pictures don't have glass in the door yet. I was still working on the glass retainer but my boys wanted to see a fire. The very last picture with the stove operating in the garage has the glass in place. I had to remove the log retainer to fit in a primary air deflector after the first real test fire but I do need to get that back in place to keep wood off the door.