FHC Exclusive! Long low oak burn in the new Ideal Steel stove

Ahmen! The ability to have a blast furnace / "cool" fire going one minute, and shut it down a few minutes later is pretty amazing on the PH. I'll try to shoot a quick video for youtube showing that.

 

Its 50 here and even a medium low burn is baking us out so I just cut back the air to about 15% and got this nifty little show:



I have the front door open to let some heat out and you can hear cars on our street but these flares are not accompanied by any noise or back puffing.

 

Brian, I could watch that for hours.

 

Honestly these combo shows don't last that long, five or ten minutes usually when I cut back from a higher air setting to a much lower one. On the other hand, any time within several hours of a reload, I can create them just about any time I want by increasing the air for a while then dialing it down.

Not that anyone would sit around doing that just for a secondaries show.

No. Certainly not ...

 

How does Woodstock ship these stoves pre-configured with propane in them?

 

Amazing secondaries.

 

I'm sure you see similar on occasion with the Progress as the hybrid systems are similar?

I have to admit though, as much as I prefer the looks of the Progress, I really like the ease of loading with this huge front door.

 

We do get fabulous secondaries with the PH. Mine tend to be a bit different than those on this burn of yours. Do yours always sort of swoosh down to the right front as they did in that video, or are they more variable in the way they flit around the firebox? If that show is typical, I'm wondering if the direction of movement is related to the air source.

They are certainly beautiful.

 

Actually the first several fires we loaded EW exclusively, then decided to try NS. I have been primarily burning NS but also using up long splits with an occasional EW load. Today I used up several splits that were too long to load in the Fireview and even in this stove EW. I just put them in diagonally for a light load. They were over 22".

 

They vary. This one was unusual. It was a light load of long cherry splits placed diagonally from the left rear to front right of the stove. I suspect the load and placement of the wood and the way it's off gassing influences the rolling cat secondaries.

 

Brian, What are the measurements on the door of the Ideal Steel? I'm sitting here wondering how it would handle a crazy, unsplittable (without hydraulics) 16 inch log that had been sitting out in the wind for a few years. I have a few of those, sugar maple, stacked for some time in the future...split in half, but then I gave up with all the twists and crotches an knots...

 

The opening for loading is 12.5" tall and 17" wide. You can get some pretty big splits in there.

 

I don't know if you saw these, they were posted before you joined on a prior thread on November 24. They are different patterns:

 

Have you tried any monster splits yet? If so, how'd thy do??

 

Not really. Everything I have that is seasoned was cut and split for the Fireview.

I did put a 6"x6"x14" piece of the oak block in the other morning that was real heavy, but that's not exactly a "monster."

 

Hadn't seen them, Brian. Thanks for posting again.

The cat is fabulous for heating a home, but the secondaries are the cat's meow.

Love seeing them, never tire of them. I always feel like I've been given a gift when I'm doing something in the stove room and suddenly the firebox erupts with secondaries.

 

Wow! I can't believe I just read a 237 post thread. Whew! Interesting new stove

 

$2,000 seems cheap for a Woodstock...and if you buy in late summer, they usually offer big incentives. I bought a demo Woodstock for 50% off. That was sweet and they sell stove pipe and all installation materials to keep it simple for you.

The Progress Hybrid was pretty affordable when they first brought it out.

 

Woodstock was gracious enough to hold the sale price for me on the PH when I traded my Fireview back in...and I had also bought my Fireview when it was on sale.. I made out very well...