Ideal Steel Season #2 Tips, Tricks, and Improvements.

I do not think anything with as many variables as a wood stove can be 'designed' to require a specific draft or anything of the like. A minimum draft perhaps but not a specific one. People burn all different types of wood, with all different moisture contents, split to all different sizes so that along kind of shoots down anything like an exacting scientific design.

The draft plates do have unusual shaped but please bear in mind that opening the draft at any point, by any amount, increases the draft opening for both primary and secondary drafts. Even at the smallest sections of the draft plates, moving them the slightest amount open will allow more air in, although as you say it is quite non- linear and the increase in air will be different at different points in the draft range- but always opening allows more air and closing it reduces air. The key to the I.S. draft plate shapes is the ratio of primary air to secondary air, which the design really can control very well no matter what fuel, what chimney or what other conditions apply.

Another thing to bear in mind in all of this is that all modern stoves are partially designed to be useful in the 'real world' to the final customers, but they are also very substantially designed to meet EPA testing. I am not very knowledgeable on the EPA testing procedures for woodstoves but from what I have seen, the tests do not reflect how a stove will be used in the slightest. So all stove makers have to make their stoves burn clean during the EPA tests, using wood and settings that just do not apply to us; the major difference is that I do not believe the testing uses anything even close to what we use as firewood but rather a specific configuration of kiln dried wood, in plank form (like building lumber), in a specific arrangement and burned rather quickly. Now in real life, virtually none of us do that- we burn air- dried hardwood (in this area- lots of folks burn soft wood also) of all various types, sizes and water content.

As to the time, most of us do not have the proper time to really run a woodstove properly from loading to the final setting once everything is stable. As you mention, it often takes an hour and in real life, we just do not have that kind of time. So we load the stove, take our best guess as to a setting that will eventually burn cleanly but at the same time not have the stove go 'nuclear' in two hours, and leave it because we have to do that. Sometimes the stove stalls and makes a smoldering mess for hours, other times the stove engages the fuel and runs well but in a controlled fashion and sometimes, the entire load burns hotter and faster than we would like. In my opinion, this is the single biggest problem with burning firewood in the modern world where we have to get to work, go out for various things and so forth.

Brian

 

Definitely agreed. I can run my stove best on weekends and Holidays for sure.

 

BDF, once again your responses and explanations are fantastic!

 

I am no expert on woodstoves. However, how quickly you can shut the stove down to a clean burn has much to do with variables that we all have control over.

Proper draft (not minimum), 2- 3 year seasoned firewood, splitting firewood to a correct size to allow air movement in the stove, OAK if required, top down fires on startup or strong coal bed, proper maintenance and cleanliness, utilizing gauges, and following instructions as per the owners manual.

From loading on coals to a low clean burn should only take 10-15 minutes. I'm burning 3 year seasoned hardwood. It turns the stove into an inferno within the first 5 minutes after loading.

I do realize that this all takes time and work. I enjoy the entire process though. Chain sawing trees, splitting wood, stacking, and operating the stove are some of my favorite hobbies.

 

And therein is the secret of obtaining optimal performance from a stove regardless of its make and model.

 

'Specific' was probably a bad choice of words... you could say all stoves are designed to operate within a specific range... we all know most modern EPA stoves are specifically designed to operate best with dry wood and a good draft. Some will not perform as intended with too high of a moisture content or too weak of a draft, and perhaps too intense a draft and too volatile fuel (like compressed sawdust logs in some cases) but the later is much easier to remedy.

Sure there will be a range, but my hunch is this might be similar to say the gain of an antenna or q-factor of a resonant circuit (or for the gear heads, the tuning of an high performance engine). You can have a really high and narrow peak output, that falls of quick once your outside the operating band, or you can have it cover a much wider operating band, but the peak value is much less. Was just a hunch but since this stove seems very efficient, even one of the most efficient stoves today, I wonder if it is designed for tighter specs. That complex air intake is an indicator to me that they put a lot more effort into the design, a very specific design as opposed to almost all other stoves out there with a simple square opening or similar. It surely isn't there for looks. By changing the ratio of primary and secondary air it seems it is trying to strike the perfect balance for a particular mode of operation - be it low cat burn, high cat burn, transition, secondary air burn, etc.

Yes of course, as you open the draft the total surface area of the opening in the plates only increase, regardless of the shape it doesn't close of what was already opened.

Yes, it is a very interesting design. But I am not sure about the no matter fuel and chimney conditions... you say it performed quite differently with different chimneys already so that is an indicator that it does matter. Well I guess you did not disclose enough info, if it merely skewed where the draft setting was at but performed similary then perhaps it isn't as specific to draft.

The engineer in me just wants to reverse-engineer this stove it is very fascinating to me. I just like knowing how things work anyhow. I'm going to check a few things and run some numbers on the computer... I'll see if I can get some better data for this. I was called in to work today though at 4am, and will likely get that early call again Sunday, so this might not happen until Christmas break or so.

 

ok,new question.. it got cold here last nite 20s and I loaded some apple and ash turned air down to a touch less than quarter. or from stove notch 4... had great lazy northern light show for Last hour before went to bed .. This morning I got 4 to 5 inches of coals very little ash where before after 20 hour burn on popular I had 4 cups of hot coals and 8 cups of white ash.

so I loaded four small splits and full air trying to burn coals down... what strategies do we have less coals mix in soft woods and higher air?

 

Was the load of coals enough to continue heating the house? If so, leave the door closed and add a little air. Otherwise you need to keep a little more air in the box as it burns overnight. Leaving the control on the first large notch seems to be a good balance of long burn and keeping the internal firebox temp up. There seems to be a step up somewhere around that notch that keeps the firebox much more active.

Don't be afraid to use the coals for heat if you can and enjoy the wood savings. I also sprinkle wood pellets over the coals if I need to burn them down.

 

Well stove room was 68 so I say it was still heating.. outside temp 5 am was 22 other oil furnace not on yet. I just added some small split and 3/4 air to burn down some .. I like hot coals... why I wanted ash pan. first fire I used real hard wood I will try that tonight a little more air thanks JA600L

 

There has been a lot of discussion about this as it is a very common problem; during the hard burning season, the stove ends up 1/2 full of coals and they will not produce enough heat to heat the house. They burn too slowly and prevent the stove from being loaded with a full load of wood. There are several ways to deal with this such as smaller splits nestled in the coal bed and lots of draft, stirring the coals up and bringing them to the front of the stove where the draft is, etc. I find just a tough of air introduced under the grate (that is right, I said it ) works to burn the coals as the firewood is consumed so there is no gigantic bed of coals left at the end of a productive and adequate burn. The easy way to do this is to poke (Easy Boys!) a hole or make an air draft in the ash pan door. I find a very small opening, perhaps between 3/16" and 1/4" in diameter, really helps the situation. I cut a much larger hole in my ash pan door and put a spring loaded draft cover over it so that I could adjust it but in the end, just leave it set at that very small opening.

A lot of folks think this is some kind of horrible, dangerous thing but again, the key to it is the very small amount of air being allowed under the fire. It is not anything at all like opening the ash pan door even a 'crack' because the door is so wide, as soon as the gasket leaves the stove body, it really does provide a very large opening for air.

My suggestion for anyone wishing to try this would be to simply drill a small hole, again 3/16" to start, through the ash pan door. If it is not desirable at a later time, it is super- easy to close using a button head bolt and nut. If the bolt still bothers the owner, a new door can be purchased for a very reasonable price and easily installed onto the stove with one spring clip.

This is what I did to modify mine:


Brian

 

BDF, yes I re-read first 10 pages and saw where you had done that, I guess I am just a little to chicken to go that far yet.. I will start by mixing the quality of wood adding more air and see what happens. The good news I still have a lot of popular to mix in and maybe pull some dry pine into mix. but as Temps are predicted to go up and stove is still under warranty I want to try other avenues first. I do not know about anyone else but I expect little projects too get real big real fast... I would say stove was probably less than third coals and 4 hours later at 20 percent or so. stove room is 80 so all good now.. read wife and daughter are in the shirts

 

I believe there is a direct relationship between internal firebox temperature and leftover coals.

Per load of wood, you have a certain amount of btus to play with. This stove full of hardwoods is more then capable of providing some degree of heat for 24 hours.

When you are doing an overnight burn what are you trying to accomplish? 8 hours of good useful heat? Would you rather reload in the morning to get more heat in the house then burn coals down?

The answer is as simple as cutting that 24 hours in 1/3 . The only real way to do that is turn the air up until you get the desired result.

 

Question about the Condar 3-12-1 Cat Prob. When you install it, did anyone use the small metal sleeve it came with or did you just slide the prob into the hole in the front of the stove?

The metal sleeve won't fit into the hole so I put the prob straight into the hole without it. There's a little play with just the prob in the hole, is this correct as I don't feel like drilling the hole out just to fit the sleeve...

Thanks

 

I think read somewhere that someone used a round magnet like the one on the probe thermometer for double walled pipe.

Apparently the probe port is mandated by the epa. Be nice if there was a standard for the port. Maybe something threaded?

 

Mine has been like that since new. I let it hang upside down so I can see the active side of the scale. Every once in a while I have to tap it back in. You could always try a little furnace cement to tighten it up.

 

Ok so would the below picture constitute an overfire in this stove? 800 or so above the door. It held there for about 4 hours. I seem to be the only guy on the planet that can't control this stove. I can control the firebox fine, but the cat goes wild. I have been trying to keep some flame in the box to limit the fuel the cat gets, but tonight it did not matter, it raced to 800 as soon as I shut it down, and stayed there. I am concerned about damaging the stove. The stove top was around 600-650. I can't get a nice 400-500 degree fire in this thing, they all run right up super hot. I think I may call Woodstock tomorrow to see what they have to say, and see if they can offer guidance. I like the stove, but I feel like I need some more control of it to trust it.

 

That's right where the cat is so yeah its gonna get hot. Really hot. Mine hadn't gotten that hot but maybe different conditions. Have you verified that the thermometer is calibrated? Maybe it's off a bit, I've seem that area go over 600 but not often. I'm thinking it might when I start to load it with oak and locust. Due to the crazy weather here I haven't even loaded the stove over 80%.

 

It's been a few weeks since I've been here, personal reasons. Anyways, after reading this particular post I wanted to add something I did while I was at the WS open house in Nov. I did purchase a second cat. My thoughts were that I knew I would get "show" pricing and I didn't know when I would get back to the next open house. If anything was to ever go wrong with my newly issued cat I could turn to the backup to get out of a pinch. Also, when the time on the original ends I'll have the 2nd cat ready to go. It was worth it for the 'show' price.

 

x2

The magnetic thermometer is quite different from my ir thermometer I shoot the stove with. With the ir thermometer, I think my highest temp above the door has been about 610, while the ir thermometer shows well over 700. What are you measuring the stove top temp with? I have yet to reach 650 on the hottest area on my stove top. (Just to the right of the flue)

What is your flue set up like? Is it really tall? Maybe you have too much draft?

 

I know your post is from Dec 17th Jeff, It's Dec 26th now and this is the first time I've burned in nearly 2 weeks myself. I'm seriously ahead on my unused wood pile as I type this. It's 36 outside right now and close to 75 inside with a half load and the draft set at 1/4.