I can remember getting only slight ash fusing when burning with mostly Fir in the past. This year I have been burning a lot of Madrone, Locust, Cherry and Big leaf Maple (in roughly that order) using Fir only to start the fires. The amount of clinkers as well as the total ash volume has gone up tremendously! Can't say for sure that the stove temps have been higher but the burn time per volume has certainly increased. Or maybe the minerals are different in the hardwoods. Probably only the Shadow knows!
I’ve never had em as bad as that picture. But I get them regularly. I burn mostly elm and it seems like some trees are worse than others. I always guessed the difference was in the soil/mineral content where each tree grew
I have no idea as to the why. All I know is when I put elm in my firebox, I get those results. It creates a base of packed ash that blocks airflow from the vents below my grates. I used the poker to clear some ash before I noticed it was that bad. I'm not sure I'll be able to get a pic of the one large slab that is typical. These "clinkers" will not break up by shaking my grates. I have to poke them down to size in ordere to pass them through. It's a total pain. Did I ever mention I hate elm?
That's what I get with maple. Often one large thick pancake buried in the ashes taking up the front half of the stove bottom. They break up kinda easy, I've never been able to lift a whole one out. I'll get them with red oak, too, just not much red oak this year.
yooperdave, If you find the thread let me know. I admit If I search I don’t go much past 3-4 pages of comment listings since the forum seems to literally have doubled in content or more. It would need to have a way to now compile the file so it rounds up all the comments in a certain thread since words like elm are repeated so often it displays ALL. Sure makes the search seems counterintuitive. Since I do this almost always on my phone, it’s a fat finger thing. I’m glad this forum doesn’t lack the content of which is often the daily news. Also I wondered what the words to use for describing these other than Clinkers... it definitely seems to be a hardwoods issue as most of my fires now result not in a pile of white ash but black and white “coal-like” things from burning oak as a majority. Makes me wonder that the “Hot-coaling” we may see as a pinkish white hot spot by the dog or air channel is responsible for making a heat/fusion of the ashes? Would Wood ash and coals be considered at a subliminal state burning that hot with air rich to make it seem like they reach a liquid at some point since most of these are oblong shaped? My sense of wonderment here is questioning as EPA stoves and burners have been changing to make sure air is reaching the firebox may have somewhat of an Achilles tendon in burning certain woods...more research is needed.
I never get clinkers with cherry. Box elder and elm I'll get them. I think you are correct about the EPA stoves contributing to clinker "ash fusion" as it primarily occurs in the front of my stove. With the lopi epa stove that was up north, we never got clinkers, but then again we only burned mostly pine. Ash fusion... Sounds like what happens to my butt on a rainy weekend day.
I get that sometimes binging Netflix... or professional football. The Lopi insert, that dog is right down the middle but in most of my years of burning, it was Doug Fir predominantly, maybe some alder or maple but that wasn’t a collective thought, other than being something to burn. But now I’d like to pay more attention to what woods make this phenomenon happen, I don’t see it in my bbq but I use the same oak in it. Some micro-geological situation happening in our stove with heat, pressure, (more logs)?
You’re right, more info than I thought! Makes sense though. When you’re loading wood and it just burns, packs and repeats. Softwoods must not have the issue as bad though,....
