The evils of Pine

Figured I wood try some of the 6 cords of pine that I got on the cheap. The claim was that it has been cut and split on my supplier's property for quite some time. He's been a pretty honest guy and when he says the wood is dry, he has been surprisingly accurate.

So, I put some in the Defiant Thursday night and it burned just fine. Got the stove up to temp quick and the cat engaged on the Defiant. But then, Friday I got nothing but a smoldering mess. Crack the door and the fire would take off. Close the doors and it would snuff the flame.

Fought with it all day and into the night. Glass was opaque and black. It was ugly. Couldn't get the temps north of 450 with the doors closed.

Threw some of the same pine in the 30 to see what would happen and the wood took off. Burned hot and nice. Added more wood later in the evening and that burned great, also.

This morning I cleaned out the Defiant, pulled the pipe, cleaned the chimney again (just cleaned it last weekend), checked the cat, cleaned out the ash pan, and curse while I clean all the gunk off the glass. Nothing was jammed or clogged.

I'm sitting there eating some pizza and just glaring at the damm stove. *FLAP-FLAP-FLAP*. I just can't figure out what the problem is. *FLAP-FLAP-FLAP*. I mean, the wood burns just fine in the 30 and there is nothing obviously wrong with the Defiant. *FLAP-FLAP-FLAP*. The pipe is clean and nothing is blocking the liner. *FLAP-FLAP-FLAP*. And where the hell is that flapping noise coming from?!

Turns out the aluminum foil that I have set up behind the stove next to the primary air, that I use to cut the air further when the outside temps drop causing the stove to run too hot, got loose and was being sucked closed as the stove would breath in and out when it was not in use. When the stove was in use it would only suck air through the primary which would cause the aluminum foil to block the air... and that was causing the smolder burn for all day Friday.

I blame the Pine...

 

Pine can do that;
cause "operator error" LOL

Glad you found the problem.
& now you have a clean stove

 

You are lucky that it did not grenade your stoves on you!

 

Pine will cause chimney fires; dontcha know?

 

Pine is from the devil! I will be more than happy to send you my address and you can load up all your pine and have it delivered to me, lol

 

Tens of thousands of $$$$$$$ on stove R&D by the manufacture all brought to its knees by a baked potatoe wrapper...............LOL. Don't pine over the problem, its all good.

 

Great story, and well told.
The Pine I burned this past month gunked up the glass a little too. All the popping shot sap onto the glass and burned.
I'm now into the Poplar and Maple, and so far the glass is staying clean (after a good scrubbing by yours truly).
Dang Pine.

 

Tree butchers here generally do not know much about firewood. Pine is commonly burned here, and lodgepole pine is sold for a premium. I got a big load of seasoned black locust from an arborist that said to me, "I hope you have a good stove to burn this stuff with?" Yah... I did. Locust has about the same amount of misconception as pine, but for being impossible to burn, whereas pine will spontaneously grenade, cause creosote fires, cause overfiring, and burn dirty.

Wide spectrum in pine though. White pine is light and low heat, lodgepole and pinion pines are dense and have good heat.

 

Glad you discovered what was going on. I was getting ready to through all my Pine out! LOFL

I burn white Pine mixed with my white Ash. It burns hot enough. Fast, but hot enough.

 

I've taken out a lot of spruce and pine around my house. It burns hot and fast.

I offered some that was seasoned for about 1.5 years to my neighbor who was low on wood and he wouldn't take it, citing the 'it will cause a chimney fire' story. That coming from someone who burns green wood in a smoke dragon basement furnace.

If it's wood and it's seasoned, I'll burn it.

 

Burned pretty much nothing but pine so far this shoulder season thanks to pallet company rejects.