Quote:
Originally Posted by SailinAway
After reading a lot of reviews about my woodstove, I've concluded that a lot of other users find this stove quite difficult to manage, as Thinkxingu alluded. Some sample reviews that are similar to my experience:
"This item eats wood like a cast iron box stove. The damper does little to control the burn. I have to burn with the door ajar to keep it going. I lasts for only a couple of hours and requires constant supervision like a toddler."
"You have to feed it wood at least every 2 hours or it dies out. There is no lip so when you open the door to put more wood in the ashes and burning wood have fallen out."
"Firebox is small, have to continuously feed it wood, cant get a good burn longer than an hour with seasoned wood and heat output poor, has difficulty heating 850 sf."
"It is hard to start a fire and keep a fire going. It doesn't get very hot once a fire is going!"
"Needs refueling every 2 hours."
I have found some things that can help this underpowered stove. The first is a large amount of kindling to get a hot fire going quickly. The kindling needs to be pine. I've been resawing 18" logs in half for north-south loading. Then the longer logs can be stacked east-west with adequate air. Also, there's a tipping point where opening the door a crack will let heat escape, so it's better to close it at that point and contain the heat. I suspect that if I had 50% pine logs, that would also help.
Granted, results will also depend on the user's knowledge and skill (that applies to me as well), but I've concluded that the "normal" functioning of a woodstove described in this thread really doesn't apply to this particular stove. I will try to obtain some pine and see if that helps. I'll keep reading woodstove forums for tips and see if I can improve my technique.
Don't get me wrong---my house is warm at the moment. But I'm restarting the fire from scratch at least 3 times a day whenever I go out for errands, a hike, or to split wood. When I'm at home working I get up to tend the fire every 20 minutes. As I was writing that last sentence a log fell against the glass door---very delicate maneuver to open the door a crack and coax the log back up without it falling out of the stove.
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Either your wood isn't seasoned enough (probably this) or there's something wrong with your stove (less likely).
On a chilly day (helps with draft), I can load my 13 with splits and get it going with the door cracked in less than 10 minutes. After around 30 minutes, I can shut the air half way and get 3-4 hours of good heat. No way your door should be open for more than 10-15 minutes and you absolutely shouldn't be starting from scratch 3-4 times a day.
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