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paulz
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 11:33am
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Trying to figure out why my wood stove gets the cabin up to 85f at night, burns itself out and by morning it (and the cabin) are cold. Only adjustable choke is shown at bottom, even sliding it closed leaves very small gaps in the holes. The door gasket seems ok, can’t slide toilet tissue past it when closed. Chimney is open, no valve.
I have a very similar stove at my house (Arrows I believe) and it will smolder all night, just reload in the am.
Hmm..
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Nate R
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 11:37am
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What is the chimney like? Height? Straight?
Wondering if the cabin chimney has a lot stronger draft that pulls more air in than your home stove....
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paulz
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 11:56am
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Both chimneys are straight, one story, cabin one maybe 6’ higher.
Brings up something I’ve been wondering; can a chimney alone cause wood burnout? I could add a flapper, maybe..
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NorthRick
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 02:54pm
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Is the wood completely burned up by morning or is it going out with wood still left in the stove?
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Brettny
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 03:40pm
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To much air is getting in...that's why it gets up to 80*+
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 04:29pm
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Wood is completely burned by morning. Good point on the air, need to look closer.
Thanks guys
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gcrank1
Member
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 04:57pm
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Think about like an engine, it has too much throttle going on/wont idle; find a way to kick it back. If not on the intake side it will have to be on the exhaust. Yeah, I know, yer not 'supposed to have to use a flapper'....
Fwiw, the old 1980's 'airtight' our cabin came with was kinda like that. I finally found some old install/maintenance literature on it and the top part of the box was supposed to have a steel plate and insulating layer And firebrick to complete a circuitous path for the air flow. It was incomplete and allowed pretty much a straight exhaust path out; mostly a 'light switch' stove, either on or off.
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Brettny
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 05:57pm
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Stoves can actualy leak between the plates or castings after a while. The gaskets and furnace cement breaks down and causes air leaks. Really the best thing to do is to dis assemble everything you can and inspect. I do this once a year on our vermont castings stove. I can keep the house 70* if its 50* out or -15* out. I generaly get a 12-24hr burn time but hardly ever fill the thing if it's going to be warmer than 30*. I also never relight the stove November- April.
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travellerw
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# Posted: 4 Aug 2023 10:59pm
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I will be paying attention as ours does the same thing. Load at 10pm and its just barely glowing with no fuel at 4:00am.. I only have the same air control and no chimney damper. Would love to figure out how to make it chooch longer.
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Brettny
Member
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# Posted: 5 Aug 2023 07:02am
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You have to find the air leaks. Unfortunately some stoves just arnt made that good and will have constant issues like this.
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 5 Aug 2023 08:10am
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Good news! Yesterday I was in the shed and noticed a length of door gasket, must have been left over from last time I changed it some years ago. So even though it passed the toilet tissue slide test yesterday, I changed it out again.
Must have been leaking somewhere. Fire burned all night, only lost 2 degrees in the cabin and still wood left burning this morning. It’s not that cold outside (mid 50s) being summer but should help a bunch when fall comes.
Thanks for the help guys!
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groingo
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# Posted: 13 Sep 2023 07:38pm
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Open a window a bit and burn a hotter damped down fire, problem most likely is your chimney has cooled and is restricting flow and backwashing, been there, keep those nice warm blankets handy !
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 14 Sep 2023 08:02am
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I’ll try it, thanks!
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Aklogcabin
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# Posted: 15 Sep 2023 11:56am
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Hello paulz. We have the exact same stove at our cabin. I love it. The gasket is important. The door tension can be adjusted with the handle also, if you were not aware. It's threaded and can be turned in to tighten the seal.
I know ours needs to be shut down tight for overnight. In the morning if there is just a couple red embers, open the ash pan a bit and it will take off like a turbo. Really nice that we can open it up like fireplace n watch the fire without any smoke as it drafts well.
Also if I'm not burning birch in it, the only hardwood available, and burning white spruce I have trouble with an over night fire too n have to have a chunk to toss in when I do my papa walk each night.
BTW it's nice to see you back on this site. You bring a happy
positive presence and usually a smile
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paulz
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# Posted: 15 Sep 2023 10:27pm
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Thanks for the kind words Ak, and the stove info. Have not had a night fire lately, just a morning warmer upper. But that will change soon.
I’m in a redwood forest, so that gets burned mostly. It’s a banner day when I get some oak or other dense wood.
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scott100
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# Posted: 23 Sep 2023 04:23pm - Edited by: scott100
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If you ever need to look for leaks again a good way to find them is go around all the seams with a lit candle or something that smokes while you have a fire in it and the air flow turned down. The leaks will be pretty obvious.
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 24 Sep 2023 10:57am
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Great idea Scott, thanks! I’ve had successful fires last two nights with small leftover hot coals in the morning but I’ll sure keep it in mind.
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Aklogcabin
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# Posted: 24 Sep 2023 12:08pm
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Cedar is so nice to work with and smells great. Splits easy. Starts nice. Do you carve any ? How have your projects gone or maybe like me n kinda never ending. It's all good.
And yeah, you do bring a nice presence and I enjoy reading about your projects. Have a great day man
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 24 Sep 2023 02:41pm
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Yep cedar is great, did my ceiling in it, but none here unfortunately, only acres of redwood.
Projects never ending, fortunately now it’s mostly upkeep. A friend brought over his mill last week and cut some logs that were down. More work for me, as I had to clean up, get my log splitter running and buck up the leftovers.
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Malamute
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# Posted: 29 Sep 2023 09:32pm - Edited by: Malamute
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Controlling your air intake and your stovepipe out both can help with maintaining your fire longer and controlling it better. My area has some fairly frisky winds (up to 130-ish mph now and then, 60-80 isnt unusual), so I have two dampers in the pipe to help tame it down when needed.
My stove is an airtight, by Blaze King, it has a thermostatic controlled intake damper so it can shut down if it gets warmer than needed then open up for more air as it cools. It makes a huge difference in how long fires last and regulating the heat output in the range you want.
One thing you can do with any stove is build the fire upside down, at least by common reckoning. When I heard of it it totally changed my firebuilding and firewood supply picture. The basic premise is lay most of the wood on the bottom, tightly stacked togther, then build a starter fire on top letting it burn down into the wood. I was using 2x6 construction scraps and log siding scraps, Id get about 4 hours of burn. I also used mill slabs (the first cuts from a log to square them up) from a small mill i got rough cut lumber from, it shared the same basic shortcomings. I of course needed quite a lot more wood and larger pieces to get through the night or colder periods, the scraps and slabs were just not enough to get through the night. My wood is all pine, fir, spruce. Its all thats easily available in the area.
Boy Scouts used to call them Council Fires, they required no feeding and upkeep for long councils.
Enter the upside down fire. When I started it, it was a complete change. The same wood that burned out in 4 hrs had coals left by morning. I no longer needed lots of larger logs and split logs to make longer fires, and what wood I had went much farther. I started the starter fire, left the door propped open on the latches a little bit, once it was going well, I added a few medium splits then shut the door and turned the thermometer damper down. Done.
One other factor in keeping fire longer, dont clean all the ashes out, when I got about 3-7 inches of ash my fires also lasted longer than when just cleaned out, so I stopped cleaning all of it out, just down to about 2 or 3 inches.
The fire pics. Taken the same day, fire layed with mills slabs tightly together below, and lit at about 9:15 AM, last pics are the same fire 11 hours later. he remaining wood sprung into flames after opening the door and getting the camera.
Fire lay
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started
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Going and ready to close door
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11 hours later
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Aklogcabin
Member
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# Posted: 30 Sep 2023 11:53am
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Nice fire Malamute. Blaze kings are great stove. Have one in our garage.
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ICC
Member
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# Posted: 30 Sep 2023 09:20pm
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@Malamute..... Upside-down fire... cool idea
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 30 Oct 2023 10:37am - Edited by: paulz
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Great post Malamute! Just found this thread again, will try it for sure.
I have two woods on my property, redwoods and bay laurel. The redwood is soft, burns quickly and hot, great for warmups but if filled for the night it will overheat the cabin and burn up way before morning. The bay on the other hand is hard any heavy, twice the redwood. So if I put a big chunk of that on before bed, the cabin will stay comfortable all night.
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paulz
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# Posted: 30 Jan 2024 10:23am
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My outside firewood supply is damp. Although covered mostly, just getting no sun drying time lately. I do have a small shed full that stays dry. The damp stuff works ok once the stove is hot.
Starting the morning fire can be a pain if the overnight log burns up completely and stove is cold. Despite cardboard, paper, slivers of wood, lp torch it can take a bit.
I’ve had this bottle of lamp oil laying around, probably expensive whenever it came from, but a dose of that sure helps get it going. Thought about used motor oil, got lots of that, but not eco friendly. Diesel, naw..You guys use anything?
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Nobadays
Member
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# Posted: 30 Jan 2024 03:15pm
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I always used charcoal lighter. Works great!
With the catalytic stove now I don't use anything other than wood shavings ( my wife peeled a lot of poles for our railings so have bags full of shavings) and sometimes some newspaper.
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travellerw
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# Posted: 30 Jan 2024 03:33pm
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My lazy way of starting a fire. I don't always use it, but when I need to get it going fast and I don't want to build a proper bed I pull this baby out!
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 30 Jan 2024 03:59pm
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Quoting: Nobadays always used charcoal lighter. Works great!
As in fluid? Hmm, that’s an idea..
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Nobadays
Member
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# Posted: 30 Jan 2024 09:40pm
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This stuff...
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paulz
Member
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# Posted: 31 Jan 2024 12:14pm
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Great idea! In the city today, big west coast storm due, too many tall trees around the cabin, I'll get some. Thanks.
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Fanman
Member
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# Posted: 31 Jan 2024 12:43pm
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I use a "Cape Cod fire starter". It's a ceramic ball on a metal rod, along with a metal pot full of kerosene. You leave the ball soaking in kerosene in the pot, when it's time to light the fire you take it out, put it under the firewood in the stove, and light it. By the time the kerosene is burned off the wood is going, you take it out, let it cool, and put it back in the kerosene pot to soak for the next time. Works great.
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