A better explanation...

[Whitespider]

I’m hearing everything you’re saying Oxford.
But I’m not trying to “imply” anything anymore… really, I’m not.

And yes, an overdraft is a "draft problem"... I agree 100%!
That's exactly what this whole thread was supposed to be about.

(I'm startin' to really like this guy)

 

[laynes69]

While I see the glass door as a luxury, its a big part of the design and performance of the furnace. I don't have any returns nor supply ducts in our basement. In the dead of winter, our basement stays in the low to mid 60's. Now i've been in homes where they don't heat their basement, and it stays in the 60's, but their home isn't a mid 19th century home with large boulder and mortar foundation that leaks like a seive. Its nice to be able to heat the basement, and allow the rest of the heat produced from the furnace to heat the 2 floors above.

I wasn't trying to bust your chops spider, its what you said on your last post. We heated with a old wood furnace that was a simple firebox, shaker grates and baffle. The thing was extremely easy to use, put out tons of heat and was forgiving of the chimney. When we installed our new furnace, which the old one was in this house for over 20 years, it was an experience. Less heat, cooler home, poor performance all around. I realized the furnace needed a liner especially after testing with a manometer over the season. Our draft requirements were .04-.06", with our old setup the draft would go from .02" on a firebox of coals to almost .20" on a high fire. Once that load of wood burned down (Quickly, High Draft), there wasn't enough heat in the coal bed to sustain draft. Even opening the draft all the way didn't help, at that point it would take forever to burn down coals. There wasn't enough draft to keep those coals hot, which heat output was less than par. I kept telling myself, its the furnace because the old furnace did just fine and there was more than enough draft. Well the old furnace put a ton of heat up the flue, which helped the large oversize chimney to maintain draft, our Caddy on the otherhand had flue temps so low, that they were exiting the chimney at under a hundred degrees. Many mornings, we woke to dead black coals in the rear of our firebox.

When we lined the chimney, things changed. Our draft went from .01-.02" on a coal bed to .05"(or wherever we set it), as well as high fire where it was set. This allowed the furnace to burn properly, heat output increased, burn times increased, and the accumulating coal bed dissapeared. The furnace ran cleaner, and the condensation that was produced before in the chimney dissapeared. I was suprised, and all these posts I had read about lining were true.
We started burning wood that was properly seasoned, not what would burn in the old furnace. The manufacturer put all the information in their manual for a reason. That of having a specific draft requirement as well a properly sized flue.

Like I say, I wasn't trying to bust your chops. These stoves and even our furnace need specific requirements to run properly. I'm 100% sure you will be happy with your Daka. It will be less forgiving on your setup, with its simple design. That and it has everything you want or need. It sounds as though you have a decent heating load, and the Daka should take care of that with no problems.

 

[Whitespider]

Oxford,
Keep in mind that many of us, especially me, never considered that an overdraft could cause many of the symptoms I was experiencing. A fast, out of control fire, yes… but the building up of coals that will not heat or burn down, no friggin’ way. Some of us (old guys) grew up around, and spent years, burning in those steel boxes with spin drafts and flue dampers… and the people we looked at as being the “old guys” taught us that more draft was always “more-better.” Heck, just look at some of the posts in this thread by, for example, WoodHeatWarrior; I’m not so sure he’s yet 100% convinced that an overdraft could possibly be the curprit. Maybe I just don’t remember, but I don’t think one single person, in multiple threads, over several weeks, ever even mentioned an “overdraft” (but if somebody did, please speak up and say “I told ya’ so”). Heck, it goes against near everything I “thought” I knew about wood-fired appliances.

Your last couple post have been very informative, but ya’ don’t need to “sling mean” at me man… ya’ just gotta’ give me a little time to wrap my brain around it. This is sort’a like telling me I’ve been putting my shoes on backwards for 55 years. I’m getting’ it… I’m listening… you’ve got my attention man.

 

[haveawoody]

Whitespider,

This post got me interested in the problem.
When it's mild out your stove works like a champ but when it's cold like a dog.
Burning lots of wood and at record speed.

Stack temp IMO.
Got to be the pipe not heating well enough to allow correct combustion in the stove.
Sounds like it's puttng lots of energy into trying to heat the stack and little heat remaining inside.

Might be time for a dedicated chimney for the epa.
Very little waste energy from an epa and low stack temps at the best of times with them, heavy heat losses on the pipe can make for a poor working epa.

Im not familiar with your setup but i suspect robbing peter to pay paul somewhere on the system and the epa is showing it in burn quality.

7:35 AM – stove steel has turned cold – 4, maybe 5 inches of coals in the stove – reloaded.

Ya’ know what’s really sick? It’s supposed to get up over 30[sup]o[/sup] today… at some point after lunch that coal bed will magically come alive and start burning , the stove will get hot enough there won’t be any way possible to put your hand on the steel, and we’ll be opening the doors to let the heat out! But on the bright side… I won’t be shoveling it out and throwing it away like I was in January and February :msp_biggrin:

 

[brenndatomu]

HA! I see what you did on your sig line there spidey.

I guess I can't point out any one specific instance where myself or any of the others pushing for a BDR have actually said, "spidey, you have HDS (high draft syndrome)" it was more implied. I know myself, I didn't have it figured out how, exactly, high or erratic draft was causing your problems (which recently you seem to have figured out) but I did suspect it was the problem or at least contributing to the problem. I'm not too good at communicating exactly what I'm thinking sometimes. No "I told you so" from me, at least not unless you have problems with the Daka and haven't tried a BDR yet...:msp_wink:

 

[Whitespider]

Yeah, I thought the signature line thing would be fun brenndatomu... at least for a little while.

Unless I missed it, I don't remember anyone pushing a BDR before this thread (but I may have dismissed it).

 

[stihly dan]

My question would be, why is there an overdraft? I know I had one with the correct size chimney. But in many places it is stated that, if you have a POOR draft look at the chimney. One of the biggest problems encountered with the new stoves is that they call for a 6 in flue, and the old stove had an 8 in or larger because thats what they needed. So when it comes to draft a larger chimney actually reduces draft. And Spidey yours is huge!! (I feel there will be a quote here) So in theory there should be less draft?

 

[Oxford]

Fair enough, Whitespider, I'll try not to hurt your feelings, and that sig change is funny.

Not speaking to you specifically, but areas of circles often trip people up when thinking about flow through pipes, which is what a stovepipe is, after all. An 8" pipe has an area not quite twice that of a 6" pipe and four times that of a 4" pipe, which is why, for example, the flues on your other appliances aren't relieving you as much as you'd intuitively think. Your house must be fairly loose or you wouldn't be able to shut (or open, depending on swing) a door in the place.

Good luck.

 

[Oxford]

Stihly,

There's only poor draft if there isn't enought difference in density between tha gasses at the bottom to overcome the pressure at the top. If the fire's hot enough, or the chimney effect is pulling enough warm air from the house, or the diffence between outdoor air temp and the indoor temp is large enough, the chimney will draft no matter how large it is.

 

[Whitespider]

Fair enough, Whitespider, I'll try not to hurt your feelings...
Your house must be fairly loose or you wouldn't be able to shut (or open, depending on swing) a door in the place.

LOL... don't worry about my feelings, it takes a lot more to pierce this thick old skin.

Yeah, the doors open/close easily enough and I know where most of the "make-up" air is entering the house. Just behind the "appliances" and chimney in the basement is the old coal storage room. It has a flip-up cast-iron door in the foundation where the coal was once dumped in; I use it to toss the wood in now. It don't seal worth sour owl crap; when you stand in the doorway to the storage room (that puts you between the coal door and chimney/appliances) you can feel the draft moving through it. I always figured it was better to let the air come in there, close to the chimney, than to seal it and cause a bunch (more?) cold air to enter the house somewhere in the living area upstairs. Besides, sealing it would block the easy, relatively clean way of putting wood in the house.

The basement stays warm enough all on it's own, rarely drops below 65[sup]o[/sup], and then only when outside temp get nasty... if you sit down there barefoot long enough your tootsies will get a bit cold though.

 

[Whitespider]

And Spidey yours is huge!!

Thank you... thank you very much! :msp_w00t:

 

[zogger]

I still dont see why you cant put a T (sideways so you have a straight up option)a with a damper on the first pipe from the stovace, use the damper as a valve, divert it to a series of elbows connected together like an S snake, (could be on two sides for that matter) then back into another T higher up, then back out. Cold days, divert it through the elbows, the curves act as a stack reducer, or so I have read here, every 90 elbow is the same as dropping 5 foot in height, or something like that..

 

[Whitespider]

That might work zogger, might not... no way to know for sure until January soonest.
Sure seems like a lot of "extra"... something I wouldn't have been against trying two months ago.
The way it is, after all the irritation, I'm not willing to continue the experiment... but I'll support anyone who wants to take it form here (thinking - not sure how they'd duplicate conditions).

In any event , this thread is close to death, and we'll likely know little more.
I've learned a bunch, good or bad... and knowledge is never a bad thing... just too bad, as it always seems to be, the best lessons come the "hard way".