Anyone use electric firestarter?

[Chris Cringle]

I have been thinking about getting one of those electric starters for use in starting the fire in my Jotul Oslo. The gentleman that sold me my stove a few years ago told me he used an electric starter or heat gun or something like that to start his fires in his stove. But aside from that, I have not come across many mentions of this. Myself and everyone I know seems to use a couple balls of newspaper and small bits of wood to get things going. If they work well was thinking about getting one for the days when my wife or kids are starting the fire. Search engine produced nothing here. Welcome comments. Many thanks.

 

[unclemoustache]

Never heard of such a thing. So I searched Youtube. Interesting. I prefer a propane torch.

 

[Del_]

I have been thinking about getting one of those electric starters for use in starting the fire in my Jotul Oslo. The gentleman that sold me my stove a few years ago told me he used an electric starter or heat gun or something like that to start his fires in his stove. But aside from that, I have not come across many mentions of this. Myself and everyone I know seems to use a couple balls of newspaper and small bits of wood to get things going. If they work well was thinking about getting one for the days when my wife or kids are starting the fire. Search engine produced nothing here. Welcome comments. Many thanks.

If you blow air into a wood stove with a heat gun trying to light things up it is going to blow a lot of smoke into the room. The air flow from the gun will exceed the air flow drawn out of the wood stove by chimney draft.

In the warm fall and late spring sometimes I have a problem having enough draft to light off the wood stove without smoking up the house. What I started playing around with this fall was using a heat gun to warm the chimney. What I do is build the wood pile in the wood stove with the larger pieces on the bottom. Then I place smaller pieces on top because I use the 'Top Down' method of fire starting. So, the stove is loaded but not lit, then I place a piece of cardboard in the door opening that has a tight fit. The cardboard has a round hole in it to accept the end of the heat gun. I run the heat gun for a couple of minutes to start a heated air flow up the chimney. Then I remove the cardboard and heat gun and light fire to the load in the wood stove. I pay special attention to the cardboard to make sure that it has not caught fire from the heat gun. This system had worked great the dozen times or so I used it this fall. Now that it is colder out I don't need the heat gun.

Some years ago I bought six Duraflame logs at a yard sale for a few dollars. I use a hammer and a wood chisel and knock off small pieces the size of a 25 cent piece( a quarter). This small piece of Duraflame log lights right off and gets the fire started really well. I'm probably using about 1/3 of a Duraflame log per heating season.

The 'Top Down' method of wood stove fire starting. If you are not using it, look into it. Been using it for over 20 years now and it works great.

 

[Ck0461]

Dryer lent and lamp oil works like a champ. Stuff an old pickle jar full of lent, and add the oil.

 

[Mad Professor]

I collect garbage bags full of white pine cones. One piece of newspaper and a 1/2 gallon of pine cones gets things going quick.

 

[CentaurG2]

I remember electric charcoal lighters. Nothing more than a heating element you plugged in to start the charcoal. They worked well but I don’t think it would work in a stove. We use “stump chunks” to light the big green egg. They look and smell like nothing more than dried washed stump grindings from a white pine stump. They do work very well and are produced locally.



Stump Chunks - Kindling & Fire Starter

 

[HadleyPA]

If you blow air into a wood stove with a heat gun trying to light things up it is going to blow a lot of smoke into the room. The air flow from the gun will exceed the air flow drawn out of the wood stove by chimney draft.

In the warm fall and late spring sometimes I have a problem having enough draft to light off the wood stove without smoking up the house. What I started playing around with this fall was using a heat gun to warm the chimney. What I do is build the wood pile in the wood stove with the larger pieces on the bottom. Then I place smaller pieces on top because I use the 'Top Down' method of fire starting. So, the stove is loaded but not lit, then I place a piece of cardboard in the door opening that has a tight fit. The cardboard has a round hole in it to accept the end of the heat gun. I run the heat gun for a couple of minutes to start a heated air flow up the chimney. Then I remove the cardboard and heat gun and light fire to the load in the wood stove. I pay special attention to the cardboard to make sure that it has not caught fire from the heat gun. This system had worked great the dozen times or so I used it this fall. Now that it is colder out I don't need the heat gun.

Some years ago I bought six Duraflame logs at a yard sale for a few dollars. I use a hammer and a wood chisel and knock off small pieces the size of a 25 cent piece( a quarter). This small piece of Duraflame log lights right off and gets the fire started really well. I'm probably using about 1/3 of a Duraflame log per heating season.

The 'Top Down' method of wood stove fire starting. If you are not using it, look into it. Been using it for over 20 years now and it works great.

Not trying to be smart but I don't understand how you can you smoke the house up and have to use a heat gun to warm the chimney and all that other stuff that sounds like a royal p.i.a. but in the next sentence you say the top down method works great???

 

[Big_Eddy]

I don’t think I want to be reaching into the fire to retrieve an electric starter.
Newspaper and splitter trash for us.
I have a self igniting propane torch available too, but never use it.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[stihlaficionado]

Couple sticks of Fat lighter

 

[Del_]

Not trying to be smart but I don't understand how you can you smoke the house up and have to use a heat gun to warm the chimney and all that other stuff that sounds like a royal p.i.a. but in the next sentence you say the top down method works great???

The top down method does work great.

There are a few time each fall when the outdoor temperature is warmer than my indoor temperature. When the stove hasn't been fired for several days my chimney gets cool and I can get reverse draft conditions when the stove is not running. When starting the wood stove for the first few minutes I can get some smoke smell in the house and it doesn't matter which method of fire starting is used.

We have 14 ft. of double wall Metalbestos chimney and the second floor of the house is about the same height as the top of the chimney. The wood stove is in a single story part of the house. Likely what I'm seeing in the house having a chimney effect causing a negative draft at the wood stove. For the few times in the fall when this is a problem the heat gun solves the issue by sending a warm air flow up the chimney to jump start the chimney draft.

This year makes 40 years of heating with wood.

 

[moresnow]

Amazon.com : SUPER CEDAR FIRESTARTERS - 36 Count : Garden & Outdoor

Buy a small pack of these to test. Break a small chunk off of (one puck) and place it in amongst your load of full size splits. Touch it off with a lighter/match and away you go. No paper. No kindling ever again. No propane torch. No starting small stuff and having to return to load larger splits for a real load. Crazy easy efficient starts. Most certainly wife friendly!
With dry wood you can easily get 4 to 6 starts off each puck. Worth a try.

 

[PA. Woodsman]

The top down method does work great.

There are a few time each fall when the outdoor temperature is warmer than my indoor temperature. When the stove hasn't been fired for several days my chimney gets cool and I can get reverse draft conditions when the stove is not running. When starting the wood stove for the first few minutes I can get some smoke smell in the house and it doesn't matter which method of fire starting is used.

I just went through this myself the last few times that I started the stove cold, got some smoke smell in the house and even turned the lights out and looked all around the stove and pipe to see if I could see any smoke leaking out but I couldn't; I then realized that it was windy out which doesn't help BUT I noticed that I was doing the top down method but not the way I did late last year. Last year I put a few medium size pieces on the bottom, some smaller kindling splits on next and then twigs and put the newspaper on top and maybe a piece or two lower, but for some reason this year I set it up the same way wood wise but I put most of the paper under the twigs, not on top, so it smoked more, duh!!! So from now on the paper goes on top and I leave the door open as far as I can so it warms the flue but doesn't backpuff in, but I noticed some of the newspaper doesn't burn for anything, kind of just chars. I know I had posted about this awhile ago and others said the same thing, the newspaper chars more than ignites and some thought it was because the paper is recycled so many times now days.

 

[holeycow]

Perhaps you should forego the electric starter and just make sure a good supply of kindling is always on hand, since that is likely the problem as starting a fire with good starter material is pretty simple, even for an 8 year old. That's about when I learned how to build a fire. This while camping; not in the house.

 

[Mustang71]

Never heard of such a thing. So I searched Youtube. Interesting. I prefer a propane torch.

Same but I guess the electric ignition of the torch is electric. I did not search YouTube lol.