New stove question/pics

[buildmyown]

I have a raised ranch roughly 2000sq ft including the basement built in 1968 marginal insulation. The stove is in the basement that is unfinished. I keep the cellar door open and disconnected one of the floor registers that is near the stove. It takes awhile but once up to temp it stays there. We keep the house around 68 but the bedrooms are a little cooler but thats fine we like it that way.

The stove is a 1979 Garrison an old girl but it is large and cranks the heat. We are not home during the day so we dont like to leave it going. We load the stove at 4Pm when we get home from work run it wide open to the first load is gone about 3 to 4 hours. So around 8Pm we load it up again and turn the air intake to half way. The last load goes in at 11Pm and the air intake goes to about 1/2 to 1 turn open depending on the outside temp. That burns therw the night by the time we get home there are a few coals left to start a fire with some paper and kindling.

I mainly burn good dry red oak with some maple mixed in but im not picky ill burn anything that fits in the stove.

My cold air return for the oil burner runs near the stove my plan is to fab up a hood for the stove and tie into that and use the furnace blower to move the air to the upstairs a little better.

 

[sloth9669]

air intake

so what iam getting is up the air intake feed it more and just build a new fire every evening when i get home. that will definitely get the temps up and keep the chim clean a lil pita to start new each day. but i def will be adding that insulation to the inside. i dont even want to venture what it would cost to dig and place that stuff on the outside.

 

[KsWoodsMan]

:agree2:

I get longer burn time and more even heat by burning top down. It steadily burns down through the wood, instead of all going up at once. This goes against the norm but works quite well.

If you do it the same way every time should you expect different results ? or the same results everytime ?

 

[wkpoor]

I had a terrible time this year getting the new pipe to burn off and endured a couple of nights in a haze and the smoke alarms going off. My new stove is so efficient I can't get the pipe hot so it took awhile to cook the paint down. As for the heating issue I'm heating from an unfinished basement too. I find it takes about 2 full days of hard burnin to get everything up to temp (walls, floors, contents etc.) before you are effectively heating the upstairs. And I have a walkout basement so the outside block wall is quite a heat sink. I'm sure once the basement is finished it will drive me out. I plan on cutting a few gravity grates in the floor to aid in transferring the heat to the second floor.

 

[sloth9669]

2 weeks in

well iam 2 weeks in and iam not getting all the heat i wanted. insulation is a must for the basement walls. now tonight i got the fire going real good from left over coals when i came home from work. left the air flow on high for 10-15 min then tapper it on down to low and get that lil lazy flame going. olny difference is tonight iam hearing what sounds like rice crispys poppin. is that junk clearing from the single wall pipe and if so ...iam new to this wood burning thing....that cant be right whats the deal. 2 weeks in iam feelin i should just keep to sellin it and never burning it.

 

[Rookie1]

Is your furnace down the basement. If so can you somehow get wood burner ducted into it.

 

[Moss Man]

well iam 2 weeks in and iam not getting all the heat i wanted. insulation is a must for the basement walls. now tonight i got the fire going real good from left over coals when i came home from work. left the air flow on high for 10-15 min then tapper it on down to low and get that lil lazy flame going. olny difference is tonight iam hearing what sounds like rice crispys poppin. is that junk clearing from the single wall pipe and if so ...iam new to this wood burning thing....that cant be right whats the deal. 2 weeks in iam feelin i should just keep to sellin it and never burning it.

Get a friend, relative or coworker that has woodstove experience to stop by in the evening when you are putting it through the paces, maybe they could make suggestions?

 

[ALICIA21]

Definitely just the paint curing/burning off. You might get a little more the second time you fire it up if you had a short burn that wasn't all that hot. You are in good shape. Just open the windows. I had to have the windows open with my new stove all evening the first time I fired it up. Left a haze in the air throughout the whole house. Wife and I packed up the kids and left for the evening. No harm done. Things were cleared out after about 6 hours. Hope this helps and puts your mind at ease.

great article. I will bookmark this

 

[Cowboy Billy]

this is a nap 1400 and iam having a few issues

last is iam not getting much heat up stairs. its in the basement as you can see in the pic and the stair well is in the middle of the house. we set a fan at the bottom and it kicks the air up. i do get a few degrees but not what i think i should. is burning it on low not engouh air for the temp to get up. and would insulation on the basement walls do the trick. iam thinking strapping and ridged foam boards ?

ideas ? thanks for the help

andy

Hi Andy.

My Grandpa heats a good size ranch house he built with a old warm morning stove. Its a 12" block wall no insulation. Its in the side of the a hill with the back side open to the weather for all about 2' thats in the ground.

His stair well is on one side. He has two 12"x12" vents that are open to the basement and it really helps the air move up stairs. As kids we used to stand over the vents and warm up from all the warm air coming through them.

Billy

 

[Wood Scrounge]

Insulate, in my block basement it was day and night, don't forget the sill plate as well.

 

[sloth9669]

it works !!!!!!

If you could partition your basement with floor to ceiling 4 mill plastic, being sure to keep a good distance from the stove and chimney, you could greatly reduce the amount of heat lost to the basement and increase the temperature of the air that went upstairs. Even curtains from the basement ceiling that came to within a foot or so of the floor could make a big difference.

The 'top down' method of fire starting works great for starting frequent fires in the epa stoves like you and I have.

Did the 4 mil plastic works wonders 6 inch off the floor when done temps have been 4-8 degrees higher for 15 bucks thank you!!


Side question napol 1400 stove should it click and tick on warm up all the time. It's often and loud. It's ok in basement but if that was in the livin room id go nuts.