# When to add more wood to the fire?



## KaptJaq (Dec 6, 2012)

My wife always asks if it is time to add more splits to the fire.  I tell her to ask the cat.  In the picture below the old man, 17 years old, is saying the fire needs wood.  If he is completely on the hearth he is letting us know the fire is out and he is getting the last of the heat from the tiles...





A healthy, happy, and warm Holiday season to all!

KaptJaq


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## Swedishchef (Dec 6, 2012)

Very nice picture!

Add when you have to start putting layers of clothing back on 

Andrew


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## Ashful (Dec 6, 2012)

Looks a bit simpler and more reliable than WES999's rig:

https://www.hearth.com/talk/posts/1255052


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## wood burning cop (Dec 6, 2012)

i was also wondering about the cycle of a stove.  i have read on here that you let it go down to coals and then reload on top of that.  is there a reason why you would let it get down to that and let the temp drop vs. adding wood more ofter to keep the stovetop up to say 500-650 degrees.  is there any benifit to letting it go down to coals.  thanks for any input you have on the topic


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## remkel (Dec 6, 2012)

wood burning cop said:


> i was also wondering about the cycle of a stove.  i have read on here that you let it go down to coals and then reload on top of that.  is there a reason why you would let it get down to that and let the temp drop vs. adding wood more ofter to keep the stovetop up to say 500-650 degrees.  is there any benifit to letting it go down to coals.  thanks for any input you have on the topic


The only concern I would have is adding a full load of fuel onto a large bed of coals....seems to me you could have too much off gassing resulting in the stove temps taking off.


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## KaptJaq (Dec 6, 2012)

wood burning cop said:


> i was also wondering about the cycle of a stove. i have read on here that you let it go down to coals and then reload on top of that. is there a reason why you would let it get down to that and let the temp drop vs. adding wood more ofter to keep the stovetop up to say 500-650 degrees. is there any benifit to letting it go down to coals. thanks for any input you have on the topic


 
If I don't let the coal bed burn down once in a while it builds up too much, less room for the new load.

On sunny days when I am the only one in the house from 9AM to about 3PM I usually let the coals burn down. It works well for me: A load of small splits about 6AM to heat the house for showers and breakfast. Everybody else off to school or work by 9AM. Instead of another reload I let the coals burn down while the sun maintains the house temps. If it is a really cold day I will add a few small/soft splits during the day to keep the place warm and help the coals burn. A full load about 3PM as the sun fades, keeps the house nice through dinner and until bedtime. The overnight load about 11PM.

KaptJaq


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## brian89gp (Dec 6, 2012)

wood burning cop said:


> i was also wondering about the cycle of a stove. i have read on here that you let it go down to coals and then reload on top of that. is there a reason why you would let it get down to that and let the temp drop vs. adding wood more ofter to keep the stovetop up to say 500-650 degrees. is there any benifit to letting it go down to coals. thanks for any input you have on the topic


 
If I am around I do the 400-700 range.  Reload at 400 and have it run up to 700.  I have a large house that can suck up any amount of heat I throw at it though.


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## schlot (Dec 6, 2012)

brian89gp said:


> If I am around I do the 400-700 range. Reload at 400 and have it run up to 700. I have a large house that can suck up any amount of heat I throw at it though.


 
Love the picture. My dogs let me know if it's warm enough. LOL.

I have a question also regarding the loading. Our stove is in our bedroom (no other option but to have it there). Our house is very small and therefore our bedroom isn't large either. I have a fan blowing into the bedroom that keeps the other rooms warm.

I have found that by taking the stove up to the 400 to 500 range for any extended time, the bedroom temps just get too hot. We have gotten use to 80 - 82 in the bedroom but beyond that it's uncomfortable.Therefore I usually run the stove at 300 range to 400 range but this makes loading up for an all night burn impossible. I'm not using shoulder wood (cottonwood, aspen) any more so using harder woods does help some. I also try to put on rounds on as the last load of the evening too. Even with that I tend to wake up around 3 to 4 to restart the fire for the morning routine.

Because of the lower temps I run (read creosote), it's part of my routine that every other day I run the stove up to 700 to 800 range.

Any ideas that I might try to help extend a "warm" heat?


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## corey21 (Dec 6, 2012)

Nice pic.



remkel said:


> The only concern I would have is adding a full load of fuel onto a large bed of coals....seems to me you could have too much off gassing resulting in the stove temps taking off.


+1


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## wood burning cop (Dec 6, 2012)

so it would be ok to do some small reloads as long as the coal are not too high and this would keep the temps up and then one in a while let the coals burn down and do a full reload?


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## KaptJaq (Dec 6, 2012)

wood burning cop said:


> so it would be ok to do some small reloads as long as the coal are not too high and this would keep the temps up and then one in a while let the coals burn down and do a full reload?


 
In my opinion, yes.  That is what I basically do during cold days. Just keep an eye on it for a little while after the reload to make sure the stove is stable.

KaptJaq


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## oldspark (Dec 6, 2012)

brian89gp said:


> If I am around I do the 400-700 range. Reload at 400 and have it run up to 700. I have a large house that can suck up any amount of heat I throw at it though.


 pretty much what I do, if I need more heat I will put wood in at any time I want, never have had the stove run away from me.


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## rdust (Dec 6, 2012)

wood burning cop said:


> i was also wondering about the cycle of a stove. i have read on here that you let it go down to coals and then reload on top of that. is there a reason why you would let it get down to that and let the temp drop vs. adding wood more ofter to keep the stovetop up to say 500-650 degrees. is there any benifit to letting it go down to coals. thanks for any input you have on the topic


 
I personally have no interest in touching a stove that much.  I have no concrete data but for me burning full loads seems to be the more efficient way to go.


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## firebroad (Dec 6, 2012)

KaptJaq said:


> My wife always asks if it is time to add more splits to the fire. I tell her to ask the cat. In the picture below the old man, 17 years old, is saying the fire needs wood. If he is completely on the hearth he is letting us know the fire is out and he is getting the last of the heat from the tiles...
> 
> View attachment 83977
> 
> ...


 Love it!  I wish my "thermostat" was that obliging.  Mine only sleeps on my favorite chair. 
1


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## wood burning cop (Dec 6, 2012)

i was only looking at the benefit of trying to keep the house a more even temp.  with the longer cycles you get a greater swing in the temp in the house.


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## oldspark (Dec 6, 2012)

wood burning cop said:


> i was only looking at the benefit of trying to keep the house a more even temp. with the longer cycles you get a greater swing in the temp in the house.


 Excatly and when we have cold temps and south winds I need the heat, run your stove as you see fit for your needs.


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## corey21 (Dec 6, 2012)

Some times the last month or so i have been only putting one split in but that don't happen to much when my house gets to warm i just don't reload then when ti drops down some i just rekindle the fire.


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## Backwoods Savage (Dec 6, 2012)

We are getting close to that time of the year when soon there will be posts wanting to know what folks do with all the coals. They will have the problem of so many coals that there is not enough room left in the stove to stock up for a good overnight burn. A very common problem and it is worse for those who do not have good dry wood.

What we found out (yes, we had that problem when we bought this stove) is that when the weather does turn cold (it will) and we need more heat, just before the burn reaches the all coal state, we turn the draft wide open. This will hold the stove temperature up while burning down the coals. Some ask if this isn't sending extra heat up the chimney. It will some but we really do not notice the flue temperature rise much if at all but it burns down the coals. It really has to hurt those poor souls who actually go to the extreme and shovel hot coals out of the stove and take them outdoors. What a waste...


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## David Tackett (Dec 6, 2012)

This may be unconventional, but what I do is watch the thermostat when the coal cycle is going on.  When the thermostat drops a degree or two the stove is longer heating or maintaining heat, time to fill 'er up again.


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## Ashful (Dec 7, 2012)

David Tackett said:


> This may be unconventional, but what I do is watch the thermostat when the coal cycle is going on. When the thermostat drops a degree or two the stove is longer heating or maintaining heat, time to fill 'er up again.


 
That's what I do too... I try to watch the thermostat on the wall in the rear foyer, and the stove-top thermo. It's always a game to wait until the wall thermostat shows the room temp dropping, while still having enough temp left on the stove-top thermometer to get an easy re-light.


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## Wood Duck (Dec 7, 2012)

I burn mostly with full loads. I don't reload until the coals are partially burnt away. If I reload too soon I have coals building up a little more each load. In general I can let the coals burn away during the day, then at night load a little sooner and end up with lots of coals in the morning.

My stove does not produce even heat, but the thermal inertia of the house helps even out the temperature. We also use electric baseboard heat in some of the rooms which evens things out.


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## Hickorynut (Dec 7, 2012)

I smell smoke or at least gases if I open the door to add wood before it is down to at least big coals or where you can break it up in coals. So generally add wood and in about 3 hours add more wood.  Yes, no totally happy with the stove for sure.


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## oldspark (Dec 7, 2012)

Hickorynut said:


> I smell smoke or at least gases if I open the door to add wood before it is down to at least big coals or where you can break it up in coals. So generally add wood and in about 3 hours add more wood. Yes, no totally happy with the stove for sure.


Do you open up the air and wait a few minutes before you open the door, why are you not happy with the stove?


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## remkel (Dec 7, 2012)

Hickorynut said:


> I smell smoke or at least gases if I open the door to add wood before it is down to at least big coals or where you can break it up in coals. So generally add wood and in about 3 hours add more wood.  Yes, no totally happy with the stove for sure.





oldspark said:


> Do you open up the air and wait a few minutes before you open the door, why are you not happy with the stove?


+1. I would also add that you may be opening the door too quickly.


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## Treacherous (Dec 7, 2012)

Hickorynut said:


> I smell smoke or at least gases if I open the door to add wood before it is down to at least big coals or where you can break it up in coals. So generally add wood and in about 3 hours add more wood. Yes, no totally happy with the stove for sure.


 

I notice your Lopi Freedom has a bypass like my Endeavor. Could you possibly have a draft issue?

What is your flue configuration? Is your house really tightly sealed and maybe could use an OAK?

I've never had smoke spill out of my Endeavor.  I always make sure to open the bypass before opening door.


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## DexterDay (Dec 7, 2012)

Loading on a large coal bed will have the wood outgas much quicker, causing you to reload again, causing a coaling problem, causing...... 

I find it more efficient to burn in cycles and my stove will Overfire if I load on a 500° bed. Even with Primary shut all the way, those secondaries are gonna go nuclear


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## WellSeasoned (Dec 7, 2012)

We try and do exactly what bws does. +1 not much temperature rise in the flue. There are times however when we add a few splits when its super cold and or windy out. With only a small to medium fire box, we need the space. The longer you run the stove the warmer your house will be since everything in and around your house absorbs and stores heat.


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## etiger2007 (Dec 7, 2012)

Backwoods Savage said:


> We are getting close to that time of the year when soon there will be posts wanting to know what folks do with all the coals. They will have the problem of so many coals that there is not enough room left in the stove to stock up for a good overnight burn. A very common problem and it is worse for those who do not have good dry wood.
> 
> What we found out (yes, we had that problem when we bought this stove) is that when the weather does turn cold (it will) and we need more heat, just before the burn reaches the all coal state, we turn the draft wide open. This will hold the stove temperature up while burning down the coals. Some ask if this isn't sending extra heat up the chimney. It will some but we really do not notice the flue temperature rise much if at all but it burns down the coals. It really has to hurt those poor souls who actually go to the extreme and shovel hot coals out of the stove and take them outdoors. What a waste...


 

Yup I always thought those who take coals out are robbing their stoves of energy.


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## Fod01 (Dec 7, 2012)

In my house, that fire has another 20 -30 minutes left before reloading.
Looks really toasty though!

gabe


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## Woody Stover (Dec 8, 2012)

Backwoods Savage said:


> go to the extreme and shovel hot coals out of the stove and take them outdoors. What a waste...


Yep. If you have to shovel out ashes, like we do with the Fv, it's much easier to get all ashes when the coals are mostly gone...


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## KaptJaq (Dec 8, 2012)

Woody Stover said:


> Yep. If you have to shovel out ashes, like we do with the Fv, it's much easier to get all ashes when the coals are mostly gone...


 
...or use a coal rake. Move the larger coals to one side, clean half the ash, move the coals to the other side and get the rest of the ash. My rake has 1" gaps between the tines so it only moves the larger coals from side to side.

KaptJaq


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## brian89gp (Dec 8, 2012)

I have an undersized stove for the house, in reality I need two or three stoves to provide enough heat. One method I have been doing to keep the heat output constantly high is to reload early and keep the secondary burn going almost constantly until I build up so many coals that I literally can't fit anymore wood of any decent size in there. It gets to the point that I have to be careful or coals will roll out of the stove. I then open up the air as Backwoods Savage mentioned and feed it one or two 1-2" pieces and once those pieces go to coals I'll add one or two more. This keeps the stove in the 500-600* range for almost the whole time it takes to burn the coals down.

When feeding it the twigs I don't touch the air at all. Normal secondary burn varies between 3/4 and 7/8 closed and I open it to 1/2 to 5/8 closed for the twig feeding method and leave it there until the coals are burned down. The amount of heat in the coals will start off a secondary burn with just those couple twigs in there and I rarely see smoke out the chimney. The relatively small amount of new wood keeps the secondary tubes from going nuclear, once the secondaries really start to race from the open air the twigs go to coals and the secondaries taper off. The open flames of the twigs burning helps the coals burn down faster and it keeps them burning hotter.

I have been considering doing this method for my girlfriend during the day when I am gone because it is easier to leave the air alone and just add a twig or two once there are no flames and a 12" deep coal bed can take 6+ hours to burn down with this method. She isn't interested enough for me to teach her the art of the secondary burn and doing it properly and with the small amount of new wood being added it would be much harder for her to get into an overfire condition by accident.

Using really poor wood for the twigs works pretty well too.  The twigs I have been using are sumac (I cannot think of worse wood) and it works perfectly fine for this method.


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## KaptJaq (Dec 9, 2012)

We had a warm night and let the stove go out. The old man was not happy this morning. He came in from the cool dampness and went right to his favorite place. He got up on the hearth letting us know it was time for a reload. He stared at it a good ten minutes waiting for the reload. Finally he sulked off to find someplace warm. He hates shoulder season.





KaptJaq


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## Fod01 (Dec 9, 2012)

KaptJaq said:


> We had a warm night and let the stove go out. The old man was not happy this morning. He came in from the cool dampness and went right to his favorite place. He got up on the hearth letting us know it was time for a reload. He stared at it a good ten minutes waiting for the reload. Finally he sulked off to find someplace warm. He hates shoulder season.
> 
> View attachment 84397
> 
> ...


 
Lol - we have a fake electric woodstove for such an emergency.  The pooch's favorite place is about a foot away.

Kind of bummed - made it down to the bottom row of one of the 'short and ugly' piles and found those splits to be less than ideal.  Hard starting, and take a while to build heat.  I'll probably throw those on top of my last '12 pile and use them later.

Gabe


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## aansorge (Dec 9, 2012)

Brian89GT,

Wow, that is way too much hassle!  In contrast, I simply wait until the coals are burned way down so I can really load her to the gills.  The I let her rip!  I shut down my air supply after 15 minutes or so of getting the stove up to temp and the stove is good to go for about 3 hrs.  Next I open the air all the way up (like savage said) and let it run another 3 hours. I never dig out coals, just 3 small scoops of ash each morning.  So, 6 hour burn times during the day. At night the air supply never gets opened up so I get less heat but then have 8 to 12 hrs worth of heat.

I figure one should allow the stove to go through the whole cycle fully and just take what it gives.  Supplement a little with your furnace if needed a little here and there. Don't make it too much work or you'll lose the fun!

This method heats my largish house in Minnesota during all months other than January and February.  For those months, the gas furnace needs to help.


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## jimmieguns (Dec 10, 2012)

KaptJaq said:


> If I don't let the coal bed burn down once in a while it builds up too much, less room for the new load.
> 
> On sunny days when I am the only one in the house from 9AM to about 3PM I usually let the coals burn down. It works well for me: A load of small splits about 6AM to heat the house for showers and breakfast. Everybody else off to school or work by 9AM. Instead of another reload I let the coals burn down while the sun maintains the house temps. If it is a really cold day I will add a few small/soft splits during the day to keep the place warm and help the coals burn. A full load about 3PM as the sun fades, keeps the house nice through dinner and until bedtime. The overnight load about 11PM.
> 
> KaptJaq


 Hi There-  I am new to this site, but love all the input and posts. I am on Long Island as well. New to woodburning insert home warming. May I ask for some guidance? Feel free to email me at fstmil@aol.com.   Need a few short questions answered from a pro like you sound to be    Many Thanks.  Jim


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## jimmieguns (Dec 10, 2012)

KaptJaq said:


> If I don't let the coal bed burn down once in a while it builds up too much, less room for the new load.
> 
> On sunny days when I am the only one in the house from 9AM to about 3PM I usually let the coals burn down. It works well for me: A load of small splits about 6AM to heat the house for showers and breakfast. Everybody else off to school or work by 9AM. Instead of another reload I let the coals burn down while the sun maintains the house temps. If it is a really cold day I will add a few small/soft splits during the day to keep the place warm and help the coals burn. A full load about 3PM as the sun fades, keeps the house nice through dinner and until bedtime. The overnight load about 11PM.
> 
> KaptJaq


 Hi There-  I am new to this site, but love all the input and posts. I am on Long Island as well. New to woodburning insert home warming. May I ask for some guidance? Feel free to email me at fstmil@aol.com.   Need a few short questions answered from a pro like you sound to be    Many Thanks.  Jim


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## KaptJaq (Dec 10, 2012)

jimmieguns said:


> Hi There- I am new to this site, but love all the input and posts. I am on Long Island as well. New to woodburning insert home warming. May I ask for some guidance? Feel free to email me at fstmil@aol.com. Need a few short questions answered from a pro like you sound to be  Many Thanks. Jim


 
Jimmie,

        The best way to get questions answered around here is to post them to the forums.  Start a new thread so your answers don't get mixed in with others. When you post your questions you will have the collective knowledge of all the members working on your answer and I am sure you will see several interesting points of view.

        If it is something that you feel might be out of the scope of this forum please PM it to me (Use the "Start a conversation" link under the avatar.)

KaptJaq


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## weatherguy (Dec 10, 2012)

KaptJaq said:


> We had a warm night and let the stove go out. The old man was not happy this morning. He came in from the cool dampness and went right to his favorite place. He got up on the hearth letting us know it was time for a reload. He stared at it a good ten minutes waiting for the reload. Finally he sulked off to find someplace warm. He hates shoulder season.
> 
> View attachment 84397
> 
> ...


 When I read your first post I thought the Montpelier was a catalytic stove , didnt realize you were talking about your pet cat.


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