Chinook 30 not heating the house

[Bambi W]

Hello trying to figure out what I am doing wrong or if there is a problem with my new stove.
We have had our Chinook 30 installed professionally. 22ft of pipe. We have a new construction house. Cold air intake installed and using energy logs. I can't get the house warmer than 59 degrees. In fact if your not standing directly in front of it your cold. The fan kit is blowing hot air but the room never gets warm.
Any advice is welcome. Thanks

 

[stoveliker]

Can you show a picture of (the fuel in) your stove burning, and one of the right hand side of your stove while burning?

 

[Ashful]

I have the same problem, but in my case it's not the wood, but the heat demands of the house just being greater than a woodstove can realistically deliver.

Do you know your peak heat demand, in this weather? How's it compare to the rated output of the stove, over the full course of a burn cycle?

Another way to come at this is to assume the heat output of your stove, averaged throughout the day, is 85% of what you put into it. If you know your wood is dry and < 20% MC, it's easy enough to weigh a day's wood, and get an accurate estimate of BTU input. If you know how much electricity or oil you were burning per HDD, you can calculate demand versus supply, and determine if you need more firepower.

 

[Highbeam]

Can you show a picture of (the fuel in) your stove burning, and one of the right hand side of your stove while burning?

This step to verify that your bypass is closed and that your thermostat setting is to max.

Those energy logs, the NIELS I assume, pack plenty of dense, dry, punch.

Then some details about your home. How big is it? Is the stove in an uninsulated basement? It's not that cold this year in the PNW, though the next week we'll be having a cold snap.

 

[Bambi W]

Can you show a picture of (the fuel in) your stove burning, and one of the right hand side of your stove while burning?

 

[Bambi W]

This step to verify that your bypass is closed and that your thermostat setting is to max.

Those energy logs, the NIELS I assume, pack plenty of dense, dry, punch.

Then some details about your home. How big is it? Is the stove in an uninsulated basement? It's not that cold this year in the PNW, though the next week we'll be having a cold snap.

The new home is 3339 sq ft. It's in a living room. Blown in insulation. The living room temp is at 59 degrees. The stove never reaches a temps to get pasted the 1 o'clock position on the dial. That is at full temp. Not dialed down at all. I don't think my cat is working.

 

[bholler]

The new home is 3339 sq ft. It's in a living room. Blown in insulation. The living room temp is at 59 degrees. The stove never reaches a temps to get pasted the 1 o'clock position on the dial. That is at full temp. Not dialed down at all. I don't think my cat is working.

Put more wood in the stove and move the stove away from the wall some so the thermostat works properly. Also how tall are the ceilings in your living room

 

[stoveliker]

That dial doesn't tell you the stove temp. It only tells you whether the cat is active and should not be used for anything else.
That said new cats are generally overactive rather than anemic.

I agree with bholler; You need more fuel in the stove for more heat output, and it's possibly too close to the stone.

These stoves are meant to be filled with wood and run for many hours per cycle.

 

[bholler]

I would try more wood first the distance to the wall may not be causing a problem i am concerned about clearance to combustibles though what is behind that stone?

 

[stoveliker]

Is the pipe straight up?
Is the OAK not obstructed (e.g. drier damper mistakenly put on the outdoor wall?)

 

[Ashful]

I had a conversation with @BKVP about this wall distance issue, when I was installing my two Ashford 30's back around 2014/15. If I recall, he said to try to keep the stove at least 6" off a stone wall, although after hearing I might need to get closer to 4" in one of my installations (in order to close the fireplace doors in summer ), he said to give it a try and see how badly it affects the thermostat. Since I have two identical stoves running on the same wood in the same house, I made a good test case.

In my case, the 4" - 4.5" gap to a stone wall seems to work fine, it doesn't have any major cooling effect on the thermostat at that distance, but I would caution going any closer than that without some experience or experimental control (second stove?) to which to compare performance. It does appear your gap is even less than 4".

That said, this would affect the ability of the stove to self-level and provide even constant burn rate throughout the cycle, and shouldn't be a factor in max output. I'm with bholler and stoveliker... stuff that biotch to the gills, get cat probe themometer near active, close the bypass, and let's see what she can do. If your chimney is 15 feet tall or less, there's no harm in letting it run wide open throttle through entire loads. If you have more chimney, knock the thermostat back by 1-2 hours on the clock face from full throttle after the first 15 minutes, or install a key damper to manage the stronger draft that will develop in a tall chimney at full-bore.

 

[stoveliker]

Yes, but your walls are massive stone, so cold.
His is veneer on a stud wall, I think, given the new home. So they might get much warmer, leading to a thermostat that closes earlier.

Regarding "stuff it full", with sawdust logs that's not advised, according to BKVP.

(Though I did a test to see the "run away potential" by burning a bucket and a half of 1/2" sticks that had been in my stacks for more than 4 years - don't ask - and there is zero run away potential: got it ripping, closed the thermostat, boom, no flame (possibly overwhelmed cat, but no run away.)

 

[Bambi W]

Question. The stove meets clearances. The fan kit is what is close. I had this professionally installed. I will talk to the installer and see what we can do.
We also added more wood and that didn't help either. I appreciate all your comments each of you. Thank you. Let me see about getting another piece of pipe.

 

[Bambi W]

We also have a cord of red fir that is seasoned that we are burning with the energy logs. I will go and buy some pipe on Monday and give it a go. I really hope that is the ticket.

 

[BKVP]

Make certain bypass is closed AND locked.

BKVP

 

[reaperman1]

It sounds like your fan is running even tho the cat thermometer is in the inactive range. Does the fan draw the cat temp down when the cat thermometer is showing "active"? One thing I would do is put a magnetic thermometer on the stove top. Whatever temp the thermometer would show really wouldnt mean a whole lot. Other than let you see temp patterns as the stove is running. Over time you would associate stove top temps with heat output. Also, does your cat ever glow orange? It would be strange if it doesnt.

 

[BKVP]

Turn off fans to get accurate cat temp, per the manual.

BKVP

 

[Ashful]

To be 100% crystal clear, fans do not have any major effect on cat temperature. But they do impact the reading of the probe, as they blow cool air across the probe shaft.

 

[BKVP]

It sounds like your fan is running even tho the cat thermometer is in the inactive range. Does the fan draw the cat temp down when the cat thermometer is showing "active"? One thing I would do is put a magnetic thermometer on the stove top. Whatever temp the thermometer would show really wouldnt mean a whole lot. Other than let you see temp patterns as the stove is running. Over time you would associate stove top temps with heat output. Also, does your cat ever glow orange? It would be strange if it doesnt.

The CK30.2 has a decorative top above the firebox. That surface isn't indicative or a good way to gauge temps.

BKVP

 

[Ashful]

BTW, unless you really had your heart set on 100% heating via stove, having a stove that's a bit under the ability to heat the place on the coldest of days isn't a bad thing, as it likely means you're well-sized for maximum efficiency during the longer part of your heating season.

No matter how hard I run my stoves, I need to run the oil-fired boiler to add heat to the house, the number of zones of which trigger off according to how cold it is outside. Back when I was away from home all day, this meant I could just load the stoves twice per day, and let them supply heat to carry the majority of our total load, while the boiler and automatic thermostats modulated the final comfort atop the constant base heat supply that is the stoves. My savings still followed my wood usage, even if I was burning some oil to throttle the final few degrees between the stoves and our desired room temperature.

The secondary advantage to all of this is that you keep your central heating exercised and functional, such that going away for a few days mid-winter or an unexpected illness or injury does not create a heating catastrophe for your family to deal with.